European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - July 10, 1990, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Be soviet Straley a bomber know in he we both bloc a fit 1989 to cow a or Aho to pm gon by or and Het Lea critics deploy their second strike capabilities a by Michael r. Gordon new York times he Berlin Wall has fallen military budgets of Moscow and Washington Are in decline and the cold War is Over. But As a new treaty to Cut strategic arms emerges Many of the debates that surround it have not changed. Since the new treaty was approved in principle at the Summit meeting in june Between presidents Bush and Mikhail s Gorbachev the decade old debate Over soviet Quot heavy Quot missiles and other ancient arms control issues has taken on new life. The strategic arms treaty now being completed accomplishes most of the important objectives set by the United states when the talks began eight years ago but that in t Good enough for the critics who say that the Accord does not go far enough and fails to scale Back the soviet threat to the United states land based missile Force. Some prominent critics say that the Bush. Administration should have raised the stakes and sought major changes in the pending agreement that would put sharper limits on soviet missiles and Lead to further reductions in weapons on both sides. The agreement currently under negotiation is a disappointing and does not really buy us anything Quot said Paul h. Nitze an architect of the original a agreement during the Reagan administration who is now urging a More ambitious approach that he said would demonstrate new thinking on both sides but supporters say the pending strategic arms treaty is the Bird in the hand which will enable Washington to Quot lock in Quot the russians while Gorbachev holds the reins of Power. The hard liners in Washington they say Are risking the gains of Long years of negotiation for further cuts that May take years More to negotiate a and May prove to be unattainable. The refrain of treaty advocates is an Echo of the line used by the joint chiefs of staff in endorsing the 1979 Salt ii treaty the new Accord they say formally known As the Start treaty for the strategic arms reduction talks underway in Geneva is a modest but useful step. Or As Walter b. Slocombe a senior Pentagon official in the Carter administration put it the pending strategic arms treaty Quot produces the claimed 50 percent reduction in the most critical areas and As a result it creates a system which is More stable than an open ended  As such it also establishes a framework for future reductions. Despite the biting tone of the critics the prospects for ratification of the agreement which the two sides Hope to wrap up this year remain favourable. The agreement now being negotiated is remarkably like the one president Reagan put Forward in 1982, with two main goals. He wanted to slash each Side s Arsenal of ballistic missile warheads to 5,000, erasing a soviet advantage in a class of weapons Reagan deemed especially threatening because they Are propelled on fast flying missiles. He also wanted to protect the american advantage in bomber weapons which he argued Are Quot stabilizing Quot retaliatory weapons because of their relatively slow Speed. The new strategic arms treaty does both these things. The emerging Accord for example will Cut the number of ballistic missile warheads on each Side to 4,900. This will Force a 50 percent Cut in the number of warheads carried by soviet land based and sea based ballistic missiles and about a 35 percent reduction in the number of american warheads. 4. A the payload carrying capability of soviet missiles is also to be Cut by 50 percent As Reagan had sought and the soviet Force of 308 Quot heavy Quot ss-18 missiles weapons considered by Washington to be Especial in dangerous because of their accuracy and lifting capacity will also be halved. Bomber weapons Are Only loosely constrained which helps Washington because the United states has Long had a numerical and technological Edge in bomber forces. A recent classified estimate by american intelligence agencies forecast that Moscow Wilt deploy by the end of the Century Only 60 of its new Blackjack bombers and will Field an Arsenal of about 7,200 ballistic missile warheads and weapons carried by bombers. This Overall total is 2,000 to 3,000 weapons less than estimates for this category of american forces under the strategic arms treaty. But the debate is not so much about numbers As about whether the treaty does enough to reduce the risk of nuclear War. In a replay of the 1970�?Ts debate about the Quot window of vulnerability Quot he critics complain that the Accord will not substantially reduce the soviet missile threat to american missile silos. The protagonists Are As familiar As the  nuclear warhead current 12,500 11,200 promoted iat iwo to 10,300 United Suto Sovi of uni of  Sut Sov a in Len air a. I. 4% 4i Ujj among the sharpest critics Are Richard n. Perle the aide to the late sen. Henry Jackson As Well As Nitze a conservative figure in Republican and democratic administrations Nitze said the Bush administration should have Pul aside the Reagan approach and sought a More sweeping agreement that would have led to deeper cuts banned land based missiles with multiple warheads and reduced submarine missiles. And Gen. Edward l Rowny retired who left the Salt ii negotiating team with Strong objections to the Accord is now leaving the Bush team with deep. Reservations about the compromises negotiated by Secretary of state James a. Baker if. On the other Side of the debate is the Bush administration and the traditional arms control lobby including Carter administration officials who backed Tho old Salt ii Accord which was never ratified. A main complaint of the critics is that the reduced. Force of soviet ss-18 missiles Wili consist of upgraded More accurate weapons. The russians May have fewer ss-18s, the critics say but they will be so much More accurate that Moscow will be Able to aim Only one warhead at each target instead of the two weapons that it is commonly assumed Are needed to ensure destruction. Thus the reduced Force Wilt threaten the Sam number of targets As the old Force of ss-18 missiles charge the critics. The critics say that the Bush administration should have insisted that flight tests of the remaining ss-18 missiles be banned and that manufacture of the weapons be prohibited so that the ss-18 Force would gradually become obsolete. That demand was put Forth during the Reagan administration and has been repeatedly rejected by Tho russians. Supporters say the treaty will reduce Iho soviet missile threat while permitting Washington to deploy weapon systems that Are Jess vulnerable to attack such As the Mobile midget Man land based missile. The irony is that some of the critics who support arms control the least Are asking it to accomplish the most Quot said one administration official. Quot arms control can to make our weapons survivable All by itself. If we want survivable missiles we have got to build and deploy  Bush administration officials further argue that the soviet military would use the most conservative assumptions in planning an attack and thus would never be comfortable aiming Only one warhead at an american missile silo and they say that a ban on is 18 testing and production was unachievable during the current negotiations because the american military was not willing to offer any major concessions in return if further reductions Are desirable these officials say there is no reason Why they cannot be sought in subsequent arms control talks once a strategic arms treaty is in place tuesday july 10, 1990 the stars and stripes if k Page 13