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TIME: Almanac 1990
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1990 Time Magazine Compact Almanac, The (1991)(Time).iso
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07318900.022
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1990-09-17
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WORLD, Page 24ARMS CONTROLAn Exercise in TrustThe superpowers take a big step toward "intrusive" inspectionBy Bruce Van Voorst/WASHINGTON
Doveryai no proveryai, or "Trust but verify," was a favorite
Reagan Administration phrase in the arms-control lexicon, but it
is easier said than done. While nobody seriously proposes signing
agreements that can be readily violated, opinions abound on what
constitutes adequate proof that the other side is not cheating.
Last week it was learned that U.S. and Soviet negotiators in
Geneva took a major step toward verification arrangements several
weeks ago, when they agreed on inspection controls for the
elimination of chemical weapons. American officials welcomed the
accord as further evidence that after decades of failure, enormous
progress is being made across the board on the thorny verification
issues so central to all arms control.
A complete chemical-weapons ban may still be years in the
making, but the inspection initiative is a promising sign of new
thinking. Until 1987 the Soviet Union not only refused to let U.S.
inspectors check compliance on the spot, calling it espionage, but
also denied that the U.S.S.R. maintained any stocks of chemical
weapons. Under the influence of glasnost, Moscow last week
announced agreement in principle to on-site "surprise" inspections
of facilities. The arrangement defines what sorts of installations
would be involved and under what conditions an inspection could be
demanded.
The Soviets have been accelerating their acceptance of such
verification procedures since the 1987 INF treaty, which eliminated
intermediate- and short-range nuclear missiles, set up procedures
for monitoring their destruction. Soviet inspectors have been
present in the U.S. during the demolition of 326 missiles, and
Americans have witnessed the destruction of 1,088 Soviet missiles.
More than two dozen Americans stationed permanently in Votkinsk,
west of the Urals, keep tabs on a plant that once built SS-20
missiles, and a similar number of Soviets in Magna, Utah, monitor
what was formerly a Pershing engine plant. Michael Krepon, a
Washington arms-control expert, talks of "a degree of verification
unthinkable just a couple of years ago."
Verification of an accord limiting strategic weapons (START)
will be even more challenging. The INF category is comparatively
simple to check. Since all missiles of a given type are to be
destroyed, any such weapon spotted later would be in obvious
violation. START will be far more complex. It will only reduce the
numbers of various missiles, and inspectors will have to determine
how many small cruise missiles are carried aboard bombers and
possibly even submarines. Differentiation must be made between
nuclear-tipped and conventionally armed cruise missiles, even if
they look alike. A method will have to be found to keep track of
mobile missiles. With all that, the supreme challenge will be how
to prevent new production of banned weapons at secret locations.
Nor will it be easy to monitor proposed reductions in
conventional forces in Europe. Thousands of armored vehicles and
artillery pieces will have to be destroyed by NATO and the Warsaw
Pact, and hundreds of thousands of troops demobilized or
redeployed. The treaty language must precisely define differences
between aircraft capable of carrying either conventional or nuclear
warheads. Under previous verification standards, that task would
be hopeless: satellite photography and electronic sensors are not
sophisticated enough to count warheads on a missile or peer inside
production plants.
Now the Soviets appear willing to accept increasingly intrusive
inspections. To win U.S. ratification of the 1974 Threshold Test
Ban Treaty -- still unapproved because of Senate doubts about
verification -- the Soviets permitted American teams to monitor an
underground test in Soviet Central Asia. In recent weeks Moscow has
allowed Americans to inspect cruise missiles aboard a cruiser in
the Black Sea and sanctioned a visit to the Sary Shagan complex,
which the Pentagon had claimed, erroneously, housed an
antisatellite laser.
The Bush Administration is ready to test growing Soviet
openness further. Last month Washington proposed a START
verification package to be negotiated and partly carried out even
before a treaty is completed. The initiative suggests measures to
count warheads on missiles, tag weapons at manufacturing plants and
ban such impediments to verification as encryption of missile test
radio signals during launches. "This isn't putting the cart before
the horse," says Democratic Senator Sam Nunn of Georgia, "but
putting them next to each other, where they belong."
In the end, even the most intrusive measures will not be
foolproof: there is no verification catholicon. But perfect
verification is as illusory as it is unnecessary. National security
requires only that governments be able to detect militarily
significant violations early enough so that they can do something
about them. "Adequate" verification is indispensable to reducing
the risks. Recent reports from the negotiating tables suggest that
both the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. have awakened to that fact.