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prise attack
couldn 't possibly
dis–
arm the United States. Yet military
exper ts-even doves-now admit
that by the mid-1980s (at the
latest) the Soviets will be able to
knock out America's 1054 ICBMs
in a surprise attack- a move only
only thing standing between the
world and nuclear war is America's
missile submarine fleet.
But submarine missiles pack less
power than regular IC BMs and are
less accurate. While they could
destroy "soft" targets like Soviet cit-
The ultimate irony is that during the
time the SALT 1 disarmament
treaty was in effect the world moved
closer to nuclear war!
obsolete, liquid-fuel SS-4 and SS-5
midrange missiles.)
A Pinch o f SALT 11
In 1972, the USSR and the United
States signed the first strategic arms
limit agreement (SALT 1-the ini–
tials stand for Strategic Arms Limi–
tation Talks). SALT 1 was an arms
control agreement widely hai led at
the time of its signing (particularly
by the Nixon administration) as a
great step forward for world peace
and detente (a word you don't hear
anymore since the Soviet invasion of
Afghanistan).
We now know that the Soviets
cheated on SALT 1 during the
1970s (though detente-minded
Ford and Carter state departments
chose to, in the words of
Aviation
Week,
"cover up" the violations).
The Soviets tested a mobile anti–
missi le system, tested to upgrade
an antiaircraft system to an anti–
missile system, concealed missile
submarine sites from U.S. verifica–
tion satell ites, concealed the pro–
duction of the mobile SS-16 and
SS-20 missiles, and encrypted mis–
sile tes t data- all in violation of
their promises in SALT 1 to limit
¡
their deployment of antimissi le
missiles and allow for satellite ver–
~
~
ification of strategic forces.
~
The ultimate irony is that during
:t
the time the SALT I disarmament
----------------------------- treaty was in effect the world
preventable by a U.S. " launch on
warning."
Launch on warning is extremely
dangerous, though, because t he
"warning" might be a false one
and, in any case, an American Pres–
ident would probably want extra
time to see if war could be stopped
before a ny more missiles were
fired. If he had to "push the but–
ton" after just a few minutes con–
sideration, he might be condemn–
ing millions to death, which
wouldn't be necessary if he could
somehow limit the scope of the war
to, say, mutual attacks on each
other's missile bases.
Since America's 300 or so long–
range bombers face about 12,000
Soviet surface-to-air missiles, it is
doubtful that any which survived a
surprise attack could get through to
their targets. That would mean the
12
ies in a retaliatory attack, they might
not be able to hit military targets.
After a Soviet surprise attack, they
might only be good against
cities,
leaving the American President
faced with a terrible choice: if he
ordered his submarines to attack,
U.S. cities would face
certain
destruction because the Soviet
Union would easily have the power,
even after its first attack, to destroy
them; or he could surrender.
While the United States
has
foregone adding to its nuclear
forces, the Soviet Union has kept
on building. Since' 1967 the United
States has scrapped its B-47 , B-58,
B-70 and B- 1 bombers, the Jupiter
and Thor missiles, the Skybolt mis–
si le, the Polaris missile and its sin–
gle antimissile missile. The Soviets
haven 't scrapped anything.
(Though they claim to be scrapping
moved closer to nuclear war!
The Soviets used the time to
build the monster SS-18 missile,
capable of knocking out American
land-based missiles because of its
extreme accuracy-within a quar–
ter of a mile of its target. The
Soviets also used the time to build
up antiaircraft defenses to ward off
any retaliatory strike from Ameri–
can bombers.
While the United States develop–
ed the Trident submarine and Tri–
dent missile, it held back for the
most par t on upgrading its forces in
hopes of yet another SALT treaty,
SALT 11. When the Soviet invasion
of Afghanistan in early 1980 made
passage of SALT 11 in the United
States Senate impossible, the United
States was left with the possibility
that in a matter of years the Soviets
theoretically were going to be able to
The PLAIN TRUTH