Reykjavik and Beyond Deep Reductions in Strategic Nuclear Arsenals and the Future Direction of Arms Control (1988) / Chapter Skim
Currently Skimming:
7. The Future of Arms Control
7. The Future of Arms Control
Pages 58-70
The Chapter Skim interface presents what we've algorithmically identified as the most significant single chunk of text within every page in the chapter.
Select key terms on the right to highlight them within pages of the chapter.
From page 58... ...
Who could have predicted a Gorbachev, a Reykjavik, or the Reagan Star Wars speech 5 years ago? But despite the ever-present possibility of the unexpected, it is important for us to think very hard about what the future might hold for arms control and the role it may play in the continuing quest for world peace.
|
From page 59... ...
Yet this is only part of the problem of international security, and if we ever achieve some of the drastic cuts in nuclear weaponry that have been discussed here, many deeper issues that may be even less tractable will have to be considered. The truly grand opportunity to virtually eliminate nuclear weapons came with the so-called Baruch plan developed by Bernard Baruch, Robert Oppenheimer, Dean Acheson, and David Lilienthal and presented to the United Nations in 1946.
|
From page 60... ...
As far as I know, however, no serious effort was made to ban that bomb. Among the most important arms control agreements reached with the Soviet Union and the first major treaty negotiated in the nuclear area was the Limited Test Ban Treaty (LTB)
|
From page 61... ...
One of the early questions that came up in connection with unclergrounc} testing had to do with the idea of decoupling the explosion of a nuclear weapon from the surrounding earth by setting it off in a big hole anc} hicting the otherwise distinct seismic signal. This technical possibility was seized on by treaty opponents who argued that the Soviets would cheat and thus gain some advantage over us.
|
From page 62... ...
The treaty has allowed a research program that was actually initiated at the same time as ballistic missiles were introduced (contrary to some opinions, defense did not begin with the Reagan speech on March 23, 1983) and that has enabled us to reassure ourselves on the technical assumptions about defense capabilities that underlie the treaty.
|
From page 63... ...
have put a useful cap on the strategic arms race, and although it did not have the deep implications of the ABM treaty, it was important and should have been enacted. As many know, the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan caused President Carter to ask to have the treaty withdrawn from consideration for ratification in the Senate; it was later deemed by Ronalc!
|
From page 64... ...
one. The negotiators on the two sicles and all of those who back them up—the intelligence agencies, the diplomatic establishments, and, in particular, the military leaders eventually develop a creep commitment to what is perceived as a mutually advantageous agreement, and they become powerful advocates for the agreement as well as guardians against any proposed violations.
|
From page 65... ...
Some critics thus view the whole arms control process as a means for legitimizing the arms race. The slow pace of the traditional arms control process has occasionally led some people to suggest that the United States try to be somewhat bolder in unilateral disarmament initiatives, one of the alternative paths ~ mentioned earlier.
|
From page 66... ...
make existing or projected arms control agreements more difficult to police? · Would a system being proposed as a bargaining chip (e.g., Grand Forks, North Dakota)
|
From page 67... ...
The recent Soviet proposal that the United States and the Soviet Union conduct weapons tests at each other's test site is very interesting. If such tests come to pass, the way may be paved, by increasing verification confidence, first for ratification by the United States of the Threshold Test Ban and the Peaceful Uses treaties and then perhaps serious motion toward a CTB.
|
From page 68... ...
The role of defense in an era of recluced offenses will require much analysis and eventually difficult negotiations. There are a number of other obvious foci for arms control activity in the years to come, including, for example, antitactical missile defenses, cruise missile issues, the implications of mobile or concealable strategic weapons, conventional force reductions, and multilateral negotiations involving all the major nuclear powers, particularly if the superpowers significantly cut their strategic forces.
|
From page 69... ...
World peace will have to be based on many factors that lie outside traditional arms control. Things like technological change, regional rivalries, Third World sociopolitical evolution, and the diminishing oil supply are all part of the picture, which is a rapidly changing one.
|
From page 70... ...
the absurdity of a presumably civilized society wasting nearly a trillion clolIars a year on arms throughout the world, to say nothing of the human talent diverter! from the real problems of survival on an underresourced and overpopulates!
|
Key Terms
This material may be derived from roughly machine-read images, and so is provided only to facilitate research.
More
information on Chapter Skim is available.