7th Draft

8/4/74

STATEMENT
BY
SECRETARY OF STATE HENRY A. KISSINGER
SENATE FOREIGN RELATIONS COMMITTEE

AUGUST 8, 1974

Since the dawn of the nuclear age both the world's fears of holocaust and its hopes for a stable peace have turned on the relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union.

Previous generations consistently have striven for peace and suffered war. But the issues of peace and war take on an unprecedented urgency when, for the first time in history, two powers have the capacity to destroy mankind. In this era miscalculation could erase all that has gone before. No responsible statesman can base his policy on the threat of Armageddon. Every leader must concentrate on lifting the clouds of conflict.

Thus the aspiration for a positive relationship with the Soviet Union has been expressed by every President and every Administration since World War II. As President Eisenhower said over twenty years ago, "there is no longer any alternative to peace." And there can be no enduring peace so long as the two nuclear superpowers are locked in hostility and confrontation.

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But while the terrible destructiveness of our weapons underlines the urgency of our task, the deep differences in our perspectives underlines its complexity. These differences do not spring from misunderstanding, or particular personalities, or transitory factors:

- They are rooted in our histories, in the nature of our peoples, and in the ways our countries have developed.

- They are nourished by our contrary values and our clashing ideologies.

- They are expressed in our conflicting national interests and our political and military competition.

- And they are reinforced by allies and friends whose association we value and whose interests we will not sacrifice.

Herein lies the basic dilemma that shadows any dialogue on American policy towards Moscow. If peace is pursued to the exclusion of any other objective, it can mean the relinquishment of all other values. But if different perspectives lead to unbridled nuclear conflict, all other values become meaningless.

Therefore the overriding challenge in our relationship with the Soviet Union is to reconcile the reality of competition with the imperative of cooperation.

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This is what this Administration is seeking to do in a policy
that has come to be known as detente.

As we now weigh the merits of this policy let us not get sidetracted into a debate over Soviet intentions. Too often in the past this has distorted the American approach. The U.S.-USSR relationship during the 1950s and 1960s was marked by fluctuations between long periods of tension and briefer interludes of hope. During times of apparent relaxation many judged that Soviet intentions were undergoing fundamental change. Atmosphere was confused with substance. Good will was seen as the principal element in resolving problems.

When confrontations inevitably followed, many concluded that
Soviet intransigence was immutable. Our relations seemed
destined to remain hostile, and only tactical episodes of cooperation seemed possible.

Neither extreme is realistic, and both extremes are dangerous.
The one ignores that we are bound to remain competitors. The
other ignores that we are at the same time compelled to cooperate.

The central reality is that there can be no peaceful international
order without constructive American-Soviet relations. There will
be no international stability unless Soviet-American relations are

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characterized by restraint. Thus our foreign policy must be
geared to America's positive aspirations for a peaceful world
rather than to shifting perceptions of Soviet intentions. It must
be a policy:

-- that is rooted in realism, rather than wishful thinking
about either our adversaries' benevolence or our own capabilities.

-- that will provide both incentives for cooperation and
penalties for confrontation.

-- that will make progress toward a more peaceful,
cooperative world where it is possible and reduce the dangers of
conflict where it is not.

-- that our people can sustain over the long term without
excessive swings in mood and expectations.

We believe that the policy of detente fulfills these criteria.
We believe that it serves America's interests whether Soviet
purposes are malign or benign.

We ask those who question this course to state what their
alternative would be and what they would demand of the American
people.

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For today, once again, we risk relapsing into endless
speculation over Soviet purposes, and posing irrelevant questions.

Certainly, we cannot rely solely on Moscow's good intentions.
But neither can we freeze all movement while we search for
complete reassurance.

Certainly, Moscow will gain advantages from individual
transactions. But let us consider the balance in the overall
relationship.

Certainly we must maintain our national security. But
the quest for security in this age of modern weapons involves
wholly new definitions.

Certainly we should promote our concepts of justice. But
attempts to impose justice by one side will be viewed as
injustice by the other.

So let us center our discussion on the real issues. What
has been this Administration's approach? What has been achieved?
Where are we headed? What are the realistic alternatives to
the course we are pursuing?

Let me first discuss our overall political relationship in
bilateral and global terms. Then I will address the economic,
security and moral dimensions of Soviet-American engagement.

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# I. The Conduct of Soviet-American Relations

When this Administration took office we did not find in the country any coherent answer to the question of how relations between the superpowers might be constructed for the 1970s. Many believed, in the wake of the Czech crisis, that an unrelieved confrontation with the Soviet Union was the only realistic prospect; they concluded our policies had to be geared to this grim reality, even though at that very moment when the agony of Vietnam permeated our society, there was ample cause at least to question the country's readiness to sustain such a policy.

Others saw opportunities for progress in Soviet-American relations if, for example, we could hold a summit meeting to establish a personal relationship, or if we launched the SALT talks immediately, or if we would only concentrate on economic relations as the key to a change in Soviet policy.

We addressed ourselves to four questions that were suggested by the history of the postwar period, and by the imperatives of the new period in international relations:

- First, we had to determine those policies that would inject a greater degree of stability into Soviet-American relations, reducing the excessive swings from one extreme to another;

- Second, we had to determine how to give a greater degree of permanency to any improvement, so that we could build a longer-term relationship;

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— Third, we had to relate Soviet-American relations
to our larger purposes in creating a more stable international
structure, in a period when postwar bipolarity was ending;

-- Finally, we had to decide how to proceed operationally --
how to address major issues and what their interrelationship
would be.

Soviet-American relations since 1945 had been characterized
by violent oscillations between periods of prolonged and
dangerous tensions and interludes of apparent relaxation. This
cyclical pattern perpetuated itself in part because of the
reaction of American policy to the process itself.

-- For Americans tensions and emnity in international
relations are abnormalities.

-- For Communist states tensions are regarded as the
inevitable by-product of a clash between world systems.

-- In the 1950s American policy made a relief from
tensions virtually an end in itself on the theory that
conflicts of interest could be settled if the atmosphere was
conducive to an objective consideration of our position. Once
a respite was achieved, we too easily concluded that it could
then be made permanent through the technical adjustment of
competing proposals.

-- When tension inevitably returned, because there had
been no substantive basis for a change in relations, our
disillusionment was all the greater for our euphoria, and the
conflict was thus resumed in ever-increasing intensity.

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Such oscillations gradually led to a misconception of the causes of tensions and how to deal with them. We believed that our clashes with the Soviet Union were either because of key personalities, or because Soviet society had not had time to mature, or because our ideologies made us permanent enemies. Thus, in alternating periods of tension and conciliation, we sought to explain the change and rationalize our own policies in terms of changes in Soviet intentions. When Soviet policy seemed more conciliatory we interpreted it as either a shift among competing Kremlin factions, or the adoption of a new world outlook. When confrontations erupted, or Soviet policy hardened, we cited it as evidence that the USSR had always been fundamentally implacable and its aims immutable.

This preoccupation with Soviet intentions -- which still persists -- served, first to divert us from defining our own positive aims and pursuing them consistently, and second, anchored our policy to an assessment of the Soviet Union that at any given point was bound to be ambiguous.

Indeed, these ambiguities were present five years ago. In 1969 there were several factors in Soviet policy that might have led the USSR to a sharply aggressive posture, or persuaded its leaders that a more conciliatory posture would be more effective.

-- The changes in the Communist world in the 1960s challenged the leading position of the USSR and its claim

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to be arbiter of orthodoxy. This might have forced the USSR into an extremely aggressive onslaught against the capitalist world to prove its militancy, or it might have suggested to the Soviet leaders the prudence of at least a temporary lowering of tension with the West.

-- The prospect of achieving a strategic position of near parity with the US offered a choice between conducting an even more strenuous effort for advantages, or agreeing to stabilize competition through negotiated restraints.

-- Economic problems in the USSR and in Eastern Europe could lead to autarchic policies and a closed bloc, isolated from any dependence on external resources, or might draw the Soviet Union and its allies increasingly into the interdependence of the world's economy.

-- As the Soviet Union acquired the military and economic resources to extend its presence in the world, it could seek to extend its influence, but it could also acquire a greater sense of responsibility and an interest in regional stability.

-- Finally, when faced with the hopes of its own people for greater liberalization, the Soviet regime could have returned to the pressures, hostilities and suspicions of the Cold War to crush those hopes, or seek to placate them by pursuing a relaxation of tensions.

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The basic decisions we made, and the principles we have followed for the past five years have been: first, to define a coherent approach toward the USSR that is valid because it reflects our own positive aspirations and can be pursued whatever Soviet intentions might be; second, to design a strategy to encourage any positive tendencies in Soviet policy by holding out incentive for cooperation and posing penalties for aggressive behavior.

Specifically, our approach has been to focus the conduct of relations on removing concrete sources of tension -- the confrontation in Berlin, the conflict over European security, the military embalances in Central Europe, strategic arms competition and arms control -- so that if some agreements were reached, progress would be grounded in a substantive change, and because such agreements could not be reached unless each saw its interests served, each side would have a stake in preserving what had been achieved regardless of changes in personalities or shifts in the atmospherics.

Moreover, we believed we could create a basis for a permanent change in relations if we established an inter-relationship among issues, so that an agreement on a key issue such as SALT would not stand as an isolated accomplishment vulnerable to the next crisis. Progress, if achieved at all, would have to be across a broad front, and in this manner, progress in one area would also provide an incentive for progress in other areas.

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Under this approach, which geared our policy to re-
solving the substance of our differences, we accepted that
for the foreseeable future Soviet-American relations would
be composed of elements of both competition and cooperation,
of ideological conflict and the necessity of coexistence.
Profound ambiguities would persist at every stage in the
relationship, because we were not seeking a tactical shift,
or a better climate, but a major transformation of relations
involving a reorientation of foreign policy.

Our aim thus is not to reconcile every aspect of
competition, or to end all rivalry, but to emphasize common
interests, to develop them whenever possible, and to accept
without despair the fact that progress will be uneven, subject
to setbacks, and even punctuated by crises.

Our aim has been to launch a coherent process of
improvement [in the process itself] and establish a sense of
momentum so that at any point both sides would have to
weigh seriously whether the process could be abandoned
without paying an increasingly high price.

We are not so naive as to believe that anything in
international politics is truly irreversible. But we believe
that we are creating a matrix of agreements and commitments
that will insulate Soviet-American relations from capricious
reversals and guarantee to the maximum extent possible that
the policies of cooperation and moderation will be continued
by the next generation of Soviet leaders.

Finally, the policy we have adopted toward the USSR is not

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an isolated effort, but part of a larger policy of creating
a new international structure.

It was clear in 1969, as it is today, that a new inter-
national system is being formed, that the system that was
created in the fifties is in fundamental flux, and that the
seventies will be seen in retrospect as a period of an
emerging new relationship among most of the power centers.
Our view has been that for a new structure to be viable
it must engage all the major powers in its creation, and
it will have to be founded on self-restraint in the pursuit
of power. If international relations are to rest on the
principles of moderation and restraint, then the conduct of
relations between the world's strongest nuclear powers above
all must also reflect restraint.

Thus, in the broadest sense, our policy must be judged
by whether we have, in fact, brought about a degree of
restraint in superpower relations, and whether the world is
safer as a result.

## II. Progress Achieved

What have these policies achieved?

We take the position that on the basis of the principles
and strategy I have outlined, that we have already achieved
a positive change in Soviet American relations, a change
that is not mere atmospherics but one that promises a more
fundamental transformation if we have the courage to pursue
our goals in the coming period.

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We have witnessed three periods since 1969.

1. In the early years of this Administration, we were confronted with an effort to freeze Soviet-American relations, while improving relations with our allies; that is why this Administration has emphasized the necessity for harmonizing bilateral and multilateral diplomacy in the Alliance and elevating consultations to a major principle of relations; obviously, selective detente, as this period was called, could not be sustained.

Simultaneously, we faced a series of crises that tested our resolve -- in the Middle East, in Central Europe, in Cuba, in South Asia, and in the various negotiations that were in process. In each instance we left no doubt that we would respond to pressures with absolute firmness.

2. The second period witnessed a breakthrough on several fronts -- in the Berlin settlement, in the SALT talks, the agreements on reducing the danger of accidental war and seabed arms control -- which we believe validated our approach of focusing on substance even in periods when Soviet conduct raised doubts over their intentions.

By the time of the summit in May 1972 it was possible to examine some fundamental aspects of Soviet-American relations and to determine their future course; an agreement to avoid confrontation and exercise mutual restraint was confirmed in the Basic Principles of relations signed at that summit.

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3. The third period has witnessed the application of this principle to our conduct of bilateral relations and in dealing with international crises. We applied the general principles to specific issues of reducing the dangers of nuclear war in the agreement of June 22, 1973, we have broadened the area of arms control discussion to include further limits on nuclear testing, control on environmental warfare, and a further reduction in anti-ballistic missile systems.

Indeed, relations have reached the point that it was possible to dismiss the last summit as "routine", even though the fact that the summit was held at all was a testimony to the validity of the course we have pursued, and even though the discussions on strategic arms were perhaps the most open ever held between two major adversaries.

Thus, we believe there has already been a major transformation in Soviet-American relations, and one that promises to be more than an episode. In the three areas we have made basic progress: in our bilateral relationship, in arms control, and in international conduct.

## Bilateral Relations

Our bilateral relations five years ago were largely frozen: trade was negligible, contacts between various institutions of our societies and between the nationals of the two countries were at best sporadic, cooperation on problems common to industrial societies was virtually

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non-existent, cultural exchange was modest and, above all, there was nothing that could be described as political dialogue. The most recent setback that had affected such superficial ties as existed was the Czech crisis in August 1968 which had served once again to highlight starkly the fundamentally antagonistic nature of East-West relations.

If we consider the scope and content of the bilateral cooperative effort established over the past five years, in this area alone the change in relations has been profound.

We have reached cooperative agreements in a great number of diverse fields of mutual interest. They reflect the fact that as major industrial societies we face many common problems that transcend ideology. These agreements are not decisive to Soviet-American relations, nor are they necessarily a permanent state of affairs.

What we achieved is a number of commitments to cooperate that involve an increasingly broad spectrum of the institutions of both countries. These agreements greatly expand the area for discussion and active collaboration between our two governments, thus establishing a vested interest in a constructive relationship.

We have also established a political dialogue at the highest level and an ease and intimacy of communications not only at the summit but in general. We did not oppose summit meetings in 1969, but we took the position that to be effective they had to be adequately prepared by progress in negotiations,

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and to define the future course of relations. The summits have thus been the occasion to give impetus to negotiations that might otherwise consume years if conducted only at lower levels. The three meetings have also led to a personal relationship that enables each side to understand what the position of the other is, especially in a crisis. The two leaders who command the capacity to destroy humanity should meet regularly to review the whole range of the relationship and possible areas of tensions as well as possible areas of cooperation.

## Arms Control

Progress in arms control has been the most dramatic: we have had a treaty to prohibit the installation of nuclear weapons on the seabed, an agreement on measures to reduce the danger of nuclear war by accident, the SALT agreements and treaty of 1972, the agreement on the prevention of nuclear war in 1973, the treaty to limit nuclear testing to weapons under 150 kilotons, and agreements to pursue in the coming phase limitation on the use of the environment for military purposes and limitations on chemical warfare.

Each of these agreements can be justified on their own merits, but I will address the question of limitations on strategic weapons separately. What is important to consider is not only the individual agreements but the process of creating a broad base for restraint in military programs.

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Taken together these agreements will become an increasingly
important element in our own military planning. They
should offer some relief from the burdens of defense expenditures
and provide an incentive for progress in new areas of
limitations.

## International Aspects

In dealing with the Soviet Union in the international
arena we have stressed two principles: first, that our
conduct had to reflect an element of moderation and restraint,
lest the pursuit of unilateral advantage lead to confrontation
and disaster; and second, that we will not be deterred from
defending our interests when challenged.

-- We will oppose the attempt by any country to achieve
a position of predominance either globally or regionally.

-- We will resist any attempt to exploit a policy of
detente to weaken our alliances.

-- We will react if relaxation of tensions is used as
a cover to exacerbate conflicts in international trouble
spots.

The Soviet Union cannot ignore these principles without
jeopardizing its entire relationship with the United States.

Given our competitive relationship, the international
record of recent years inevitably has been mixed. But
the overall trend has been positive. We have seen sub-
stantial improvement in both the lessening of the risks of
direct confrontation and the insulation of crises when they
occur.

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Before dealing with each of these issues, let me make
a general point about the alternative policy that seems to
be taking shape: in a broad sense the advocacy of these
points will have the effect of returning this country
to the doctrines of liberation and massive retaliation of
the 1950s. But we must recognize that we will be doing so
at a time when Soviet physical power and influence in the
world is infinitely greater than they were a quarter century
ago when those policies were devised.

We believe for the most part Soviet policy has reflected
a greater degree of restraint in the last two years. Yet,
the relationship with Washington has no doubt come under an
increasingly intense scrutiny in Moscow. The benefits to the
USSR of the so-called detente may not be so clearly apparent
in Moscow, as they seem to be to many observers in this
country. As the Soviet leaders witness in this country what
seems to be a growing assault on every aspect of Soviet-American
relations, it is not inconceivable that they will conclude
that it is fruitless to continue along this general line.

I do not raise this as a warning, or to say that our
policies must reflect an interpretation of what the Soviet
leaders may or may not do. But it is one factor that we
must bear in mind when advocating alternative American
policies and positions. It is particularly relevant to the
question of linking internal changes in the USSR to economic
relations and in advocating a new era of arms competition
to retain a position of "superiority".

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We do not say that the issue of economic relations, the
nuclear relationship and moral questions cannot be debated.
But we risk allowing a quest for national consensus
degenerating into a compilation of competing catalogues of
the desirable, and in doing so we may jeopardize not merely
one aspect of relations but the entire process. Thus we
insist that our critics explain what the implications of the
alternatives are, not merely for one issue, but for the
entire range of Soviet-American relations and for the prospects
for world peace.

## The Economic Dimension

Many responsible Americans ask why we should trade with
the Soviet Union at all, or whether trade and economic credits
subsidize their armament program, or permit the Soviet
leaders to avoid the necessity of liberalizing their society.
Questions of trade have also been linked to the moral issue
of dealing with totalitarian regimes.

The Administration from the outset took the view --
which it has never abandoned -- that intensified trade should
follow a generally improved relationship. We were often
criticized for failing to move fast enough on trade, for
depriving the US business community of lucrative opportunities.
Not once, however, did anyone raise questions about the
relationship of trade to the Soviet domestic system.

The Administration pursued this strategy until the
1972 summit demonstrated that both in tone and substance relations

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undergone a significant change and a process of normalization committing the top leaders on both sides had been initiated. In this setting, the gradual transformation of trading relationships was a logical step that could serve to provide additional incentives for maintaining the course which both sides had set for themselves.

This approach seemed to command the most widespread understanding and approval. Certainly, the question of the Soviet domestic structure was not cited as an obstacle to the processes we had set in motion. Thus bringing the issue to the fore now involves profound questions of whether we negotiated in good faith.

Several points need to be clarified about economic relations with the Soviet Union. Granting most-favored-nation trading status to the USSR is not a privilege. It is the removal of a discriminatory aspect of our policy toward certain countries without which we cannot claim to be moving toward more normal relations with these countries.

The major impact of the continued denial of this status to the Soviet Union would be political, not economic. We established most-favored-nation trading relations in 1933 when we recognized the USSR; we withdraw it in 1951 during the Korean War, largely as a political act. If there are to be penalties for confrontation there must also be incentives for cooperation.

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It has already blocked fulfillment of the Lend-Lease Accord -- which has been sought by every administration -- involving repayment of over $700 million to the United States.

It is quite true that in the course of expanding economic relations the Soviet Union could gain access to some of our technology; but it is also true that in the last ten years they have had, and will continue to have, access to much the same technology from other countries in the West and from Japan. Moreover, any one familiar with the Soviet military program would have to agree that in the past two decades the USSR, with no appreciable economic contact with the US, has developed highly sophisticated military technology.

In any case, we do not intend to relax restrictions on the export of technology that might have military applications.

Finally, let me relate the question of trade to our broader aims. This government's policy must go beyond narrow construction of whether each and every transaction is economically profitable, or whether one side obtained an advantage. We have a larger interest in seeing the Soviet economy become steadily associated with the economy of the world at large. It should be our goal, as indeed it is, to encourage the Soviet leaders to value the benefits of interdependence, of obligations running in both directions, of goods, services and funds flowing into as well as out of the Soviet Union. It is precisely this kind of mutuality

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which strengthens the process of normalization and serves
to build deterrents to hostile and irresponsible political
and military conduct.

We are not so naive as to think that complex economic
and cooperative relationships in and of themselves serve
these ends. That is precisely why we did not begin to enter
into them until broad political relationships had begun to
evolve; and that is precisely why we seek to keep these
functional aspects of our relations in broad harmony with
political and security relationships. By the same token,
our policies would be unbalanced and incoherent were we to
pursue the goals of more stable political and security
relationships without reinforcing them by more normal
connections between our two societies.

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Strategic Issues

If it is our basic objective to preserve our security and to contribute to the building of a safer world by building a relationship of restraint, reduced tensions and broadening cooperation with the Soviet Union, we must address with utmost seriousness and precision just what security means in our age. For it is clear, that security in the nuclear age differs from the security nations sought in past ages. And security today and in the future, when the strategic military forces at the disposal of both the USSR and the US are in rough balance differs from the security we had and sought in an earlier phase of the nuclear age when we possessed a virtual monopoly in the capacity for strategic warfare.

In the pre-nuclear age, nations could attempt to seek something like absolute safeguards against attack and injury by pursuing military superiority in relation to potential adversaries. Before the advent of strategic power, nations separated by oceans from potential competitors could aspire to absolute physical safety, especially when they were large and self-sufficient like the United States. And in the early years of the nuclear age, when we enjoyed a nuclear monopoly or near monopoly, it made some sense for the United States to assume that its capacity for visiting vast destruction upon potential adversaries

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without risk of suffering significant damage in return would suffice to restrain those advarsaries from taking liberties with our interests and those of our friends and allies. For many years, facing growing Soviet strategic power, we wrestled with how to define security in circumstances where those earlier assumptions were plainly no longer valid. We sought and to a substantial degree found security through a combination of strategic forces capable in all circumstances of inflicting unacceptable damage even if the other side struck first and of conventional forces and alliance arrangements capable of deterring or if necessary fighting regional conflicts.

But now, in the age of nuclear plenty, we must come to grips with even more unprecedented and, in some respects, paradoxical attributes of security.

-- Technology and the productive capacities of the USSR and the US now permit a continuing multiplication of deliverable nuclear weapons in the arsenals of both sides;

-- New generations of weaponry with new or refined characteristics in such key indices as accuracy and reliability can be expected to appear at regular and probably ever shorter intervals of time;

-- With this enormous accretion of power and weaponry neither side, even were it in some respects to outpace the other, is likely to acquire strategic forces capable of

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being translated into usable military advantage with
respect to the other.

-- Yet it is clear that neither side will permit itself
to lag behind the other in any significant aspect of strategic
power, fearing that the appearance of inferiority could have
disastrous consequences to its interests;

-- As each side keeps pace with the other in strategic
power at ever higher levels of capability and the utility of
this power in practical terms becomes increasingly question-
able, the possibility of conflict at levels below the strategic
rises at least to the extent that it is calculated that the
risk that such conflicts may explode into strategic warfare
is declining;

-- Thus, to the economic and psychological burdens of
sustaining the maintenance of a strategic balance are added
the burdens of sustaining forces that deter the lesser conflicts
which the strategic balance has seened to make less risky. An
obsession with strategic power, unrelated to its utility, is
likely, in the United States at least, to undermine our ability
to sustain these twin burdens.

Considerations such as these would lead any responsible
American Administration to seek to engage the Soviet Union in
negotiations to restrain the growth of strategic weapons
arsenals, and to avoid a situation where productive and tech-

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nological capabilities set the pace at which new strategic forces are acquired. Let me say at this point that I do not mean to imply that technological advance is in itself and in all respects dangerous. On the contrary, in many ways technology has served to bring military power under greater control. But that is precisely the point: we must seek to retain mastery over the advance of weaponry instead of permitting technology to drive it, to diminish our choices and to dominate our decisions.

The SALT talks are an effort to undertake this task in cooperation with the Soviet Union. And it is because the impulses required to this are not technical and military alone, but require a broader environment of restraint that we have insisted in embedding the strategic dialogue in a wider network of communication and cooperation.

Thus, in considering the issues posed by the next phase of SALT, we require new and more sophisticated understanding of the nature of security:

-- What is the meaning of strategic superiority or inferiority?

-- Has the United States already accepted a position of strategic inferiority?

-- Is it possible to pursue a relaxation of political tensions if there is no limit to military competition?

I want to emphasize certain points that must be considered.

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If one talks about superiority or inferiority, first of all we need to define what it means operationally.

-- Is it only the capacity to inflict a certain level of industrial damage and destroy a certain percentage of the population, under any conceivable circumstances?

-- Or is it the capacity to destroy a certain percentage of the other side's strategic forces in a first strike?

For any conceivable level of nuclear forces over the next decade, you also have to ask whether it has political utility, and what do you do with it in a crisis?

There is probably some combination of numbers of strategic weapons and qualitative characteristics that would give one side a theoretical "superiority." But that combination is not at all obvious. And as the numbers of missile warheads increase into the thousands an analytical definition of superiority becomes more and more elusive.

The basic situation is that in the foreseeable future neither side can gain the capacity to destroy the nuclear forces of the other. In this sense neither side will be superior.

There could be a more limited definition of superiority such as the ability to destroy and land-based ICBM force of the other side. Such a vulnerability is politically destabilizing in a crisis situation. But it is almost impossible to conceive of a political rationale that would cause a political leader to order an attack against ICBMs alone, even if such an attack could be accomplished with a small percentage of one's own forces.

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Even in this limited sense, then, it is highly unlikely
that one side or the other would allow what might be con-
sidered a major advantage. The real danger is that both
sides will pursue programs rationalized by fears of a
theoretical inferiority, and after another decade of com-
petition, the result will still be a rough parity but
accomplished at staggering costs and accompanied by a return
to the tensions of the cold war.

Our policy is to use the SALT negotiations as the means
to place a ceiling on the size of strategic forces, to slow
down the pace of destabilizing technological change, to
reduce the vulnerabilities of our strategic systems, and
to ensure a balance of capabilities in which both sides
will have confidence in the sufficiency of their strategic
forces.

Even though an objective analysis indicates our forces
are in no sense inferior, we recognize that political action
may be based on a perception of strategic advantage, by
either side, or by the world at large. The subjective belief
that one side did have a margin of superiority would impact
on our diplomacy, our will to react in crises, and the confidence
of our allies. Our arms procurement policies, and our SALT
position, therefore, must ensure that our real as well as
our perceived strategic capability does not expose us to
miscalculations.

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Thus, in this discussion I want to settle the question
of a so-called American inferiority arising from SALT lest a
false perception in this country lead to an unnecessary and
dangerous acceleration of certain strategic arms programs,
possibly to the detriment of military programs in other
areas where continued efforts are required.

Let us look at the realities about the SALT
agreements:

-- The SALT agreements of 1972 were the first ones
ever negotiated to establish some jointly acceptable
pattern for the strategic forces of the two superpowers;
that fact in itself does not make them immune from critical
analysis but it does impose a requirement upon us at least
to debate them seriously.

-- Our strategic programs for the duration of the
agreement -- from 1972 to 1977 -- had been established for
some time on the basis of careful calculations of what our
security required. None of our offensive strategic programs
were stopped or hampered by the agreements.

-- Soviet programs, on the other hand, were in a
dynamic phase and the limits imposed upon them by the
agreements established levels of forces for the USSR well
below those generally estimated to be within their capacity
to acquire over the ensuing five years. Whatever the precise
Soviet plans, the agreements for the first time placed an
explicit ceiling upon them both with respect to the ability
of the USSR to build its heaviest types of ICBMs.

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-- Counting missile warheads and bomber weapons, the ratio of capabilities between the US and the USSR will be substantially unchanged: it was 3 to 1 in 1972 and will be about 5 to 2 in 1977. At this moment, because of our deployment of sea and land-based launchers with MIRVs, the ratio is actually 4 to 1 in our favor.

Thus, our advantage in these elements continues to be overwhelming and will remain substantial for several years even if no agreement is reached to follow the interim Agreement when it lapses in 1977.

It was always understood that the larger size of Soviet ICBMs would over time enable the Soviet Union to deploy a greater number of warheads on those missiles; an interim agreement covering five years could not and did not cope with this longer term problem, nor was this ever claimed. But the interim agreement did provide a basis for doing so in a follow-on agreement and certainly in no way precluded us from dealing with it unilaterally with our own programs should it not be possible to do so, or do so adequately by agreement.