Mr. WARNKE. My own feeling was that the President picked that time, because he thought it was going to be a plus, and not only that, but I think he tried to turn it into a plus.

Mr. HUNTER. Was that his choice or the Russian choice?

Mr. WARNKE. He could have said, I don't want to go on October 11, I will go on November 11. That would have been easy to do. I have seen it done. I think he thought it was a plus. It probably was a plus. I think the Republicans would have lost worse had it not been for the summit.

I think it gave a momentary feeling of euphoria that has subsequently turned out not to be justified.

Mr. HUNTER. Do you think if the President had agreed to something at the summit, he could have kept all those Senate races that he lost by half a point?

Mr. WARNKE. No; I don't. I think he tried to make political capital out of turning down any sort of compromise on SDĪ.

Mr. HUNTER. I accept your right to be the world's greatest expert on your own opinion, also, but let me say that historically if you looked at even the Carter years in 1978-79, when we made agreements with the Soviets, it was very beneficial for the party involved, and if you look at the raw numbers, the President's percent of candidates lost by fractions in the last election.

In California, it was 48 to 49 percent; Alabama, 50 to 50, right down the line. You don't think that signing or agreeing to an arms control agreement 3 weeks before the American elections would have shifted those fractions, those very close elections even a half a point to have given the President some help?

Mr. WARNKE. No; I don't, and I think that if you asked President Jimmy Carter whether signing an agreement had helped him politically, he would indicate he does not agree. Not only that, but there was no chance in the world that any agreement could have been signed at Reykjavik.

Mr. HUNTER. I don't mean signed. Time magazine had on the front page, no deal, the day after the meeting. I am saying something like we have a deal, the idea that the American people had was that there had been agreement not to have agreement at Reykjavik, and I think if they had something else, it would have been a real plus for the President.

He campaigned very heavily on his adamancy in turning down a deal.

The CHAIRMAN. It seems to me that he was doing pretty well with the policy as it is. The polls all indicated overwhelming public support for the way the President handled himself at Reykjavik.

So I think Paul has a good point, that if it hadn't been for Reykjavik, the loss would have been bigger.

Mr. FIELDS. I think one thing we found out was the young leopard has the same spots that the old leopards had. He was there after a political goal. Their maneuvering, I think, proves that out.

I think it is very interesting to note the one magazine cover headline about the summit that I like best, instead of "no deal" and "stalemate," was in the Economist, which says, "Hard Luck, Try Again." That is the attitude that I would like to see us press ahead with.

The point made in the Economist's analysis of the President's position was:

Whatever experts may disagree about star wars, most Americans applauded him. A year ago, 53 percent of a CBS News-New York Times sample was ready to give up star wars in exchange for negotiations with the Russians.

But, in the first post-summit test of opinion this week, the same pollsters found 68 percent backing Mr. Reagan's refusal to trade SDI for arms control.

So, whether that translated into the electoral process in State elections, where you have to consider the local impacts of these kinds of global issues, I think the President's position at Reykjavik certainly strengthened SDI from a political standpoint in the United States.

It may have not carried through to winning the number of Senate seats that the President would have liked, but I am not sure that whatever was decided, the results would have been, in most cases, the same.

The CHAIRMAN. One more question before we adjourn. Let me ask you on a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being no way, 10 being absolute certainty, what is the possibility of a Reagan administration in the remaining 2 years getting an arms control agreement with the Soviet Union?

Mr. Fields.

Mr. FIELDS. Well, as McLaughlin would say, I would say about 8.5.

The CHAIRMAN. Pretty good probability.

Mr. FIELDS. Yes.

The CHAIRMAN. Paul.

Mr. WARNKE. I think I am with Ray Garthoff, I put it no higher than 25 percent, and that would require a very major shake up in those in control of arms control policy in the administration.

The CHAIRMAN. 2.5 for Warnke.

Gerry.

Mr. SMITH. 1.5.

Mr. GARTHOFF. I said I thought after Reykjavik, it was down to 1 chance in 5, and I think it has receded somewhat since then, so 1 or 2 out of 10. I think the pacing fact in it was the question of whether there would be a Washington summit in December.

Specific dates had been discussed between the two sides already, and the pacing factor was not the American election. It was open to the President to put it off until after the election if he had felt that was the more politically advisable thing to do here, and he didn't choose to do that.

I think the Soviets sought to gain his agreement through incentives rather than pressure. I don't think they saw him as being under pressure that way. They did try to lay out real concessions to bring him around if they could. I think his response at Reykjavik, and later, should have been that he was going to continue with the SDI, he was going to continue to keep the SDI Program, but was prepared under this agreement with all these concessions from the Soviets to continue the SDI Program as it now is being conducted under the traditional interpretation of the ABM Treaty for the 10year period.

Technical experts differ over the extent to which that would really hold back research. It would have been some constraint, but

he wouldn't have had to say, I will give up SDI. He could say, I have 50 percent reductions in Soviet strategic forces, and I have kept the SDI. The biggest concession in some ways that Gorbachev made was coming off of saying no research or no SDI. Although he tried in terms of no testing of space elements, I think he would have fallen back, or still might, to simply nothing more or less than the ABM Treaty in its traditional interpretation for a 10-year period. That is why I think that is a basis on which agreement might be reached.

If that were seen in the Executive here, I would raise my 1 or 2 to 7 or 8.

The CHAIRMAN. Thank you all, and we appreciate your spending the time with us. It has been a very, very interesting morning. Thank you all.

[Whereupon, at 12:37 p.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

DEFENSE POLICY PANEL OF THE

COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES,

Washington, DC, Thursday, December 4, 1986.

The panel met, pursuant to call, at 10 a.m., in room 2118, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Les Aspin (chairman of the panel) presiding.

STATEMENT OF HON. LES ASPIN, A REPRESENTATIVE FROM WISCONSIN, CHAIRMAN, DEFENSE POLICY PANEL OF THE COMMITTEE ON ARMED SERVICES

The CHAIRMAN. The meeting will come to order.

This morning let me welcome our witness. He was scheduled to appear last Monday, but because of ill health, he could not appear until today, so we want to thank him very much for rescheduling us for the event.

This is one of the long series of hearings we are having on the Reykjavik summit: What happened, how it came about, what was accomplished and where we go from here.

The first witness we had was Richard Perle; we then had Ken Adelman. We had Admiral Crowe, and we wanted to have Paul Nitze in the series of administration witnesses.

We had outside witnesses. We had Jim Schlesinger on Wednesday. We had a panel of people yesterday who have negotiated with the Soviets, and we are going to have some members of the Scowcroft Commission tomorrow: General Scowcroft, Jim Woolsey, and John Deutch.

We have two more in the series before we wrap up. Next week the Democratic Caucus is meeting Monday and Tuesday, but on Wednesday we will have Gen. Bernie Rogers, and we will have Admiral Crowe in close session on Friday, and that will wrap up the hearings.

The gentleman we have as our witness this morning is, if not the most experienced person, certainly one of the most experienced people in this administration, and maybe any administration dealing with these issues: The defense of the country, national strategy and arms control negotiations with the Soviet Union.

It is a very great pleasure for us to welcome you here, Ambassador Nitze. We would like to give you an opportunity to begin with any kind of opening statement you might want to make and then I think a lot of us would like to ask some questions.

So, welcome, Ambassador Nitze.

STATEMENT OF PAUL H. NITZE, SPECIAL ADVISOR TO THE PRESIDENT ON ARMS CONTROL, ACCOMPANIED BY NORM CLYNE Mr. NITZE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.