Cue for a New Arms Race By MALCOLM RuMERFoRD
THE recent American decision to raise the subject of the anti-missile missile in the councils of NATO suggests that President John- son is finally about to take, if he has not already taken, the long-debated, long-delayed step of giving this radically new and expensive weapons system his approval. So much, in fact, has been suspected for some time, at least by the British, who are holding shortly a special European conference to discuss the implications of the anti-ballistic missile (ABM) for Europe.
Plans for a ballistic missile defence system (BMD) have, of course, been around for a long time, but there are two basic reasons why the United States, however reluctantly, seems now ready to go ahead. One is that though the ABM may be expected to be of little use against attack from the Soviet Union, it might be a consider- able defence against an eventual, less sophisti- cated attack from China. The other is that the Russians made their own decision to go ahead in 1964 and now, after early difficulties, are apparently making progress. America could not lightly ignore such a development for long.
The fact that the initial Soviet reasoning may have been very similar to that of the United States is now almost coincidence. Undoubtedly it must have occurred to the Russians that, at least in its early stages, such a defence system would be far more use in a nuclear conflict with Chins than with America. But it would be naive to imagine that all that is happening is that the super-powers are preparing themselves against a possible rather primitive nuclear attack from China. The two new defence systems have also to be seen in relation to each other.
Ballistic missile defence systems are currently spoken of as 'partial,' which means that no one expects them to be anything like 100 per cent effective. They might, their proponents claim, cut the losses suffered from a primitive nuclear attack by something more than half. Nor, at present, are their costs reckoned as anything like prohibitive. Mr McNamara, for instance, in 1965 put the figure for one such partial system at between eight and ten billion dollars over five years. Compared to the US defence estimates for 1966-67 of just over fifty-eight billion dollars, that figure is not high. The system has the further attraction for some Americans that its adoption by both super-powers would appear to render pointless nuclear pretensions on the part of the smaller European countries, notably Britain and France. Soviet ABMs, it is argued, may not be able to do everything, but they could at least cope with anything launched by the nuclear small-fry.
But defence estimates have a way of escalat- ing beyond all proportion. Equally, defence systems which appear foolproof and fully cost- effective have a way of breaking down, and flaws in BMD are plain for all to see. They lie, particularly, in the use of the word 'partial,' and the fact that a system like the one costed by Mr McNamara, which would afford partial pro- tection to a selected number of American cities, might turn out to be as partial as civil defence. The Americans would have a limited number of missiles to deploy; they could either cover some centres adequately, leaving the rest unpro- tected, or spread the defences so thin that they would afford hardly any new protection at all. It is quite clear that the first result would be a
demand that if the thing be done at all, it must be done properly, thus saying goodbye for good to Mr McNamara's modest estimates.
There would, however, be another far, icnierica. Knowledge that the US was producing a new defence system would immediately bring about a change of strategy in any country contemplating a nuclear attack on the American mainland. The first and most obvious thing to do would be to see that any genuine missile was accompanied by a shower of dummies, so that there would be a good chance that American defensive strength would be wasted on the wrong targets. This again would produce further American demands that their defensive strength be increased once more. Another response would be to return to the strategy of getting missiles in by means of low-flying aircraft which the ABMs could not hit. (Vis-à-vis the French Mirages, this alone is a sign that the French deterrent at least would not be rendered useless by the development of Soviet ABMs.) Yet again, it should not be diffi- cult for a potential aggressor to devise missiles coming in from the sea which, in their final stages, would fly low enough to avoid the ABMs. In each case no doubt more sophisticated methods of retaliation could be discovered, but the road from the first-generatign nuclea acarezi- io 1116 -11taratiiiv—e? is long and ex- pensive and dangerous, and the answer is probably not final even then.
For the Americans, far more than for the Russians, there would be -political problems too. The adoption of a new defence system reserved for American cities would have ominous reper- cussions in Europe. It would inevitably rouse new fears of 'Fortress America,' followed by demands that part of Europe should also be covered, demands which the Americans would find highly embarrassing to refuse. The Russians could by no means ignore such a situation. The prospect of, say, Hamburg fortified with ABMs, however partial a defence system they could provide in the early stages, would threaten a serious change in the balance of power. The Russians could not fail to react, both by spend- ing more money on their own defensive system and by accelerating the search to find ways of probing the new defences in Europe and the US. In short, the arms race would probably surpass anything we have seen so far.
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