Another Missile Gap?

Friday, Nov. 07, 1969

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The prospect of any action, or even conversation, about disarmament inevitably frightens some. It delights others. With the start of Strategic Arms Limitation Talks between the U.S. and the Soviet Union just two weeks away, the two groups maneuvered in Washington to influence both the tone and substance of the Helsinki conference.

Disarmament advocates made new pleas for a moratorium on testing MIRVs —clusters of independently targeted warheads atop a single missile, a new weapon that they fear will set off one more round in the seemingly endless arms race. The Pentagon, however, is anxious that American opinion—and the American delegation—not underestimate the Soviet military challenge to the U.S. Therefore the Defense Department leaked new intelligence estimates pointing to one conclusion: that the Soviet Union is rapidly building up its nuclear-arms stockpile and is already taking the lead from the U.S. in one critical department of potential destruction.

According to Government experts, the Soviets now have in place or are preparing to deploy a total of 1,350 land-based ICBMs, for the first time putting Moscow ahead of the 1,054-missile U.S. arsenal of Minuteman and Titan II ICBMs. The new intelligence data, obtained mainly by spy satellites, also purport to show that the Soviets are testing new types of intercontinental and medium-range offensive missiles, as well as more sophisticated anti-ballistic radar missile defensive systems. What is more, the Russians are test-flying a new swing-wing bomber similar to the nearly operational U.S. FB-111.

In the overall balance, the U.S. is still well ahead of the U.S.S.R. in its ability to deliver strategic weapons (see chart). American nuclear-missile submarines and H-bombers vastly outnumber their Soviet counterparts. To be sure, the larger average size of Soviet warheads gives the U.S.S.R. an enormous lead in deliverable megatonnage, but whether that is an advantage is debatable. There has long been dispute over the relative efficacy of big-yield weapons v. larger numbers of smaller warheads. The Soviet fondness for monster missiles worries some American strategists, who feel that the U.S.S.R. could eventually use them to wipe out U.S. offensive ICBMs in a surprise first strike. Yet the very number and variety of American nuclear weapons, combined with their wide dispersal, makes any such attack extremely difficult.

Intelligence experts argue that if the Soviets continue their present programs while the U.S. stands pat, there will inexorably come a point when Soviet forces equal and then surpass the U.S. in total numbers of offensive nuclear warheads. That is an updated version of the 1960 missile-gap worry. The problem with it is that neither side can now know the other's intentions concerning additional weaponry.

Exploration. In the past, mutual fear has kept the arms race going. Administration advocates of arms control believe that the U.S.S.R. is simply trying to achieve parity with the U.S. in order not to negotiate from weakness. There is Soviet testimony to support that view. Georgy Arbatov, one of the Soviet Union's leading America watchers, believes that there is no longer a significant strategic gap between the two countries—and that this will make it easier for them to act on their concern for limiting the arms race.