Chairman Spence Warns of Perils for America’s Strategic Equities in New U.S.-Russian Negotiations, ‘Grand Bargain’

(Washington, D.C.): Tomorrow, a U.S. delegation will begin negotiations in Moscow
aimed at
achieving what outgoing Clinton National Security Council arms control czar Robert Bell has
long called the “Grand Bargain” — a deal in which the United States will be obliged to make
further, deep reductions in its strategic forces while preserving, if not adding to, the restrictions
imposed by the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty on the deployment of effective missile
defenses.

The inadvisability of such a “bargain” was lucidly described in a recent paper
distributed by
Rep. Floyd Spence (R-SC), the Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee in the August
edition of the Committee’s National Security Report. The Spence analysis constitutes a scathing
critique of President Clinton’s arms control policy, a timely warning about the negotiations now
getting underway and, it is to be hoped, the opening salvo in a sustained fight by the Loyal
Opposition against any agreements that result therefrom. (Emphasis added throughout.)

Communiqus and Treaties are Poor Shields: Implications of
the
U.S. -Russian Joint Statement on the ABM and START III Treaties

by Rep. Floyd Spence

On June 20, 1999, President Clinton and Russian President Boris Yeltsin agreed to the “Joint
Statement Between the United States and the Russian Federation Concerning Strategic Offensive
and Defensive Arms and Further Strengthening of Stability” that called for discussions later this
summer on a third Strategic Arms Reduction Talks (START III) treaty and on strengthening the
Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty. According to Administration officials, these discussions
will begin in Moscow on August 17^th. However, serious questions remain
over whether the
Administration’s commitment to continued reductions in nuclear arsenals and past treaties
– in particular, the 1972 ABM Treaty – will serve to increase or decrease American security
in a rapidly changing and increasingly dangerous international environment.

The Administration has hailed the Joint Statement as a major achievement. According to
National Security Adviser Sandy Berger, this is “the first time the Russians have agreed to
discuss changes in the ABM Treaty that may be necessitated by a national missile defense
(NMD) system were we to decide to deploy one.” The Joint Statement also moves
the United
States and Russia closer to a third round of nuclear weapons reductions under the Strategic Arms
Reduction Talks (START) despite the fact that the Russian Duma, or parliament, has yet to ratify
the START II treaty.

The fundamental question is whether these two negotiations will leave the United
States more
or less secure in a world marked by the rapid proliferation of missile technology and
weapons of mass destruction? Has the traditional arms control “theology” been
rendered
obsolete by the variety of post-Cold War threats and challenges facing the United States?
Understanding the origins of the ABM and START treaties and their evolution since the demise
of the Soviet Union sheds light on this question.

The ABM Treaty

The ABM Treaty, concluded between the United States and the USSR in 1972, prohibits the
deployment of a ballistic missile defense system to defend the territory of the United States. It
was intended to prevent deployment of missile defenses that could undermine the Cold War
theory of mutual security being best preserved if all parties leave themselves vulnerable to
nuclear attack. This Cold War strategy was referred to as Mutual Assured Destruction, with the
appropriate acronym of MAD.

After the treaty entered into force in 1972, the United States scaled back its missile defense
efforts. The treaty had an even more far-reaching effect, however, as it inhibited the development
by the United States of many of the required building blocks for a national missile defense
system by banning the development, testing, and deployment of sea-based, air-based,
space-based, or mobile land-based ABM systems and ABM system components (including
interceptor
missiles, launchers, and radars or other sensors that can substitute for radars). In stark
contrast
to U.S. inaction, Russia built and today maintains and continues to modernize a
sophisticated strategic missile defense system – the world’s only such anti-ballistic missile
defense system. Some estimates indicate Russia’s missile defense system could protect
nearly
80 percent of Russia’s population from a limited nuclear attack.

Much has changed, both strategically and technologically, since the ABM Treaty was first
conceived. Most strikingly, the Soviet Union no longer exists, and the proliferation of
missiles and weapons of mass destruction has radically altered the strategic
environment.
The threats posed by rogue regimes such as North Korea differ greatly from threats posed by the
Soviet Union, and Russia’s increasing reliance on nuclear weaponry to preserve its declining
status as a great power complicates the relatively simple calculus that underpinned the ABM
Treaty. Moreover, as U.S. investments in missile defense technology mature, the feasibility of
deploying an effective national missile defense system becomes increasingly apparent.

In reaction to these strategic and technological changes, U.S. policy and adherence
to the
ABM Treaty has become increasingly hard to understand and consequential for the future
of U.S. missile defenses. In 1993, the Clinton Administration sought to reach an
agreement with
Russia on a “demarcation line” to distinguish between strategic missile defense systems and less
capable Theater Missile Defense (TMD) systems. The demarcation agreement, concluded on
September 26, 1997, imposed limits on the capabilities of U.S. theater missile defenses –
capabilities that the ABM Treaty never intended to restrict.

The Administration also began negotiations in 1993 on an agreement to determine which
states
of the former USSR would be successors to the Soviet Union with regard to the ABM Treaty.
The resulting and highly controversial September 1997 agreement named Russia, Ukraine,
Belarus, and Kazakhstan as treaty successors to the Soviet Union. Remarkably, this
agreement
is so controversial that, two years later, the President still has not submitted it to the U.S.
Senate for advice and consent. Regardless, the most significant effect of adding parties
to the
ABM Treaty is that it will be significantly more difficult for the United States to negotiate
changes to the treaty to permit deployment of effective national missile defenses.

Even as the Administration continues its efforts to preserve the viability of the ABM Treaty,
two
recent studies have challenged the legal status and validity of the treaty. One of these studies,
The
Collapse of the Soviet Union and the End of the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty: A
Memorandum of Law, by specialists in constitutional and public law at the firm Hunton
and
Williams, concludes: “The ABM Treaty no longer binds the United States as a matter of
international or domestic law. This is because the Soviet Union has disappeared, and there is no
state, or group of states, capable of implementing the Soviet Union’s obligations under the ABM
Treaty in accordance with that agreement’s terms.” Despite such assessments, the Administration
continues to view the treaty as the “cornerstone of strategic stability.”

Though Administration officials have portrayed impending negotiations with Russia
as an
opportunity to renegotiate the ABM Treaty to allow U.S. development of national missile
defenses, the Joint Statement seems to indicate that the negotiation’s primary purpose may
be
to preserve the ABM Treaty.

The START Negotiations

The first Strategic Arms Reduction Talks (START I) treaty was signed in Moscow on July
31,
1991. The treaty, approved by the U.S. Senate in October 1992 and by the Russian Duma one
month later, required Russia and the United States to reduce their strategic nuclear forces to
6,000 deployed warheads on each side, a limit both parties have nearly achieved today.

The START process produced a second treaty (START II) between the United States and
Russia
on January 3, 1993, that limits each side to 3,000-3,500 deployed warheads and bans all
multiple-warhead intercontinental ballistic missiles (MIRVed ICBMs). The ban on MIRVed
ICBMs is considered one of the most important provisions of START II. MIRVed ICBMs – in
which Russia maintains a substantial advantage – are considered to be the most destabilizing
weapons. The ability to deploy as many as 10 warheads on a single missile makes them lucrative
targets and in the minds of some, a “use it or lose it” weapon.

Although the White House and the Kremlin quickly reached agreement on START II, the
Russian Duma has still not approved the treaty. The majority of the Duma is made up of
Communists and hard-liners who generally consider START II disadvantageous to Russia and
who view nuclear weapons as Russia’s only remaining claim to great power status. Indeed, most
Duma members advocate “skipping” START II and negotiating START III to correct the
“errors” of START II that hard-liners perceive as “unfair” to Russia. Nonetheless,
Presidents
Clinton and Yeltsin agreed at the Helsinki Summit in March 1997 that the United States
and Russia would only begin negotiations on START III after START II enters into
force.

Despite the 1997 agreement not to negotiate START III until START II is approved by the
Russian Duma, Russia and the United States almost immediately began unofficial
negotiations over “what a START III package might look like.” Thus far, this “picture”
of
START III would limit deployed warheads to between 2,000 and 2,500 by December 31, 2007,
and include measures to increase transparency of strategic nuclear warhead inventories and in the
destruction of strategic nuclear warheads. Unfortunately, as the United States further
reduces
its nuclear arsenal in conformity with bilateral START agreements, the impact of other
nations’ growing nuclear arsenals not bounded by START – such as China – take on
greater significance.

Of particular concern, the 1997 Helsinki Summit foreshadowed what may happen to
the
START II treaty during upcoming START III discussions. At Helsinki, the United
States
agreed to extend the elimination period for nuclear weapons from 2003 until the end of 2007.
Although all missiles and warheads originally scheduled to be eliminated in 2003 are to be
“deactivated” while awaiting elimination in 2007, the term “deactivated” is undefined in any
agreement and is yet to be negotiated. Critics charge that extending the elimination
period
allows Russia to retain its destabilizing MIRVed ICBMs for an additional four years,
effectively canceling one of the most important and stabilizing achievements of START
II.
This interpretation appears to be shared by senior Russian military officers who, after Helsinki,
flight-tested the SS-18 and other MIRVed ICBMs for the stated purpose of extending their useful
service life until 2007.

The Implications of the Joint Statement

As the bipartisan Rumsfeld Commission unanimously concluded last July, the threat to the
United States posed by ballistic missiles and the weapons of mass destruction they can carry is,
“broader, more mature and evolving more rapidly than has been reported in estimates and reports
by the intelligence community.” As a consequence, the commission noted that the United States
could have, “little or no warning” of a ballistic missile threat.

Despite assertions to the contrary, the June 20 Joint Statement does not bode well
for the
development of U.S. missile defenses, as there is a fundamental disagreement over the
statement’s intent. Russia did not agree to accommodate changes to allow the United
States to
deploy effective missile defenses, but only to discuss possible amendments to the ABM
Treaty.
More substantively, the Joint Statement reasserts the centrality of the ABM Treaty to
U.S.-Russian relations, and has “the Parties reaffirm their commitment to that Treaty.”
According to the statement, the purpose of talks on the ABM Treaty is, “to strengthen
the
Treaty, to enhance its viability and effectiveness in the future.” Thus, it appears that a
higher
priority is being placed on adhering to the 27-year old treaty than on allowing the development of
effective missile defenses.

Indeed, the Joint Statement itself nowhere explicitly mentions developing effective missile
defenses as a purpose or focus of future talks. Rather, it includes ambiguous language stating that
talks may, “consider possible changes in the strategic situation that have a bearing on
the
ABM Treaty.” The statement does, however, explicitly recognize past agreements to
restrict
missile defense development and deployment: “The Parties emphasize that the package of
agreements signed on September 26, 1997, in New York is importantfor the effectiveness of
the ABM Treaty, and they will facilitate the earliest possible ratification and entry into force of
those agreements.”

In stark contrast to Administration policy, Congress has long recognized the importance of
effective missile defenses to America’s future security. In May 1999, the Congress
passed H.R.
4, declaring it to be the policy of the United States to deploy national missile defenses.
Although the President signed H.R. 4 on July 22, 1999, President Clinton simultaneously
declared, “No decision on deployment has been made.…In making our
determination [on
deployment in the future], we will also review progress in achieving our arms control objectives,
including negotiating any amendments to the ABM Treaty that may be required to accommodate
a possible NMD deployment.”

The Administration’s reluctance to commit to a national missile defense system is difficult to
comprehend considering that, since release of the Rumsfeld Commission’s report,
Administration officials have increasingly acknowledged the seriousness of the ballistic missile
threat. Recently, Secretary of Defense William Cohen stated that ballistic missiles, “will soon
pose a danger not only to our troops overseas but also to Americans here at home.” Despite this
recognition, the Administration continues to link development and deployment of U.S.
missile defense programs to what can be negotiated with the Russians under the ABM
Treaty – a treaty that does not even address the ballistic missile threat from China, North
Korea, Iran, or other nations developing and deploying such weapons.

The implications of the June 20 Joint Statement for the strategic nuclear balance also remain
uncertain. Discussions on START III, as agreed to in the Joint Statement, present
Russia
with the opportunity to undo the most important provisions of START II and impede U.S.
plans for deployment of a national missile defense system. For example, public
statements by
Russian officials and defense experts advocate using START III to reverse the ban on MIRVed
ICBMs, impose a ban on more stabilizing MIRVed SLBMs (where the U.S. has an advantage),
establish prohibitive technical restrictions on U.S. national missile defenses, and preserve the
Russian advantage in tactical nuclear weapons.

In the post-Cold War era, the nuclear balance has become a more complex
calculation, and
much of the equation lies outside the framework of U.S.-Russian relations.
The ABM Treaty
and START negotiations do not take into account the volatile developments in southern Asia,
where both India and Pakistan have recently tested nuclear devices and increased the pace of
their missile development programs.

Furthermore, neither of these bilateral treaties can account for potential increases in China’s
nuclear arsenal, North Korea’s expanding missile and nuclear capabilities, and the clear
ambitions of Iraq, Iran and other rogue nations to develop such systems. Under such
circumstances, it is questionable whether current and future U.S. security needs are well
served by a Cold War strategy that subordinates missile defenses to the preservation of
nuclear parity in strategic offensive forces with a weakened Russia, to the exclusion of these
other growing threats.