think it is important to stay with that approach, particularly in the weapon development area. That is why it is necessary, I think, to have some follow-on modernization programs moving forward in the Department of Defense not only in this area, but in others as well.

Mr. ZABLOCKI. And the Trident, indeed, is a particular program that gives us some assurance?

Secretary LAIRD. That is correct.

Mr. ZABLOCKI. If we do have a negotiated offensive weapons agreement, then of course the Trident or any other advances in technology may not be necessary in order to achieve that agreement. Again we must be in a position to deal on a position of strength.

Secretary LAIRD. Yes. I think we will always have the need to move forward as far as modernization is concerned. I think that in any kind. of an agreement that I can foresee on down the road, modernization of the forces within certain limits will always be permissible.

MOVEMENT TOWARD ARMS REDUCTIONS

Mr. ZABLOCKI. Of course, many of us hope that after phase II we can go into a phase III or even IV, not only of controlled armaments, but disarmament.

Secretary LAIRD. I would hope that we could get into the question of reductions. That is a matter which I think should be a very important part of our discussions. We want to move from arms competition to arms limitation, and then to arms reduction.

Mr. ZABLOCKI. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Chairman MORGAN. Any further questions?
Mr. Fraser.

ACCELERATION VERSUS VULNERABILITY

Mr. FRASER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Mr. Secretary, I support the agreements that were made between the Soviet Union and the United States as a consequence of the SALT talks. My concern, which I think is the concern of many members of the committee, is this new urgency to push ahead with the Trident and the B-1 bomber and to develop both ABM sites. For example, I accept that in negotiating with the Soviet Union one ought not to be in a position of declining strength or even declining relative strength. I am not arguing bargaining ships but just in terms of hard dealing. Don't you get the same leverage, for example, from Trident if you were to limit it so that instead of a speed up on the whole program, we might put the money into the development of the Trident missile which would have the effect of giving you a much larger part of the ocean in which existing boats could patrol and be within striking range.

My understanding is that at the moment we do not know from what source the Poseidon equipped submarines might become vulnerable. We don't know what kind of technological breakthrough might make them vulnerable. I think today they are invulnerable.

The admiral has said that. The one thing that would appear to be useful would be to increase the range of the missiles on those

boats so that they would have a much larger part of the ocean to patrol.

If this is phase I of a program for the Trident, which may be a program we should consider going ahead with at a measured pace, why don't we get the position of strength that we need in our subsequent bargaining with the Soviet Union?

Why the accelerated program on the whole enterprise when we don't know what we are designing against in terms of increased vulnerability of the submarine?

TRIDENT, B-1: NOT "BARGAINING CHIPS"

Secretary LAIRD. First, I agree with you that the B-1 and the Trident are not bargaining chips for SALT. I have never been one that has referred to the Trident system or the B-1 as any kind of a bargaining chip. They are modernization programs as far as our forces are concerned. 7

They are modernization programs that need to go forward whether we have a SALT agreement or not. The question as to the timing of the Trident program which goes to the heart of the matter that we are discussing right now, is one that we have looked at very carefully and thoroughly.

We could have perhaps accelerated this program by an additional 12 months. We could perhaps have stretched it out another 18 months. Last year when the decision was made on the timing of the Trident program-to bring it into inventory at the end of 1978-we did have this agreement at that particular time.

Perhaps if we had known we would have gone into a crash program to produce the three additional submarines during the life of this agreement. But after looking at the comparative costs to accelerate or to stretch out, we decided that the phased program which we have developed is the best use of the resources.

Unfortunately, we did not go forward in April with the design work that we wanted to, because I felt that Congress should make that decision and it should not be done through a reprograming action. So, we came up with a separate supplemental request for $35 million to go forward with the advanced engineering work.

The Congress decided, no, we will consider that along with the overall FY 1973 budget request. So, the Congress made the decision to include the engineering work plus the other funding in the 1973 authorization bill.

We will go forward now with that engineering contract very shortly. The point I am making is that we need to have a submarine construction program ongoing. It will take us these 5 years even to have that kind of a program.

We are going to have to replace the first 10 Polaris submarines during these out-years. As you know we cannot economically put the Poseidon missile system on them. What we will have here is merely an on-going submarine construction program. I don't want to get this Trident program tied up as some sort of a bargaining chip because it is not a bargaining chip.

It is important for us to be strong as we go into these negotiations but I do not anticipate that the Trident or a follow-on modernized sub

marine is going to be used as a bargaining chip in any further SALT.

PRODUCTION OF NEW WEAPON SYSTEM

Mr. FRASER. The Trident of all your systems you are talking about I find most acceptable in terms of its invulnerability. Was it not true that last year you were talking about 1980 and now it is 1978?

Secretary LAIRD. I think the estimate we were using last year was the 1980 or 1981 time period. We are now trying to bring it in in December of 1978.

I just hope you don't hold me to that exact date but that is our program. We are going to try to bring it in by that particular date. There was some talk, and this was all in the development stages, that 1979 would be the date of the first submarine.

We are going to try to do the best we can to bring it in soon after the end of this agreement. The B-1 decision, however, that we have asked the Congress to make is a prototype decision to build three prototypes.

We have not made a production decision as far as the B-1 is concerned. We will be making a production decision on the submarineto proceed with this first one-based on the authority that the Senate will be acting on this afternoon.

WARHEAD FIGURES BY 1977

Mr. FRASER. The background papers for the briefings that were produced by the National Security Council indicate that by 1977, which will be the end of the 5-year period, the United States will have under the SALT limitations 9,690 separately targetable warheads and the Soviets under the SALT agreement would have 3,950.

Secretary LAIRD. That does not have anything to do with the SALT agreement.

Mr. FRASER. Well, there is an estimate that without the SALT agreement the Soviets might have 6,750. In other words, by their being subjected to the limitations of the interim agreement

Secretary LAIRD. You have included the heavy bombers there. They are not in the SALT agreement, and the number of warheads is not in the SALT agreement either.

Mr. FRASER. No; I am talking about the total warheads the United States will have by 1977, which is over 9,600. Under SALT the Soviets would have a total of 3.900 plus.

Secretary LAIRD. I think the chart that you refer to has the Soviets going to over 1.000 SLBM's and also going forward with their current construction program as far as the heavy missiles are concerned, and with deployment of over 2,000 ICBM's by 1977. I believe that is the projection in that chart.

Mr. FRASER. The point that I am trying to make, and this is the chart that comes out of the National Security Council as I understand, is that under the 5-year agreement

Secretary LAIRD. I have the chart here now.

Mr. FRASER (continuing). We will have twice as many separately targetable warheads as the Soviet Union. The reason I stress this is

we get a lot of talk about how the United States is falling behind the Soviet Union and that we are in real trouble.

I don't believe it. I wonder if that is a serious position that is being urged by you or your Department.

U.S. STRATEGIC DETERRENT IS REALISTIC

Secretary LAIRD. No, I have stated that I believe our strategic deterrent is today a realistic deterrent. It is an adequate deterrent. It does deter nuclear war at the present time and it is important for us to maintain this deterrent during this period.

Mr. FRASER. And at twice the numbers of the Soviet Union?
Secretary LAIRD. Well, the number-

Mr. FRASER. I know they don't take in megatonnage and so on. Secretary LAIRD. The SALT agreement has nothing to do with these numbers that we are talking about. I know the chart and I have it now before me but the SALT agreement has nothing to do with this chart.

Mr. FRASER. In a sense they do. Your own projections under the chart show that without the SALT 5-year interim agreement they would be up substantially, and these are obviously estimates under the 5-year agreement-they will be limited to 3,900. Admittedly, these are esti

mates.

Secretary LAIRD. Those are estimates on the basis that they do not start MIRVing for 24 months and I think that is a fairly realistic estimate.

U.S. OVERKILL CAPACITY

Mr. FRASER. But at the end of 5 years we are going to have twice as many. We will have a tremendous overkill capacity. We will still have the triad whereas the Soviets are dependent on two systems. I just find it hard to believe that these figures project disaster for the United States.

Secretary LAIRD. I think we are protected during the period of this 5-year agreement, but with the momentum that they could acquire in the MRV program and because of the throw weight that they have in the period after this agreement, the situation could be quite different. It could be quite different and that is why it is important for us to work toward more equality numbers in the out-year agreements.

Mr. FRASER. But isn't it a fact that once we have the capacity to destroy them and many times over and since we have now banned defensive missiles that there really is not much that they can add that shifts the balance ?

In other words, we both have this capacity to destroy each other. We both have abandoned a defensive strategic posture. What more do you get by adding on?

Secretary LAIRD. Well, the important thing is to have a survivable system. Survivability must be built into our system in order to have realism in our deterrent because we are not in a first strike position. That is not part of our strategy. As they move forward with modernization force, it is the question of survivability that becomes so very important. I am talking about the survivability of a retaliatory force.

NEED FOR FOLLOW-ON WEAPON SYSTEMS

Mr. FRASER. I just repeat my first concern and then I will quit. We are now designing a new submarine system against some unknown technology that might make our present submarines vulnerable and all we are really getting out of it is a submarine with longer range, which I think has an advantage. I don't dispute that. We are ahead with advanced missiles.

Secretary LAIRD. The submarines that we have now could wear out. Mr. FRASER. But they are programed to continue. Other than the 10 which you are not converting to the Poseidon, the others were programed to last for a long time.

Secretary LAIRD. Even those 31 will wear out.

Mr. FRASER. Sure they will some day. But, there is an increase now for these strategic systems.

Secretary LAIRD. No, we have not increased. We have decreased our request.

Mr. FRASER. Because of the ABM deletions?

Secretary LAIRD. Yes.

Mr. FRASER. But you have not decreased under the Tridents and B-1. Secretary LAIRD. We have not decreased the strategic offensive force because as far as numbers are concerned we gave up our momentum in the ABM area, and the Soviet Union has given up some of theirs in the offensive area. That is why we got an agreement.

Mr. FRASER. I think the agreement is fine. I just wish we would pace ourselves to do what we now need to insure our survival. Chairman MORGAN. Mr. Bingham?

THE F-14 AND GRUMMAN CORPORATION

Mr. BINGHAM. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

I wonder if I could ask one question since we have gotten into the area of the defense program even though it is not related to this particular matter of the SALT but it is a matter that I have been interested in personally for several years.

Could you give us your estimate now of the situation as far as the F-14 is concerned and whether you plan to go ahead with it in the light of the action taken by the House the other day in support of the House Armed Services Committee's position that the authorization for the F-14 was conditional on that being for a price per unit that the company says they cannot meet?

Secretary LAIRD. The decision was made on January 17, 1969, to go ahead with this contract. It was finalized and it had been worked on over a period of time.

We take the position that we have a firm contract with the Grumman Corp. Now they have expressed some desire to renegotiate some of that contract. I have taken the position-and with the language that is presently written in the Senate bill no other position could be taken even if I desired to take a different position because the Senate language is very firm-that we will hold Grumman to the contract.