The SALT Talks: Round Two

ANTHONY HARRIGAN

The Strategic Arms Limitations Talks enter a new and critical phase as U.S. and Soviet negotiators meet in Vienna. President Nixon has said that the American negotiating team will move from “a discussion of basic principles and objectives”—the purpose of the Helsinki meeting—to “more specific positions.” At this writing, the same U.S. negotiating team fielded at Helsinki will be in action in Vienna. This isn’t encouraging, for two members of the team—Paul Nitze and Dr. Harold Brown—were high-ranking aides of former Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara, the man largely responsible for the loss of American nuclear arms superiority in the 1960s. Nixon said in his State of the World report that “we will make a determined effort throughout these negotiations to reach agreements that will not only protect our national security but actually enhance it.” But on a careful reading, the President’s comments on the preparations for the SALT talks— drafted, no doubt, by his civilian national security advisers—reflect a narrow technician’s approach to arms control and emphasize “what might prove negotiable.” This may sound reasonable to some people but one has to bear in mind that the negotiations at Vienna will not be with a friendly nation eager to find a business-like solution to an international problem. The Soviets have a tradition of militant diplomacy. In their view, the conference table is simply another battlefield.

AH

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Anthony H. Harrigan

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ANTHONY HARRIGAN

The Strategic Arms Limitations Talks enter a new and critical phase as U.S. and Soviet negotiators meet in Vienna. President Nixon has said that the American negotiating team will move from “a discussion of basic principles and objectives”—the purpose of the Helsinki meeting—to “more specific positions.” At this writing, the same U.S. negotiating team fielded at Helsinki will be in action in Vienna. This isn’t encouraging, for two members of the team—Paul Nitze and Dr. Harold Brown—were high-ranking aides of former Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara, the man largely responsible for the loss of American nuclear arms superiority in the 1960s. Nixon said in his State of the World report that “we will make a determined effort throughout these negotiations to reach agreements that will not only protect our national security but actually enhance it.” But on a careful reading, the President’s comments on the preparations for the SALT talks— drafted, no doubt, by his civilian national security advisers—reflect a narrow technician’s approach to arms control and emphasize “what might prove negotiable.” This may sound reasonable to some people but one has to bear in mind that the negotiations at Vienna will not be with a friendly nation eager to find a business-like solution to an international problem. The Soviets have a tradition of militant diplomacy. In their view, the conference table is simply another battlefield.