Carter and Brezhnev: The Game Begins

Even as the Carter Administration was scolding the Kremlin for its mistreatment of Andrei Sakharov, the President and Soviet Party Chief Leonid Brezhnev moved vigorously to resume the long-interrupted East-West dialogue on arms control. It was almost as if a referee had blown a whistle after a lengthy timeout; the diplomatic ball had suddenly bounced into play.

The first signal that the game was renewed came last week when, in his first interview as President, Carter expanded his Inaugural Address pledge of "perseverance and wisdom in our efforts to limit the world's armaments." In a talk with the Associated Press and United Press International, he said: "I would like to proceed quickly and aggressively with a comprehensive [nuclear] test ban treaty. I am in favor of eliminating the testing of all nuclear devices, instantly and completely." As for the stalled Strategic Arms Limitation Talks, he declared that he expected "a fairly rapid ratification of the SALT II agreement. [And] I would like to move very quickly toward a much more substantive reduction in atomic weapons as the first step to complete elimination in the future."

Even before Carter's Inauguration, Leonid Brezhnev had signaled his readiness to work with the incoming President "to accomplish a major new advance in relations." Speaking at Tula, a three-century-old armaments manufacturing center 100 miles south of Moscow, the Kremlin chief pledged that the U.S.S.R. "will never embark on the road of aggression, will never raise the sword against other nations." He then stressed that "it is necessary to complete [the SALT agreement] in the nearest future ... Time will not wait." Repeatedly, Brezhnev used the word razryadka (relaxation), evoking that old familiar term detente, which Gerald Ford banished from his political lexicon last year.

Soviet Assurances. While the statements themselves deserved to be viewed with some skepticism, the tone of Brezhnev's remarks was significant. Immediately after the U.S. election, some Western experts had feared that Brezhnev would be tempted to test the new President by increasing East-West tensions (TIME, Nov. 29). Later Brezhnev sent word through former Treasury Secretary William Simon that this was not the case. The Tula speech and a surprisingly effusive orchestration of pro-Carter sentiment in the Soviet press have appeared to underscore Brezhnev's new assurances. This enthusiasm will probably be tempered by the Kremlin's angry response to the Carter Administration's statements on Soviet violations of human rights.

The most urgent matter in the U.S. Soviet dialogue is a new agreement on strategic arms, for the 1972 SALT I limit on missile launchers will expire in October. For nearly five years, negotiators have been seeking some broader formula for a long-term ceiling on strategic weapons. At the Brezhnev-Ford summit at Vladivostok in November 1974, the two leaders agreed that a SALT II accord should limit each superpower to 2,400 strategic nuclear delivery vehicles--including missiles and bombers. A final draft of the SALT II treaty seemed imminent, but complications arose. Many American advocates of arms control pointed out that the Vladivostok ceilings were so high as to contribute almost nothing toward reducing existing nuclear arsenals. A more serious obstacle was the right-wing challenge that Ford faced during the G.O.P. presidential primary campaign. To avoid giving Opponent Ronald Reagan any cause to denounce the White House for appeasing the Kremlin, Ford simply stalled on SALT.

The main impediment was the failure of the two sides to agree on whether the proposed 2,400 ceiling should include the U.S.'s new cruise missiles and the Soviet Union's new Backfire bombers. Henry Kissinger, the architect of both SALT I and the Vladivostok guidelines, regards this as a "non-issue," arguing that if both sides had the political will, a formula could be found for dealing with the two new weapons, enabling a conclusion of SALT II in "less than a week." But the Carter negotiating team will find that devising a formula may not be that simple. Many U.S. strategic analysts worry about the Backfire's potential for striking the U.S., and oppose major limits on deployment and refinement of the cheap, versatile and extraordinarily accurate cruise missile.

The new Administration's SALT Working Group, composed of representatives from the State Department, Pentagon, Joint Chiefs of Staff, CIA and National Security Council, is studying options. "The amount of work is simply not that great," says one White House official, "but the questions are tough." The feeling in Washington is that Carter may eventually adopt a double package. Says a presidential adviser: "The

President is talking in terms of doing it in at least two bites." The first would be an attempt at an agreement, adapting the Vladivostok ceilings in some way that would include the cruise missile and the Backfire. For the second bite, the Administration would push for a SALT in deal with lower overall ceilings.

Initial Confusion. Carter's call for a comprehensive nuclear test ban will be even harder to achieve than SALT. Since 1963, the U.S., the U.S.S.R. and Britain have observed a ban on atmospheric explosions and have detonated all their atomic devices underground--a restraint conspicuously ignored by France and China (India tested its nuclear explosive underground). Carter now wants to extend the 1963 ban to subterranean testing. The U.S. and the Soviet Union have already negotiated two partial underground bans. An accord signed in mid-1974 bars underground nuclear blasts greater than the equivalent of 150 kilotons of TNT --about ten times the force of the Hiroshima bomb. A second agreement, concluded last May, regulates underground nuclear explosions for peaceful purposes, such as excavating and mining. Both treaties are still awaiting Senate approval.

After some initial confusion in Washington last week, the State Department explained that the Administration would press for ratification of the two documents "as steps to an overall ban." Carter has instructed the National Security Council to prepare a study on possible next steps. The advantage of a comprehensive ban, if accepted by all nations, is that it would significantly check the spread of nuclear weapons and weapons-making capability. But a ban would be meaningless without the cooperation of China, France and India. Some experts caution that a comprehensive test ban would also prevent the U.S. from verifying that its nuclear weapons remained in working order.

Raw Power. Carter's advisers insist that he is serious and not seeking propaganda dividends when he advocates nuclear disarmament. It is this kind of idealism that worries many. Example: Richard Burt of London's International Institute for Strategic Studies warns that "the very high hopes of Carter's Administration are likely to be dashed" once he understands how highly Soviet leaders regard raw military power as an instrument of international relations. "The Kennedy people got disillusioned, then they got angry, and finally they overreacted," notes Burt, referring to the deterioration of U.S.-Soviet relations that culminated in the 1962 Cuban missile crisis.

What is bound to impress Carter are the irrefutable signs of mushrooming Soviet military muscle. Recent testimony before congressional committees, the report by Senators Sam Nunn and Dewey Bartlett cataloguing NATO's weaknesses, and statements by West European leaders have all sounded that alarm. Exactly how much the Soviets are spending is a question that has long bedeviled the West. To begin with, the published Soviet military budget is far from a reliable guide. In addition, the Soviet Union's centralized "command" economy can order factories to sell military arms and equipment at artificially low prices. Thus even if the real Soviet defense budget were known, the figures would be grossly misleading.

Heftier Budget. Perhaps the most comprehensive method of assessing Soviet defense spending is that developed by the CIA. It reckons what the Kremlin would pay if it had to buy arms and support its troops at U.S. prices. While this permits a statistical basis for comparing Soviet efforts with those of the U.S., for a time it also provoked charges that it overstated Soviet spending, thus providing ammunition for advocates of a heftier Pentagon budget. Bowing to this criticism, the CIA revamped its estimating procedures by eliminating controversial items and drawing on improved intelligence-gathering techniques. Although the new estimate of Soviet military outlays, as calculated in dollars, was revised downward slightly, the conclusion remains: since 1972, Soviet military expenditures have surpassed America's--and the gap is widening (see chart). In the past decade Soviet troop levels (excluding border guards and internal security units) have grown by 800,000, to 3.9 million, while U.S. forces, at 2.1 million, are at their lowest since the Korean War mobilization. In the meantime, the Russians have developed seven new intercontinental ballistic missiles, v. a mere one for the U.S., and have outproduced the U.S. since 1972 in tanks (5.9 to 1), tactical aircraft (1.9 to 1) and artillery pieces (8 to 1).

At Tula, Brezhnev dismissed the West's concern over this buildup as "noisy and idle talk [that] has become quite tiresome ... The allegations that the Soviet Union is going beyond what is suitable for defense ... are absurd and totally unfounded." Nearly every Western expert would dispute that disclaimer. Retired Lieut. General Daniel Graham, former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, observed last week: "The arguments within the intelligence community about whether the Soviets are trying to achieve superiority have disappeared. All responsible analysts agree that they are trying. The argument is over whether they will make it; that is arguable because it depends on what the U.S. does about it." While the U.S. and its NATO allies today retain enough punch to deter a Soviet attack, the balance could tilt against the West if present trends continue--especially since improvements in Soviet technology are closing the quality gap that the U.S. has long enjoyed.

Brezhnev, moreover, has made it no secret, as he told last year's Soviet Communist Party Congress, that despite his wish for detente, "there is no room for neutralism or compromise in the struggle between [socialism and capitalism]." This conviction, coupled with Moscow's burgeoning military might, provides the sobering backdrop for the U.S.-Soviet ball game that will put both Carter and Brezhnev to the test.

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