WASHINGTON — In their search for a new approach to arms control, Moscow and Washington are likely to soon encounter an old bugaboo: Russia’s demand that the U.S. stop resisting limits on its missile defenses, which the Russians view as a long-term threat and the Americans see as a deterrent to war.
The United States first proposed an anti-ballistic missile treaty at the 1967 Glassboro Summit Conference during discussions between U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara and Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Soviet Union Alexei Kosygin. McNamara argued both that ballistic missile defense could provoke an arms race, and that it might provoke a first-strike against the nation fielding the defense.
After the early 1970s and the ABM Treaty, in the early 1980s there were years of discussion of Reagan’s Star Wars ballistic missile defense. Orwell got this part wrong: he had entire departments devoted to constantly revising the media of the past to reflect whatever the current situation was. This is completely unnecessary if few people look at the newspapers, magazines and television programs of 40 years ago.
