Arms Control: Salt II Gets a New Lease

Advocates of nuclear arms control heaved a collective sigh of relief last week. Reagan Administration officials announced that the U.S. would continue to adhere to the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks of the 1970s, although the agreements had lapsed. The accords, known as SALT II, were never ratified by , Congress, but the two superpowers have more or less abided by them. Conservatives in Congress made a strenuous attempt to persuade President Reagan to abrogate the agreements on the ground that the Soviets have flagrantly cheated on SALT. In fact, the record of Soviet compliance is more ambiguous than the accusations suggest.

The President chose to follow a middle course: he reserved the right to engage in selective retaliation for any Soviet violations that might occur in the future. Moscow was prompt in denouncing the decision as "crawling out" of arms control. On the contrary, Reagan did not want to jeopardize the prospects for progress in the arms talks now under way in Geneva. The new negotiations, he concluded, are difficult enough without having the U.S. cast into doubt whether it intends to abide by the old agreements.