In addition to the implications of BMD deployment for the arms race, there are also some arms control implications that would be unavoidable in any new debate on active defense against missiles. Most obvious, of course, is the ABM Treaty. The original treaty, signed in 1972, allowed each side to maintain two BMD sites with no more than 100 launchers each. The 1974 protocol agreement reduced the authorization to one site per side. With a view to the future, the treaty also prohibited development, testing, or deployment of space-based BMD systems or components. Any BMD deployments beyond the treaty limitations would necessitate renegotiation or abrogation of the treaty.

Some analysts have no compunction about abrogating the treaty, if necessary. They tend to view as patently unsuccessful U.S. attempts to use restraint and arms control as the preferred means of maintaining strategic stability. Their common perception is that arms control agreements opened opportunities for the Soviets, which the Soviets used advantageously to deploy offensive systems capable of credibly threatening U.S. ICBMs. The ABM Treaty aggravated the situation by denying to the United States what may have been the best remedy for this growing vulnerability.

That SALT II has been essentially rejected by U.S. decision makers attests to the extent of the perception that SALT agreements have hurt more than helped. What about the future then? Although most Americans appear to support the resumption of the Strategic Arms Reduction Talks (START) initiated by the Reagan administration, some defense analysts are skeptical about the potential advantage of such talks for the United States. These analysts would prefer some sort of hedge against failure of new arms control negotiations. Many see redressing real or perceived asymmetries as just such a hedge against a future made uncertain by the murky outlook for arms control and the thrust of the recent buildup of Soviet offensive forces. BMD is only one of many alternatives

that they suggest. A few analysts see ballistic missile defense as more than a hedge, however. As in 1969, some see BMD as a stimulus to negotiation. 10 Déjà vu?

To answer that question now would be premature without considering the contemporary context relevant to the fourth major issue of the BMD debate-deterrence. In conjunction with their reassessment of Soviet nuclear war doctrine, U.S. strategists and decision makers have been reevaluating how to best deter the Soviets from initiating a nuclear attack against the United States. Perhaps the most obvious result was the Carter administration's countervailing strategy and Presidential Directive-59. Both seemed to reinforce the need for a secure, second-strike-capable ICBM. At issue has been what is the best way to ensure ICBM survivability. Some analysts advocate novel basing schemes for missiles; others, BMD. Still others support a combination of both. Overall, a significant number of analysts see in BMD a costeffective way of maintaining the credibility of the ICBM leg of the U.S. strategic nuclear Triad.11

Colin Gray, when he was Director of National Security Studies at the Hudson Institute, provided a succinct summary of the arguments in favor of reopening the debate on BMD deployment:

... BMD technologies which the United States... could deploy in the 1980s and 1990s have little in common with the Safeguard ABM technology that was debated in 1969-70. Moreover, our knowledge of Soviet “strategic culture,” and of Soviet strategic "style" in arms competition, had undermined the plausibility of a good many of the anti-ABM arguments popular ten years ago; and the disadvantageous evolution of the multi-level military balance in the 1970s, in an era characterized by intensive arms negotiations, has cast significant doubts upon the value of a Western concept of strategic stability born in an era of US strategic superiority. In short, BMD technology has changed, Western understanding of the Soviet Union has changed, and Western appreciation of what is, and is not, an adequate strategic concept, has changed. 12

12

Further:

... there are more than sufficient grounds for reopening a policy debate not only about BMD's possible merit for stabilizing the Soviet-American strategic balance . . ., but also about the fundamental wisdom of the offence-dominance which has characterized US strategic doctrine and posture for the better part of fifteen years.13 There are many reasons why a new debate on BMD deployment would be more than simply déjà vu. The contextual changes identified in this discussion make reopening debate both necessary and potentially fruitful. On the horizon, the implications of weapons in space— such as directed-energy weapons for BMDstrengthen this imperative. Thus, it might be wise for potential participants in such a debate to adopt a comprehensive analytical framework for considering the merits of any proposed BMD deployment.

Such a framework demands consideration of a rather wide range of issues and concern. Ideally, military strategy should guide decisions on force development, force deployment, and force employment. However, military strategy is constrained by several outside influences, some of which seem particularly relevant to the BMD question. What, for example, does current military doctrine say about BMD? How do "pure MAD" advocates and "deterrence plus" advocates differ in their views? What about the economic factors? What, for instance, is the marginal utility of an additional dollar's worth of offense versus defense?

How significant is the current Soviet threat? Is Minuteman really vulnerable? Can future ICBMS be deployed in a survivable basing mode without BMD? And what of the national culture? Will the public accept a defense of forces but not of people? Finally, is BMD technology sufficiently advanced to permit deployment of an effective system?

Beyond these concerns are other matters to consider. Certainly, any BMD deployment holds the potential for affecting the arms control process. Would it enhance the prospects for meaningful arms control or complicate the process? Ballistic missile defense also has implications relating to the strategic balance. Would an American BMD deployment restabilize the balance or destabilize it? Is the actionreaction phenomenon real? Would deployment start a new arms race? If so, would it be a defense-defense race or an offense-defense race? Is either preferable to an offense-offense race?

IT should be apparent that the question of whether to deploy a BMD system is indeed complex. The potential for clear answers to critically important questions is probably very low. Decisions perhaps must be based on the so-called bottom line. What is the bottom line? Hopefully, it is this: What would be the contribution of BMD to the national objective of deterring nuclear war? Or stated more broadly, what is the best way to deter? That is the fundamental question.

Kirtland AFB, New Mexico

Notes

1. U.S. Congress, House of Representatives, Committee on Appropriations, Safeguard Antiballistic Missile System, Hearings before subcommittees for the Committee on Appropriations, 91st Cong., 1969, p. 19. Hereafter referred to as Safeguard System.

2. Ernest J. Yanarella, The Missile Defense Controversy: Strategy, Technology and Politics, 1955-1972 (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 1977), p. 120.

3. Ibid., p. 121.

4. Ibid.

5. Safeguard System, p. 24.

6. U.S. Congress, Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, Strategic and Foreign Policy Implications of ABM Systems, Hearings before the Subcommittee on International Organization and Disarmament Affairs of the Committee on Foreign Relations, Part II, 91st Cong., 1969, p. 408. Hereafter referred to as Implications of ABM Systems.

7. Yanarella, pp. 1-7.

8. Implications of ABM Systems, Part I, p. 78. 9. Ibid., p. 319.

10. See, for example, arguments by Jack Kemp, "U.S. Strategic Force Modernization: A New Role for Ballistic Missile Defense," Strategic Review, Summer 1980, pp. 11-17; and Raymond L. Garthoff's views in "ABM Revisited: Promise or Peril?" Washington Quarterly, Autumn 1981, pp. 53-85.

11. See, for example, arguments by Raymond L. Garthoff and William R. Van Cleave in "ABM Revisited: Promise or Peril?" loc. cit. For one analyst's description of the Reagan administration's position on BMD for ICBMs, see Clarence A. Robinson, Jr., "Administration Pushes ICBM Defense," Aviation Week and Space Technology, 11 October 1982, pp. 113-18.

12. Colin S. Gray, "A New Debate on Ballistic Missile Defence," Survival, March-April 1981, p. 60.

13. Ibid.

construction improvements to existing Minuteman silos. In addition to strengthening our strategic forces, production and deployment of the Peacekeeper will have significant national and regional economic effects on the demand for industrial output, employment, skilled labor, and critical materials.

The Peacekeeper missile has been designed as an ICBM capable of delivering ten reentry vehicles (RVS), or warheads, to independent targets at ranges greater than 5000 miles. In comparison with other ICBM systems currently in the U.S. inventory, the missile has greater resistance to nuclear effects, the ability to carry more warheads, and greater range and targeting flexibility. Peacekeepers are to be deployed in existing Minuteman silos in Wyoming and

Figure 1 Economic Impact Assessment Methodology

Nebraska supported by Frances E. Warren Air Force Base. The Peacekeeper program schedule calls for the initial operational capability of 10 missiles by late 1986, with the full operational capability of 100 missiles expected by late 1989.

Based on the latest program schedule and cost data provided by the U.S. Air Force and the application of input-output models developed by Data Resources, Incorporated, and the Bureau of Labor Statistics, a preliminary economic impact analysis of the Peacekeeper program was conducted for the fiscal year 1984 Five-Year Defense Plan, covering the fiscal year 1984-88 period. The general approach used to assess the effects of Peacekeeper development on industrial output and employment was a five-step procedure. (See Figure 1.) The objec

tive of the assessment was to identify the affected industries and to estimate the growth or sales (output) potential and the employment opportunities generated for these industries by Peacekeeper-related economic activities. The growth potentials for the various affected industries, and for the country, were measured in both dollars and jobs.

Specifically, the input-output technique and models were used to determine estimates of:

. The input requirements from each of the 400 supplying industries for the system RDT&E and acquisition.

The input requirements from each of the 156 industries contributing to the Peacekeeper silo construction/improvement.

According to current program projections, MX missiles, dubbed "Peacekeepers," will be deployed in already existing Minuteman silos at F. E. Warren AFB near Cheyenne, Wyoming. Installation of the missiles will begin in 1986, with the whole system projected to be fully operational when 100 missiles have been deployed in 1989.

Strategic materials and skilled manpower requirements associated with the Peacekeeper program.

These estimates, in turn, were used to develop summary economic impact assessments.

The total outlay for Peacekeeper RDT&E and procurement for the 1984-88 period is estimated to be $12 billion, at an annual average of $2.4 billion. (These figures do not include silo modifications.) The production activities