War and Peace in the Nuclear Age; Interview with McGeorge Bundy, 1986 [2]

Well I think it got into trouble because it had. They've kept moving the basing mode on with it. All right. Well I think the ex got into trouble because they kept moving the basing mode they had before they had four finished some 34 different basing modes for the missile. And I think people began to question whether anybody knew what they were doing. With the max. And there is a. At the same time that was going on was there was a pretty strong movement generally that we weren't doing enough as a country in arms control and the frieze movement was picking up steam. So a combination that we ought to be doing more on arms control and here is a weapon system that nobody seems to know exactly what to do with it. Led I think to a situation in which there was a pretty good assault on funding for the maxim in the Congress. Right so I don't worry but I think I see it

there. Yeah I think that the Reagan administration rhetoric did play into it but mainly it was a problem that they had not. We're not making any progress on arms control I mean people know whether that arms controllers are meeting whether there's any discussion on after all and it was clear that there was nothing going on. That's going to mess up that and. Yet not a lot. Well what is you know I can't remember what I said. You were just talking about. OK there's just a sense that there was no movement in arms control that the that the negotiators weren't meeting and nothing was going on. Now when did you and why did you begin. I believe that the that the Reagan administration

was right when they came into office saying that there was a window of vulnerability they overstated the case but that the land based missiles were vulnerable because they were in fixed positions and the Soviet accuracy meant that those missiles were becoming vulnerable. When you got vulnerable missiles at a time of a crisis that is a very unstable dangerous situation because then it's in somebodies interest to use those missiles first. So the whole situation was. Dangerous. It was not as bad as the Reagan administration painted it. It was in fact a window of vulnerability about land based missiles it was not a window of vulnerability of the whole force we still had submarines we still had bombers. But even a window of vulnerability of the land based missiles would have been dangerous in a crisis. It seemed to me that that was important to do something about that problem. What what what all of us who are interested in resolution in a resolution to this

problem did was recognize that there had to be some kind of a political compromise and there was a lot of meetings that went on. The president in effect was forced to appoint the Scowcroft commission because his dense pack proposal just been voted down by Congress. So he instituted the Scowcroft commission. But somebody did the right thing which he put into the charter of the commission that solution that they came up with had to have some political stability to it. It had to be something that was politically acceptable not just technically it didn't that couldn't just solve the technical problem you had to have some kind of a political solution to it. And so what you ended up with was a much more political oriented group of people out talking to Congressman talking to people to find out what they might do in the way of a political settlement. And there is a lot of informal meetings and I got very heavily involved in all of those. Basically what we did was get together and talk about what was politically feasible.

And. And I was involved because I knew how Congress works and how it what it would vote for and what it wouldn't vote for and could could give some advice along those lines and the eventual solution that Scowcroft commission came up with was as much a political product as it was a technical part of what. I think the feasible it's to it is still it's the feasible solution the problem which is that you build a certain number of M-x missiles because you needed a bargaining chip with the Soviets you needed to have a missile as powerful as accurate as lethal as their SSA teens. And the only thing we have that's close enough to that is the max so you had to have a certain number of those. But because we couldn't make that much mobile we had to stick it in the ground. But the SSA teens are in the ground and fix silos in the ground too so that puts us on a par there. But the second part of the Scowcroft commission was to go ahead and build a small missile.

What came to be known as the midget man. And that's a single warhead missile a smaller missile easier to make mobile. And you make that the mobile missile and move that around and that the advantage of that one is that it is survivable. That's the one that gives you the survivability that you need because it's the Soviets cannot. Attack that missile because it it can be moved in the end at any one point they don't know exactly where it is. Yes I mean I think that it would have been nicer not to have M-x in silos but we've been through 34 basing modes with them X and the question is do you want to put air maxes in silos or do away with them axis altogether. I thought you had to put em XS in silos and try and trade them. I mean my my solution was that what you had to do is go ahead with what as Scowcroft recommended. Put the axes in the silos and offer to see if

you can't use it as a bargaining with the Soviets to get the Soviets to reduce their most accurate and destabilizing weapons the SS 18. And I still think that that kind of a trade was or is possible in some kind of a context. Because the debate again focused on the AMEX they did not focus on the overall compromise but rather focused on the issue of the M-x. And so that was there were people who GEND up and were against DMX and still against DMX and ultimately in Congress we compromised that out by agreeing on 50 have access. It was those of us who wanted a hundred there were those who wanted zero we ended up after a couple of years of fighting the issue on the floor and close votes we ended up deciding we quit all this fighting us decide on 50 and we'll build 50.

50 cap. We agreed. Well I told about I was with the Scowcroft commission and I was in favor of 100 but if Congress would agree to 50 and we would stop the fight and the people who are against the missile would agree to 50 then those of us who wanted a hundred agreed that we would go to 52. Well I think the real Gerson issue is is going to raise a problem of how many we're going to have if they want if the administration wants to take the original 50. And put them on real Garrus and. I think that's doable

if that's what they want to do they come to us now and say look we now have a rail mobile system which we didn't have before. We now want to take that original 50 under the Scowcroft compromise that was going to be in the ground and put it on rail. I think most of us would say that's fine. If they come back and they say they want to take 50 and they want to put those in the ground and want an extra 50 I think they've got problems they've got real problems in Congress with that. You know I think that you know the problem always in these things is that you have an arrangement made between people.

And then what happens on the administration side is that they change the personnel because during an eight year period or whatever secretaries of the Air Force come and go people who are in the the director of research and development in the Pentagon they come and go assistant secretaries come and go secretaries of defense come and go. So the problem is always holding any kind of a deal between Congress which is somewhat of a changing kaleidoscope. But the executive branch which is a really changing kaleidoscope of people. So each time anybody new came in they wanted to review the bidding on the issue and so it was changed slightly but I must say that I think the Air Force did go ahead and develop the midget man as honestly and as well as could be expected. And I think that the image of man has picked up some supporters in the Air Force and I think the program so far has done very very well. The arms control I think

they negotiated more sporadically then than we had in mind when we wrote up the Scowcroft commission report. But on the other hand of course they could argue that Congress didn't give them 100 m X's it only gave 50 m axis so I mean all of these things you kind of work towards a general overall goal and see if you can't get a solution to the problem. Got to keep in mind what is the problem. The problem is the vulnerability of a land based missile force. If at the end of this process we have a START agreement with 6000 warheads on a side and a mobile missile preferably the midget man a mobile missile. He would have solved the window of vulnerability problem even though that solution will not take place until years after Ronald Reagan first raised it. In spite of the fact that they're making administration has not pursued ending that thing with anywhere near the kind of consistency that you would have hoped and in spite of the fact that we've had changing

people on personnel in Congress and on the other side there is a solution to that problem in sight and ultimately keep your mind on. And that's what you're trying to do is solve that problem. The specifics of how you get there are adjustable. You're right you're right. You know what I think you're probably this. You really want to answer that because when January one thousand eighty nine it's going to be all out of date. Well you can't you can't look ahead you can only look back if you're doing this in January waiting I mean anything I thought I would be reluctant to say anything. It's like getting off in January nice GO LOOK LIKE I'M GOING idiot. So you know every day I'll tell you what's going on in the next three months not over the next two hours.

Answering that question in December of 1987. I think that Congress will fund midget man in the 1988 budget. Beyond that I can't predict that. No I mean it's a it is an expensive program per warhead but it is survivable warheads. Survivable warheads are expensive warheads. If you want warheads to survive you put them on survivable systems the M-x warheads are cheap because there are a lot of them and on a fixed silo it's vulnerable. But they're very cheap. If you want to make a warhead survivable you put them on Trident submarines and put them out to sea. The midget manned warheads are cheaper than warheads on Trident submarines. But the point always is that if you want a survivable system it's going to be expensive which means you but you need some

survivable systems I mean if you're going to protect the war against the threat of nuclear war you need some systems that are survivable. I think it's worked out in part and it depends on how it plays out from here. I think you can answer that thing until we come really to the final chapter and we're not at the final chapter yet. I thought we were doing a very good deal that we did agree to build some axes that they would build the midget man and that we would move towards an arms control agreement. And as I say we don't know here in December of 1907 how it's going to play out but it's not it would not surprise me to see that we get a very good

arms control agreement that we will get some air maxes and that we get a midget man. So you know if the arms control agreement that would be relevant to this is nothing to do with IMF This is nothing to do with IMF. It has to do with strategic systems. So the arms control agreement that you're talking about would be a START agreement. That the arms control agreement that is relevant to this is the START agreement. The IMF agreement is not relevant to this to us discussion. The the arms control agreement that is relevant to this discussion and is important here is the strategic arms agreement the intercontinental missiles not this IMF agreement the IMF agreement is an agreement that applies to the European systems and if that's not what we're

talking about when we talk about the Scowcroft commission. So we're going to solve the vulnerability problem you need a combination of cuts and deployments to solve anything. Vulnerability problem you need some kind of arms control plus deployments you got to build some systems and limit other systems. The START agreement the strategic agreement that the administration is pursuing is a reduction in warheads which is one part of the thing the other part of it is you've got to build a mobile system. If you don't have a mobile system the reduction in numbers isn't going to do it all by itself. I don't know I think that you always say that how it comes out it comes

out. You can't mean you can't judge people sincerity by what they say you only can judge it by what happens. And certain people in the administration were not in favor of carrying out the Scowcroft recommendations. But others were. And in the end I say the the the proof is in what happens if we get an agreement that limits warheads we build a mobile system you will have solved the problem. And so roughly along the lines of Scowcroft recommendations. Sure but that's that's not unusual. And indeed it's probably healthy to compete on a certain part and then pick one or the other. I don't think you want to pick one or the other before you get the arms control agreement because that may influence which one of the two systems you pick you may

not want to pick up until you see how they are coming because if one of them suddenly runs into technical problems that may influence which one you pick. But there's nothing wrong with in this system of in fact we got to do it more often. Is funding competing systems and then picking one after both of them moved along a little We've saved a lot of money in this whole defense budget if we did that a little more often. I mean that that is about the craziest idea I've ever heard. The problem if the problem is funds and the problem is the survivability of land based missile forces. It is many many times cheaper to make the missile forces mobile than it is to build a defense for it. If you're restricted by funds

SDI is not something you want to be thinking about. I mean the funds for SDI are so many many many times more expensive than the funds for midget man. And so if you're saying that the problem is the vulnerability of land based missiles we can do either one of two things. We are to make those land based missiles more mobile. So that you can't hit them or we will defend them so that you can't hit them. By a factor of several. It's cheaper to make them to make a mobile. I got to go and vote. It's a vote that's a vote right. I think that let's just answer me I think that really is about the craziest notion I have ever heard. To say that if you have two problems you've got a problem that the land based missiles are vulnerable and you say then

we've got a funding problem on top of that. So how do you what do you do about the vulnerable land based missiles with a funding problem. Well you can do two things. One you can make a mobile so that they can't be hit because the Soviets can't find them. Or number two you build an SGI and you defend them. If you've got a funding problem you make a mobile. SDI is many many many times more expensive than a mobile midget manned system. It's just that. It is a crazy idea that has crept into the debate. But it is true I mean I think that part of our problem here is that people do not want to have anything that competes with an SDI program. There's a big constituency out there for SDI. And if they see that mobile is a cheaper way to solve the land based missile vulnerability problem then that's one less argument for an SDI. They still have other arguments for SDI but it's one less thing that you can argue. And so it's one of the reasons why why

midget man is is I think in some trouble politically because a lot of people are coming at it for a lot of different reasons. But the the SDI mafia that wants wants SDI at all costs is just twisting the whole argument in order to justify building SDI to defend missiles make a mobile it's a lot cheaper. Basically the argument for joining the building. Yeah Max was essentially the argument for building the Amex was to deploy it as a bargaining chip with the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union had a SS 18 highly accurate 10 warhead missile. We had been trying for many years in salt one of a lot of our stock and salt too to get the Soviets to agree to reduce the number of their SS 18 missiles. No success. I think it's kind of an axiom that unless you have

something that the Soviets want you're not going to get a deal with the Soviets and I think that that's borne out in a couple of cases most recently with the IMF agreement the IMF agreement we had to deploy the Persians in the ground launch cruise missiles before we got the Soviets serious about removing the SS 20s and eventually got the SS 20s out 0 0. But there's no way we would have been discussing that if the people in the demonstrators on the left had succeeded in those years and stopping the deployment of the Persians in the ground launch cruise missiles. So I think when you're dealing with these Soviets on these systems you've got to have some things that they did get their attention that they are willing to bargain about and I think the Amex is clearly one of those systems that can be used in that way. Well I think they're willing to use it as part of a bargaining chip to get the story

right. The Reagan administration did was part of our problem is by this time when this thing airs we will know whether there was a START agreement or not. I can't answer that question. Yeah sure. But you never know from the public statements if you're going to bargain something away you don't announce it. I mean if I wanted to bargain and I even if I believed that SDI was a bargaining chip I wouldn't go out and announce that publicly the Russian sale was good. And we don't have to pay so much for of course when you're going into negotiations you don't say what is of our Egypt. The proof is was a deal ultimately made. You know I think that the Soviet Air Force has done what they

said they were going to do. I think the Air Force has done what they wanted what they were supposed to do in developing the midget man.