An Interview with Richard Nixon

As Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev head toward an agreement to eliminate intermediate-range nuclear missiles in Europe, the deal has become the object of intense controversy. Critics of this so-called zero option say it would "decouple" the defense of the U.S. from that of Western Europe: the less nato can rely on American nuclear weapons in Europe, the more it will be at the mercy of the numerically superior conventional forces of the Soviet bloc.

Not until this week has Richard Nixon spoken out publicly on the subject. In a 90-minute interview at his Manhattan office with TIME Deputy Chief of Correspondents John F. Stacks and Washington Bureau Chief Strobe Talbott, the former President elaborated on an article that he and his Secretary of State Henry Kissinger were writing for the Los Angeles Times Syndicate. In it they propose what Nixon calls a "good negotiating position" for turning the zero option from a blunder into a "major step for peace." Kissinger had earlier been a scathing critic of the zero option; now that he has joined his old boss in what amounts to a qualified endorsement of the plan, the Administration may face less domestic opposition to the summit.

In his TIME interview, Nixon also gave his own recommendations of how the summit might be used to re-establish "linkage" between the "big issues" of strategic offense and strategic defense. Excerpts:

Gorbachev is the ablest of the Soviet leaders I've met. He's charismatic, eloquent and highly intelligent. If he were a candidate in our elections, he'd be a surefire winner. He's even interested in reforms. But he's not a philanthropist. So why is he accepting the zero option? Why is he willing to give up more intermediate-range warheads than we would have to give up?

It's because he's playing chess while we're playing checkers. He's not just looking at numbers of weapons. He's looking at the board in broader political and military terms. He has to be taking pleasure that the prospect of this proposal is causing consternation in Europe. He wants to decouple the U.S. from Europe.

But I think Gorbachev has another motive. When I saw him last July for an hour and 45 minutes, I told him that Ronald Reagan was a very popular leader and that Gorbachev should look beyond the Reagan presidency. If Reagan leaves office without having achieved an agreement, he could be a formidable opponent of any agreement his successor reaches. It's possible that Gorbachev now wants to get Reagan involved in arms control, give him a stake in the process, so that he won't mobilize opposition to it in the future.

So what should we do? We've made an offer. The Soviets have accepted it. We can argue about whether it should have been made in the first place. I can't buy the line ((propounded by Secretary of State George Shultz)) that the Soviets have put us in a box, but it's a "wonderful box to be in." Dean Acheson titled his memoirs Present at the Creation. Well, if I'd been present at the creation of the zero option in 1981, we'd never have gone ahead with it, because it reduces the credibility of our deterrent. Nevertheless, that bridge has been crossed. We'd be in an impossible position if we didn't go forward.

So there will be a summit, and there will be an agreement at the summit. The question is, How can we use the agreement to make progress on fundamental issues? If we're going to have the zero option in Europe, we've got to have it in Asia too. The Soviets' warheads allowed in Asia are aimed at the Chinese, with whom I'm somewhat familiar, and at the Japanese and Koreans. If we really press to get rid of those weapons, Gorbachev would have difficulty turning us down. Also, remember that the goal of arms control is not just to reduce the danger of war but to reduce the danger of blackmail, and that's why we need to be concerned about Soviet conventional superiority. The Soviets have stonewalled on that. Now it's time to tackle that problem. I think we should make a condition that at the end of the five-year period, when we are removing our cruise and Pershing missiles from Europe, the last withdrawals should not take place unless the problem of Soviet conventional superiority has been rectified.

There's also the question of strategic arms. Let's keep the zero option in perspective. If we get rid of all those missiles covered by the offer, we're still talking about less than 3% of the 50,000 warheads in the world. We're not addressing the main issue.

We've got to disabuse ourselves of two myths. One is that we can eliminate nuclear weapons from the face of the earth. Jimmy Carter talked about that goal, and so has Ronald Reagan. But it isn't going to happen. Nuclear weapons aren't going to be abolished, and they're not going to be uninvented. Moreover, nuclear weapons have helped to keep the peace for 40 years. The other myth is that we're going to render nuclear weapons "impotent and obsolete" ((a favorite Reagan phrase)) with a perfect defense ((the Strategic Defense Initiative)). Both myths have got to go.

What we've got to do is re-establish the linkage between our concern with the Soviet superiority in land-based nuclear weapons and the Soviets' concern with SDI. SDI is very useful for developing offense-defense linkage. One way for us to counter their offensive buildup is to defend our missile sites. We should make clear to the Soviets that we'll do this only to the extent necessary, given the threat that their missiles pose to our deterrent. We tell / them that we're going to protect not our population but our deterrent, and that we're willing to negotiate on deployment of a defensive system if the Soviets reduce their big, most threatening missiles and reduce the ratio of their warheads to our deterrent forces.

I call this the "comprehensive compromise." It's simply not going to work to tell this President to give up SDI. What I'm proposing is that SDI should go forward, concentrating on defense of our missile sites. Then you'll be able to have negotiations with the Soviets on offense.

The offense-defense linkage that we established in 1972 with the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks is the basis of the kind of linkage we should have today. In SALT I the Soviets wanted to limit only defense. We were concerned about their offensive buildup, so we insisted on including limits on offense as well. We're in the same situation now. They want to limit defense, and we want to limit offense. I'm saying, let's talk about how to do both together.