Foreign Relations of the United States, 1981–1988, Volume XI, START I

307. Memorandum of Conversation¹

Moscow, May 30, 1988, 10–11:45 a.m.

SUBJECT

• First Plenary Meeting (U)

PARTICIPANTS

• US

  • The President
  • Secretary George P. Shultz
  • Secretary Frank C. Carlucci
  • Senator Howard Baker
  • General Colin Powell
  • Ambassador Rozanne Ridgway
  • Ambassador Jack Matlock
  • Mark Parris, Department of State (Notetaker)
  • Nelson C. Ledsky, NSC (Notetaker)

• USSR

  • General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev
  • Chairman Andrei Gromyko
  • Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze
  • Defense Minister Dmitri Yazov
  • Politburo Member Aleksandr Yakovlev
  • Secretary Anatoly Dobrynin
  • Deputy Minister Aleksandr Bessmertnykh
  • Mr. Chernyayev
  • Ambassador Yuri Dubinin
  • Mr. Victor Sukhodrev (Notetaker)
  • Mr. Sredin (Notetaker)

[Omitted here are discussions not related to START.]

Moving on to arms control, the President noted that experts were already at work, but volunteered to summarize the state of play. The two sides’ discussions on arms reductions had come a long way since the Geneva Summit. Progress had been registered across the whole spectrum of arms reduction problems, from intercontinental strategic forces to conventional forces, nuclear testing and chemical weapons. At each of the two leaders’ meetings, they had been able to add another piece to the foundation. They should do the same in Moscow. (S)

The INF Treaty reduced arsenals for the first time in the nuclear age, and set a tough new standard for verification. The two sides were well along the way to a START agreement. The President wanted to move ahead and complete START and Defense and Space (D&S) treaties that year. But we had to begin with a clean slate. Before we could enter into new agreements on strategic arms, we needed an understanding on how our concerns about Soviet activities that we considered to be violations of the ABM Treaty would be resolved. This was a very important issue, as Congress raised questions on issues which were perceived as challenges. (S)

General Secretary Gorbachev said he had the same problem with the Supreme Soviet. He felt that Congress would have difficulty fighting against peaceful proposals; it could not afford to be perceived as militaristic. But it was up to the Administration to put the issue squarely to them. (S)

The President observed that it was not as easy as that. Congress was good at pointing fingers at the Administration when it lacked a good answer for issues which arose. The INF Treaty had been a success, but we had shed a lot of blood to get it. In any case, the President hoped that, at the end of his visit, he would be able to report that ways had been found to resolve the major questions blocking new agreements. The President was prepared, if Gorbachev agreed, to review what we viewed as the main obstacles. (S)

Starting with strategic arms, the President noted that the two sides’ negotiators in Geneva were working on a draft treaty to reduce strategic nuclear arsenals by 50 percent. There were several outstanding issues he and Gorbachev ought to address. First, they should agree to sublimits on ICBMs—the most destabilizing weapons systems—so as to strengthen stability and reduce incentives for a first strike. Second, they should work out a formula for attributing numbers to the nuclear-armed cruise missiles on heavy bombers, taking into account the differences in terms of stability between these slow-flying systems and ballistic missiles. The President noted that the US still preferred to ban mobile missiles, but was prepared to see if it were possible to pin down verification provisions for mobile ICBMs which would make it possible to determine whether limits were feasible.

Finally, because START dealt exclusively with nuclear forces, the President proposed the two sides work out procedures for removing from START constraints older heavy bombers that were converted to conventional missions, in other words, to work out means to exclude conventional bombers. The President asked if Gorbachev wished to comment. (S)

General Secretary Gorbachev said he had a few remarks. His impression was that everything was settled with respect to medium and shorter-range nuclear missiles. It was important that the exchange of instruments of ratification of the INF Treaty would be an element in the Moscow Summit. The importance was political: this was the first disarmament treaty in post-war history. (S)

The General Secretary expressed his thanks to the US team for its contribution to the INF Treaty; he hoped that reciprocal thanks would be forthcoming, as neither side could have done it alone. It was true, he acknowledged, that the US had been the first by a few hours to ratify the Treaty. It was also well that the final Senate vote had been so high—93 to 5. Neither side had expected such an impressive figure earlier. True, the Soviet side had done better—with 100 percent of the votes in favor. (S)

As for strategic offensive arms, the Soviet side had already agreed to work on the question of sublimits by linking them to resolution of the mobile missile issue. Moscow was aware that the US had concerns on this point; but so did the Soviet Union. The Soviet side, for example, wanted to apply sublimits to submarines. But if a solution could be found to the problem of mobile missiles—both with respect to a number and to verification provisions—it would also be possible to think about setting ICBM sublimits. The working group could work on the issue. (S)

As for SLCMs, General Secretary Gorbachev wanted to set the record straight. It had been agreed in Reykjavik that SLCMs should be constrained. If they were not, and the two sides started down the path of 50-percent reductions, it would open the gate for a whole new arms race. There must be clarity on this point. Did Gorbachev correctly understand that the US was now prepared to agree to a limit on SLCMs? (S)

Secretary Shultz said that the President had been talking about ALCMs. (S)

General Secretary Gorbachev said he had misunderstood. There was a saying in Russian: “He who has a hurt, keeps talking about it.” So here was another for the President’s collections of proverbs. (S)

General Secretary Gorbachev said he thought ALCMs could be discussed in a positive light. The Soviet side understood that the US felt it needed this system. It hoped for reciprocal US understanding of Soviet concerns about ALCMs and SLCMs. There seemed to be agreement that ceilings were necessary; it would be well if the two sides could agree on numbers. (S)

General Secretary Gorbachev said his experts told him that it might be possible to find a solution to the ALCM problem on the basis of a compromise. If so, it would improve chances for an agreement on 50-percent reductions. Gorbachev could assure the President that the Soviet side wanted to sign a treaty while the Reagan Administration was still in power. Gorbachev had said yesterday that he had once said to Secretary Shultz that the two sides had arrived at a relationship which made it possible for them to discuss things calmly. Gorbachev was sorry that the Administration’s term of office was nearing an end. It was too bad it could not be extended, like Roosevelt’s. But the President should know that Moscow was ready to work on a START agreement right up to the end. (S)

The President said he had some points to make on Defense and Space. The objective of SDI, he explained, was to make the US and its allies more secure, not to threaten the Soviet Union. The Soviet side knew the merits of defending itself, as it devoted far more resources to strategic defense than did the US. As the two leaders had discussed in Reykjavik, the US was willing in the context of a START agreement to agree to a period of nonwithdrawal from the ABM Treaty, after which, unless it were otherwise agreed, each side would be free to choose its own course of action. (S)

The President said he could not agree to a nonwithdrawal provision until the Soviet Union had corrected its violations of the ABM Treaty. In Washington, he reminded Gorbachev, the General Secretary had made clear that he opposed the United States investigating advanced strategic defenses. Nonetheless, he had accepted that, at the end of a nonwithdrawal period, unless agreed otherwise, each side would have the right to deploy strategic defenses if it so chose. This needed to be made clear in the agreement. (S)

The US also needed, the President continued, the right to take necessary steps if its supreme interests were jeopardized by unexpected extraordinary events. This was standard in treaties. It needed as well to protect the right to research, develop and test advanced strategic defenses during the nonwithdrawal period, and could not accept restrictions beyond those actually agreed in the ABM Treaty. We had thus proposed an agreement not to object to each others’ space-based sensors. Both sides used space to collect information for a variety of purposes. It was impossible to distinguish among these purposes. Why not agree not to make this the subject of unnecessary disputes? The two sides’ negotiators, the President concluded, had put together a joint draft D&S agreement text. He proposed they be instructed to press ahead. (S)

General Secretary Gorbachev said that that task could be facilitated if the US could accept a single formula in the treaty—that, if one side violated the ABM Treaty, the other would be free of its obligations under the treaty to reduce strategic arms by 50 percent. Such an approach would make it unnecessary to discuss what was or was not permitted under the ABM Treaty. But Secretaries Shultz and Carlucci argued against this. (S)

Secretary Shultz reminded the General Secretary that the US viewed the Krasnoyarsk radar as a violation of the Treaty. The essence of the problem, however, was that the two sides did not agree on what was permitted by the Treaty with respect to research, development and testing. If that were agreed, the US would not have so many hang-ups. We had always felt that the Soviet Union agreed that during the period of strategic arms reductions, it would be a good thing to know what would be happening with respect to nonwithdrawal. But there was no such agreement. (S)

General Secretary Gorbachev said he could give the President some free advice—even though Henry Kissinger would have charged him millions for the favor. The President, he stated amiably, was being deceived. He had initially been deceived by former Defense Secretary Weinberger; perhaps Carlucci was now doing the same thing. Some might think that it was possible to put something in space which could give the US an advantage (even though, Gorbachev pointed out, this would be contrary to one of the principles, which had been agreed to at the Geneva Summit). But during the proposed nonwithdrawal period—nine or eight and a half years—SDI was not a workable concept. If the President would tell his military people to confine their experiments to earth, nothing would happen. There was no need during this period for research in space. Attempts to conduct such research, on the other hand, would produce suspicion and mistrust. It would lead to a cooling of relations. That was why Gorbachev felt Carlucci, with Shultz’s help, was moving the President in the wrong direction. He wanted to state this in their presence so they could defend themselves. (S)

The President said that, before they did that, he had some things to say of his own. He had come into office believing in the instability of a world whose security was based primarily on nuclear missiles. The average person could envision and was psychologically prepared to deal with the threat of conventional weapons. But when cities could be destroyed at the push of a button, it was another thing. Shortly after entering office, therefore, he had called in America’s senior military leaders and asked if it would be possible to devise a system to render missiles obsolete. They had come back after consulting with our scientific community and said that, with a lot of time and resources, it could be done. The President had said, “Do it.” So SDI from its inception has been a defensive weapon. (S)

General Secretary Gorbachev said that the systems being developed in connection with SDI could be used for other than defensive purposes. (S)

The President replied that Gorbachev was overlooking the President’s frequently stated belief that a nuclear war could not be won and must never be fought. The President believed nuclear weapons must be eliminated. When he had been informed that SDI was possible, the President had announced, if a workable system were devised, the US would make deployment of such a system available to all countries, and would not deploy until nuclear weapons had been eliminated. (S)

But if nuclear weapons were eliminated, there would still be a need to ensure that no madman could obtain the knowledge necessary to develop a nuclear weapon and blackmail the world. The situation, the President explained, was akin to that after World War I. Poison gas had been banned, but people had kept their gas masks. The President said he really meant this. There had been breakthroughs, and US scientists were very optimistic SDI could work. But the purpose of the exercise was to eliminate the arsenals which could bring about such destruction in minutes. The nuclear accident at Chernobyl had shown what damage could be done with a release of radioactivity which was miniscule compared to that of even the smallest nuclear warheads. No one could be a victor in a nuclear war. (S)

The President reiterated that if SDI were proved workable, it could not be put into effect until nuclear weapons were eliminated. It was not an offensive weapon in any way. It was, therefore, non-negotiable, as far as the President was concerned. (S)

General Secretary Gorbachev asked why SDI would be necessary if all missiles were destroyed. (S)

The President repeated that it was like a gas mask. It was impossible to unlearn the knowledge of how to build nuclear weapons. One had to be sure that a madman like Hitler was not at some point able to build a bomb and name his terms to the world. (S)

General Secretary Gorbachev said one could not be too careful where nuclear weapons were concerned. He reaffirmed that the Soviet side believed SDI was not just a defensive system, but also would provide a means of attacking targets on Earth. The question also arose as to why, if one party wanted to build such weapons, the other should make it easy for him. It was one thing for SDI to defend against a certain number of missiles; it was another for it to stop that number times X. But if both sides devoted all their national wealth to such a competition, the discussions the two sides were having were meaningless. Stability would also suffer. The capital which had been accrued in negotiations to date would be undermined; mistrust would arise; Moscow would have to consider a response. (S)

The President reminded Gorbachev that he had offered in Geneva to share development of SDI with the Soviet Union. (S)

General Secretary Gorbachev said he had to express doubt as to that offer. He pointed out that the US had refused to work out a system of on-site inspection of SLCMs aboard US warships. How could one believe that America would open its laboratories. This simply was not serious. The two sides were talking about matters of life and death. (S)

Secretary Carlucci noted that there was a difference between verifying an operational system and exchanging data and mutual observation opportunities relating to research and development. (S)

General Secretary Gorbachev said Carlucci had not convinced him. He reiterated that the two sides should proceed on the basis of the Washington Summit statement language on the ABM Treaty. In that connection, he noted that the US had raised the question of sensors. Perhaps the experts could talk more about that. But Gorbachev urged the President to think about what he had said. The President was listening only to scientists like Teller,² not to scientists, including those in Europe and the Soviet Union, who had very different views. So the experts could work, but Gorbachev hoped the President would weigh what he had said. (S)

On the Krasnoyarsk radar, General Secretary Gorbachev added, several things needed to be kept in mind. First, construction had been stopped. Second, US “scientists” (sic) had visited the site and found nothing. Finally, the Soviet side had expressed its willingness totally to dismantle the radar if an agreement were reached. Gorbachev reminded the President that there were also US “forward” radars which should not be forgotten. But experts could discuss all of this, “including the US sensor idea,” in Geneva. (S)

Moving to verification, General Secretary Gorbachev stated that the problem here was resistance on the part of the US leadership and US Navy. The President had earlier been a strong advocate of verification. Now the Soviet side had to talk the US into it. Was the earlier position a bluff? It was the same for chemical weapons. Now it seemed that factories and ships could not be included. What was to be inspected? The White House and Kremlin? The two leaders had now visited both sites themselves. They had to move forward on verification. (S)

The President said he thought both sides understood the importance of excluding certain things which bore no relationship to weapons. For example, on mobile missiles, we were talking about how to count them, not how they were manufactured. The key was to be able to determine if agreed ceilings had been exceeded. That went for the Soviet side as well. That was the problem verification had to deal with, rather than exposing techniques one side or the other was using to manufacture weapons. (S)

General Secretary Gorbachev said he agreed, but stressed that the two sides should be talking verification in comprehensive terms. Privately owned facilities should not be excluded. Ownership was irrelevant; the question was what could be produced. Moscow would be very stringent on verification issues. (S)

Secretary Shultz clarified that the question of excluding private manufacturing facilities had arisen in the CW negotiations. For its part, the US was not drawing distinctions on the basis of private versus government ownership. Secretary Carlucci noted that neither had we made this an issue in negotiating the INF Treaty. (S)

General Secretary Gorbachev suggested that the US may have removed its demand with respect to CW. In that case, the only obstacle to conclusion of a CW convention was the US binary program. (S)

Secretary Shultz noted that the President had some points on CW. There had been some progress on that issue. There was a good statement to be included in a Summit concluding document. The Secretary recalled what a strong impression photographs of the effects of CW use against Kurdish civilians in the Iran-Iraq War had made at the time of Foreign Minister Shevardnadze’s March visit to Washington. This had redoubled our determination to come to grips with this issue. This was why it was essential that all states with CW manufacturing capability sign on to a convention. (S)

The President said that the language in the agreed joint statement would help bring about further progress. Nonetheless, much work remained to be done on a chemical weapons ban, especially in the areas of verification and ensuring the participation of all states. And no solutions were yet in sight for these problems. The situation was similar to that with respect to strategic defense. Given the conflicts in the world, any CW ban had to be comprehensive. Both sides ought to work toward that goal. (S)

General Secretary Gorbachev said he had consulted his notes, which indicated that as yet there was no agreement on the question of inspecting private and multinational plants. Was there a change in the US position? Was it true that the US was not excluding such facilities? (S)

Secretary Carlucci confirmed that the US was not excluding private facilities. (S)

General Secretary Gorbachev welcomed this clarification. This was what he had wanted to be clear on. (S)

General Powell pointed out that the disagreement was over the size of the “net.” No one was talking about declaring “open season.” Categories needed to be carefully defined. (S)

General Secretary Gorbachev asked how that squared with the President’s concern that prohibited activities could be taking place without the knowledge of parties to a convention. General Powell’s clarification had raised questions about the workability of a CW verification scheme. If there were a convention, anyone with a manufacturing capability should adhere. This, in turn, implied comprehensive verification provisions. But this was an issue for further discussion at another time. (S)

For the moment, General Secretary Gorbachev continued, he wanted to address the US proposal for an agreement on launches of missiles within national territories. Secretary Shultz noted that the US proposal had related to ballistic missile launches. General Secretary Gorbachev said that the Soviet side agreed to the proposal. It had an additional suggestion to make, but authorization should be given to finalize the US proposal for signature during the President’s visit. Secretary Shultz said we could do that. (S)

General Secretary Gorbachev continued that the Soviet side would also like to propose that experts reach agreement—or at least begin discussions—on launches of ALCMs and SLCMs, as well as of mass take-offs of 100 or more heavy bombers, of exercises of strategic forces, and of ballistic missiles in depressed trajectories. Agreement on such steps would increase predictability and reduce the threat of miscalculation. So perhaps experts could study this even as they elaborated an ICBM test launch notification agreement. (S)

Secretary Carlucci asked if Gorbachev was proposing to ban depressed trajectory missile test launches, or simply to notify in advance that they would take place. (S)

General Secretary Gorbachev said he was talking about notification. As for depressed trajectory tests, he was not proposing a ban, but that could be discussed. The US had proposed this at one point. It could be discussed. (S)

Secretary Shultz noted that there were two things to consider. One was an agreement on ballistic missile test launch notification, regardless of trajectory. That could be signed in Moscow. (General Secretary Gorbachev interjected that he was talking about launches within national territories.) Secretary Shultz said that the second issue was a proposed discussion of notification of other activities. This was something we could certainly agree to study. (S)

General Secretary Gorbachev said this might be reflected in instructions to delegations in a joint statement. The President said that a test launch agreement would be a concrete example of the progress being made by our START delegations. (S)

1. Source: Department of State, Executive Secretariat, S/S-IRM Records, Memoranda of Conversations Pertaining to United States and USSR Relations, 1981–1990, Lot 93D188, Moscow Summit 5/29–6/1, 1988, Secret; Sensitive. The meeting took place in St. Catherine’s Hall at the Kremlin. The full memorandum of conversation is printed in Foreign Relations, 1981–1988, vol. VI, Soviet Union, October 1986–January 1989, Document 158.
2. Nuclear physicist Edward Tellar.