All Cyrus Vance seems to want for Christmas is a SALT II treaty. Hope springs eternal in his attache case as he plans yet another trip to Geneva later this month for yet another round of arms talks with Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko. The SALT J shuttle has been going on for six years, and there have been eight rounds of weapons talks since Carter became President.
The Carter Administration claims that SALT II will provide for parity because each side would be limited to 2,250 strategic weapons. This sales pitch is a deception because the Soviets get a long count and we get a short one.
All existing 415 U.S. bombers which can hit the Soviet Union will be counted in the total and are subject to the SALT limitation. On the other hand, the Soviet Backfire, Badger and Blinder bombers, which can hit the United States from Russia, are not counted and not limited.
SALT II negotiators don’t seem to think that the distance from the U.S. to the U.S.S.R. is the same as the distance from the U.S.S.R. to the U.S. The bomber deal they are working out is just as lopsided as when the Soviets increased their production of Backfire bombers after President Carter cancelled our B-1. We still plan to continue to rely on our 25-year-old B-52s, another one of which crashed on take-off on October 19.
Any M-X mobile missiles which our country might build (if President Carter ever allows them to be built) will have to be counted under the SALT II ceiling of 2,250 strategic weapons. The hundreds of Soviet SS-20 mobile missiles, however, will not be counted.
Another example of the phony proposed “equality” of SALT II is the prohibition of ground- and sea-launched cruise missiles which fly more than 600 kilometers. Get out a world map or globe and see how unequal that is. This provision will enable the Soviets to launch their missiles from off our Atlantic, Pacific and Gulf coasts and strike 69 percent of the U.S. population, while we could target only 15 percent of the Soviet population.
SALT II is expected to prohibit or restrict the development of new strategic missile systems. The Soviets have eight new ICBMs which are in testing or production, whereas the United States has none. If both sides agree not to develop any “new” missiles, the United States will never be able to match the new advances the Soviets have made during the years that they stalled negotiations.
Soviet ICBMs carry at least six times more explosive power than our ICBMs. SALT II limitations would prevent the United States from building “heavy” missiles such as the Soviets have, or from trying to match their tremendous superiority in missile megatonnage.
Of course, SALT II will not provide for on-site inspection. The way will be clear for the Soviets to cheat on SALT II just as they have cheated on SALT I, a fact fully documented by former Defense Secretary Melvin Laird.
When SALT I was signed in 1972, allowing the Soviets a numerical superiority of three to two in both ICBMs and missile-firing submarines,” the SALT sellers told us that this was balanced by U.S. superiority in technology, missile accuracy, and greater numbers of MIRVs. All those advantages are now gone. Soviet tests have proved their impressive missile accuracy, and their far greater throw-weight gives them the potential of having far greater numbers of MIRVs.
SALT I was sold to the American people on the slogan “it will stop the spiraling arms race.” With the 20-20 vision of hindsight, all Americans should now be able to see that it stopped our country from racing, but it did not stop the Soviets.
Now SALT II is being sold as a numerical limitation on the strategic weapons of both sides.. It is becoming clearer every day that SALT II will merely legalize and perpetuate Soviet military superiority and make it forever impossible for us to catch up.
