SALT in the wounds (1978)

From the August 1978 issue of the Socialist Standard

In the post-war struggle between East and West to establish spheres of economic and political influence, global networks of alliances have been sealed with aid in the form of arms and supportive technology. The foreign policies of the two major powers have been essentially nothing more than preparations for war. While direct confrontation has been avoided, opportunities to test the kill-effectiveness of their respective arsenals have not been lacking. The first thirty years of the United Nations saw 119 wars waged on the territories of 69 countries, involving 81 states, with a total duration of conflict exceeding 350 years and at a cost of tens of millions of casualties. The invitation of nominally independent, but in fact puppet, governments has been invoked to justify the presence of American and Russian armed forces in the Third World. An increase in the number of wars fought by proxy on foreign soil and the spread and strengthening of capitalism through nationalist movements and new states are responsible for the huge increase in conventional armament expenditure in the last decade.

Seventy million men and women are now fully engaged, directly or indirectly, in capitalism’s military programmes. Spending on ‘defence’, including research and development, has trebled in real terms since 1948 and now accounts for more than 7 per cent, of total world output, a figure representing the combined incomes of almost half the world’s population. No sharp contrast is evident between the general conditions of the Cold War and Detente eras; in fact, as far as actual war is concerned the latter is the more violent. The major powers have nevertheless gone to some trouble to ensure a truly lasting world peace. We have witnessed a considerably more polite use of diplomatic language and the number of nuclear weapons rise to 40,000, a figure exceeding the level of MAD (Mutually Assured Destruction). With fire strength increased a millionfold since ‘Little Boy’ fell on Hiroshima, present stockpiles are sufficient to annihilate the total world population a little over 690 times.

It was against this background that in June a United Nations Special Session on Disarmament was convened in New York (a monastic gathering to chat about the sanctity of life) and NATO heads of state at a Washington summit decided upon substantial military reinforcement in Europe.

The Big X-Ray

In April and May tentative agreement was reached in Moscow on the terms of the second SALT (Strategic Arms Limitation Talks) treaty intended for signature next winter. We can safely state that its concern will not be with reduction of nuclear weapons, but the setting out of marginal differences in their increase. According to a spokesman from Washington’s Arms Control and Disarmament Agency the treaty ‘will not prevent the United States from doing anything that it would otherwise have wanted to do’ (Guardian, 28 April); the quantity of nuclear warheads ‘permitted’ by 1985 will be at least double that of 1974. On 8 May, when nobody was looking, the two sides adjourned indefinitely quite separate talks in Geneva on banning radiological and mass destruction weapons.

Seven thousand nuclear warheads are deployed in Western Europe and half that number, but with considerably higher yields, behind the Iron Curtain. The strategy of massive nuclear retaliation has fallen out of favour as the capabilities of both sides have increased and underground and submarine based delivery systems introduced. United States policy in the event of a (much discussed) Warsaw Pact blitzkrieg is that attempts should be made to restrict the war to Europe, using tactical nuclear weapons (‘the theatre nuclear rung of NATOs ladder of flexible response by controlled escalation’ as the military would put it — or calculated genocide in English). The concept of ‘limited’ war, with homelands as sanctuaries and Europe as the graveyard, has not surprisingly found little support among political victims. This scenario has been played out in five NATO nuclear war games in the last two years, with victory being secured at the expense of Europe and the copyright sold to Waddington’s.

In 1977 American military strategists, concerned at the increased ground attack capability of Eastern block forces and inspired by the President’s Human Rights campaign, enthusiastically adopted the neutron bomb. What endeared the device to them was its ‘increased kill capability, principally against personnel’ (US Defence Department spokesman) and relative sparing of property. Radiation emitted on impact would penetrate the armour of advancing tanks and kill cleanly those within a mile radius; after the crumbling off the skin, several days of spontaneous internal bleeding would be faced before death. The weapon could wipe out Russian armoured divisions in St. Peter’s Square without harming the Pope or damaging the Sistine chapel. Thus, not only would Christian civilisation survive, but the clearing away of bodies rather than the rubble of cities would mean significant savings. In short, a really effective labour killing and labour saving device. The diplomatic heat generated by the warhead’s proposed deployment led however to its temporary shelving; in June the United States Senate authorised procurement of components for its manufacture in 1979.

American capitalism’s investment has in the past few decades been increasingly transferred to ‘developed’ regions rather than raw material and extractive operations. Its vast investment in European industries, unsuccessful military intervention in Vietnam, and concern at the modernisation and expansion of Warsaw Pact forces (they are unsportingly weakening ‘NATOs historic qualitative advantage’) explain the desire to re-establish military credibility. At NATOs summit meeting members of the alliance agreed on an eighty million dollar increase in military spending for 1979 and outlined plans to bolster the morale of combat troops and patch up the southern flank. Calls were made to expand NATOs traditional military role, particularly to include Africa, where super power involvement is naturally discussed in terms of ideology rather than economic interest. On occasion however the military is liable to express clearly capitalism’s priorities, and in the week of the summit the last chairman of NATOs Military Committee stated:

The Allies are united in their detestation of the South African Government . . . but . . . South Africa produces three quarters of the West’s gold, she has three quarters of the world’s known reserves of chrome and is second only to the Soviet Union in its production, she has a similar share in industrial diamonds, and is second only to the United States in the production of uranium. All these undeniable facts make it mandatory for the Alliance to devise adequate defence of the Cape.

(Sir Peter Hill-Norton No Soft Options: the Politico-Military Realities of NATO)

Standardisation of arms equipment was also on the summit agenda, providing an example of possible conflicts of interest within the western capitalist class. Although its need is generally accepted, standardisation could mean a loss of home development and production programmes by some countries, leading to a loss of technological expertise and profits from arms exports.

Meanwhile, back at the UN Disarmament Session the main Soviet speaker Gromyko was radiating goodness and light, calling for an end to the production of nuclear weapons and the complete destruction of nuclear stockpiles. President Carter sent film actor Paul Newman along, John Wayne being indisposed. Those awake were treated to a brief repetition of the Soviet government’s views on unpleasant wars and cruel weapons of mass destruction; they very much favour old fashioned mass destruction and humane devices like their own chemical warheads.

The peculiarities of the Soviet language were further illustrated in two recent documents. In a letter sent to President Carter by Russian scientists, we read that "for the first time in human history, favourable conditions have been created for concerted international measures to curb the arms race” and learn of a “disarmament campaign which progressive forces around the world have been waging for years” (Soviet Weekly, 25 March). The architect of the Russian Navy, Admiral Gorschkov puts it in a slightly different way however:

Soviet naval power, merely a minor defensive arm in 1953, has become the optimum means to defeat the imperialist enemy, and the most important element in the Soviet arsenal to prepare the way for a communised world.

(The Sea Power of the State, Moscow 1977)

This confusion of peace with war is not an easy mistake to make. The Soviet Union has 87 strategic nuclear powered and 286 conventional submarines, with an armoury of 845 nuclear missiles. They have not been sitting back contemplating their naval strength either. The tank force has increased from 47,000 to 60,000 in ten years, 4,600 combat planes are deployed on the Eastern front lines and 3.67 million people are under arms or engaged in support activities. The Soviets are also planning a new intercontinental missile family for the late 1980s.

The recognition that war may be suicide does not affect the drive towards a new world war. To argue, as would the liberal, that arms production and trade arc a cancer on the body politic is to misunderstand the nature of society. Militarism is a natural growth of capitalism. Armament expenditure offers the liberal a convenient explanation of world poverty; the transfer of ‘scare resources’ and money to areas of need is viewed as simply a question of will. In fact under capitalism war is the extension and consequence of underlying international conflict in trade and other spheres, and for the ruling class arms are essential for the maintenance of their privileged position and defence of their interests against rival states. Indeed in some cases, greater economic aid could result in radical changes in the economic and social structure of developing nations and so lead to the overthrow of political alliances favourable to the superpowers.

There is evidence of a strong association between high military spending, high rates of industrial growth and foreign dependence. The rise of weapons system armies coincides with the beginning of industrialisation and the need to create or preserve a social structure in which economic expansion can take place. The overwhelming part of aid received by underdeveloped nations consists of military assistance. Although Third World defence industries are growing in size and becoming more widespread, international trade in arms remains the chief source of major weapons. America and the Soviet Union have captured, respectively, 38 per cent. and 34 per cent. of the conventional arms market, with Britain and France bringing up the rear. In the Middle East, with its resources vital for the economic expansion of the major powers, arms spending has now increased at an annual rate of 22 per cent. since 1965, compared with 15 per cent. in Asia and Africa. Iran has one of the world’s most sophisticated defence systems and in May signed a protocol with the British Government which could lead to the latter’s biggest ever arms contract — £750 million.

Force has played an essential role in the process of economic and social change throughout history, the particular form of force reflecting its social setting. Whereas formerly the weapon was the instrument of the soldier, the soldier now appears to be the instrument of the weapons system, reflecting the importance of machines in society as a whole and minimising the possibility of individual action. Developments in electronics are rapidly rendering weapons platforms, aircraft carriers and tanks vulnerable and completely depersonalising the killing between enemies at war.

The barbarism of the Twentieth century cannot be explained in terms of conflicting ideologies of malevolent leaders and nothing is more fallacious than the idea that increases in knowledge and the progress of what is called civilisation bring with them increased social harmony. The sterility and waste of capitalism are laid bare in its wars — men fall in their millions that shares might rise.

Melvin Tenner

A Spring thaw? (1988)

From the June 1988 issue of the Socialist Standard

To many in the "peace movement”, it seems that the tide is finally turning. The focus for their optimism is none other than former Cold Warrior Ronald Reagan, who has instructed his negotiators to "go for gold", and hammer out a 50 per cent cut in the superpowers' nuclear arsenals. They should not be so easily fooled. Behind the pacific rhetoric lies a grimmer calculus which reflects the new realities facing American capitalism in the 1980s.

In the drive to restore profitability to US industry, business interests have clamoured for cuts in the $200bn budget deficit in the new financial year. As a result the Pentagon will be receiving $33bn less than it anticipated and funding for "Star Wars" will be slashed. Forced into a corner, the military and their political allies have felt compelled to change their tactics, and the apparently paradoxical result has been a new found enthusiasm for arms control. To see how this has come about, we will take a brief excursion into the bizarre world of nuclear strategy.

To the military mind, there is no such thing as an "unusable" military weapon, and from the earliest days of the US "deterrent”, the Airforce developed plans for massive first strikes against the USSR. General Curtis Le May stated this quite openly in front of a presidential committee in the 1950s. when it was put to him that pre-emptive nuclear strikes were not official US policy. "I don’t care", he replied, "it’s my policy. That's what I'm going to do." This remains the dominant view in the highest reaches of the US military-political establishment. Colin Gray, for example, now a senior presidential adviser, wrote in 1980 that the US should "identify war aims that in the last resort would contemplate the destruction of Soviet political authority and the emergence of a postwar world order compatible with western values". Nuclear weapons were to be treated in the same way as conventional ones had been in previous eras; as a means to destroy opposing military forces and compel compliance with the interests of the victorious national ruling class.

The paradox of using nuclear weapons to accomplish political objectives, however, was that their sheer destructive power could result only in genocidal war. which could have no rational political use. This was the conclusion of the Harmon Committee, which examined the feasibility of a pre-emptive strike against the Soviet Union in 1948-9.

What was needed, from the point of view of the military planners, were "cleaner" weapons, which could selectively "take out" discrete military targets such as silos, troop assembly points etc. whilst avoiding large-scale "collateral" damage. It has been estimated that 20 million deaths is an "acceptable" level for civilian casualties in this sort of scenario. In recent years, the technological developments necessary to allow such nuclear war fighting strategies have begun to emerge.

In the dehumanised language of nuclear mass murder, the ability of a warhead to destroy a hard target, such as a silo, is measured in terms of "lethality", or “K". “K" is dependent primarily upon how close to the target a warhead is delivered. The first generation of US ICBMs had an accuracy (acronym "CEP") of some 1000-4200 FT. giving a lethality of between 9 and 12. Some meaning is given to these figures when we compare them with the comparable ones for the new generation of US missiles. The MX and Trident D5 have accuracies of just 300 FT and lethalities of 200. whilst Cruise missiles will land less than 200 FT from their targets with a lethality of 300. US scientists are now working on manoeverable terminal guidance warheads which will have accuracies of 120 FT. as well as "earthquake bombs" which bury themselves in the ground before exploding. In practical terms, these missiles can destroy with virtual certainty the hardest of Russian silos. Moreover, simply throwing more of the earlier missiles at a target does not compensate for lack of accuracy, since the first missile to arrive over a target would destroy those following even a split second behind. Greater accuracy, with fewer missiles means greater certainty of a clean kill. Military strategists have even turned the controversy about the "nuclear winter" to their own advantage, by claiming that the theory is only applicable to attacks on cities by the older, indiscriminate nuclear missiles. Military targets such as silos, it is argued, are located in wilderness regions, which would not throw up the debris associated with burning cities. This form of attack is undoubtedly the more ecologically sound!

It will by now be clear that far fewer of the new missiles are necessary in order to pursue an effective nuclear war-fighting strategy, and that the older ones are effectively obsolete in military terms. It is precisely these older missiles that the US will be "sacrificing" in any major arms reduction agreement. This, however, is only half the story. There is another very good military reason for supporting a major cut in the superpowers" nuclear arsenals, and this has to do with the technological limitations of the "star wars" (SDI) programme.

When SDI was first conceived, it was intended as an integral part of a war-fighting strategy; it was to be the shield behind which the US could shelter from Soviet retaliation after delivering its own first strike. Insuperable technical problems have been encountered in attempting to develop such a device, however, and military planners recently conceded that it is not a feasible objective for the foreseeable future. Instead of a massive space security shield protecting US cities, they now plan only to protect vital military installations, and still reckon only to be able to destroy 30 per cent of an all-out Soviet strike, or some 1,300 warheads.

There is more than one way to skin a cat. however. Suppose that the Soviet nuclear arsenal could be cut in half, to some 2,800 land-based warheads and 600 submarine launched ones. Suppose also that the new US missiles could be expected to destroy even half of the remaining forces in a first strike (bearing in mind that five out of six Soviet submarines are stuck in port at any one time and therefore highly vulnerable. This leaves the number of warheads available for a retaliatory Soviet strike at a number which the new slimmed-down SDI might be expected to deal with. The enthusiasm of the military for a treaty which would cut both sides' arsenals by 50 per cent whilst leaving the US free to develop and deploy its own devastating new weapons is thus readily apparent.

The change in the US approach to the Geneva arms talks, therefore, has nothing to do with the changing whims of its leaders, and still less to do with the influence of the peace movement. Rather, it has to do with material factors; the weakness of American capitalism, which necessitates cutbacks in non-competitive production, and the capabilities and limitations of the available technology. This much is conceded by Professor Paul Rogers, a leading spokesman for CND, in a recent article in the New Statesman (8 April). What, however, is to be done about it? Rogers is reduced to calling for yet more campaigning for a test ban and a freeze in the deployment of new weapons; this is apparently "the best that can be hoped for". But military power and its related technology are the necessary accompaniments of the rivalry between competing capitalist and state capitalist blocks. The murderous technologies and strategies of nuclear war do not have an existence outside of this struggle, and cannot be eliminated without first tackling the antisocial system of which they are simply the most terrifying symbols.

Andrew Thomas

Some facts of life at the top (1986)

From the January 1986 issue of the Socialist Standard

Facing each other across the table at Geneva last November. Reagan and Gorbachev underlined the fact that America and Russia are the two powers which count in world capitalism in the 1980s. As recently as Macmillan. a British prime minister could expect to have been involved in negotiations at this level. Now states like Britain are reduced to being satellites, bases where one or other of the super powers sites their missiles. The sun has finally set on the British Empire; imperialism now wears a different face and calls it human progress.

It was to be expected that some of the media would do their best to cloud the reality of the summit at Geneva by concentrating on the ballyhoo which always obscures such events. So we saw much of Reagan — who is unusually skilled at reducing desperately frightening issues to a few folksy, vacuous words — musing on whether Gorbachev would accept some fatherly advice from him. Gorbachev is a son for a father to be proud of — smooth and intensively educated, not at all like those aged Kremlin manipulators who preceded him. And of course he has a dazzling wife, who almost upstaged Nancy Reagan. Mrs Gorbachev's dress designer (in a country where class privilege is supposed to have died in the Revolution) works "almost exclusively" for her and she seemed to be on a personal mission to erode the stereotype of Russian women as lumpy bundles of quilting and head scarves. If Reagan ever gets to press the button, it will no doubt be to the accompaniment of some banal homily, while Gorbachev will do it with an economic urbanity.

But beneath the ballyhoo there is the matter of the relationships between Russia and America and what these mean to the people of the world. Reagan is always liable to describe the conflict as a matter of ideology — "we don't like your system and you don't like ours". For millions of Americans, the "system" means an unrelenting round of slums, disease and impoverishment; who can understand what interests they feel they have in the "American way of life" ? They suffer poverty because the ideology of capitalism, in Russia as well as in America, is that of the commodity, of wealth which is turned out for sale and profit as opposed to satisfying the needs of people. Capitalism is a society in which minority interests prevail.

That ensures that international negotiations are not about clashes of principle, nor about differences between father and son; on the basic principle of class monopoly of the means of life both sides are at one. They are concerned with the continuous capitalist conflict over economic supremacy, about which ruling class will dominate and plunder which parts of the world. The supposed ideological clash did not prevent a steady growth of trade between Russia and America during the 1970s. until Carter reacted to the Russian invasion of Afghanistan. “We used to sell hundreds of millions of dollars worth of equipment to the Soviets", ruefully said James Griffin, president of the US/USSR Trade and Economic Council. "We won't see those figures again for a long time”. Some American companies are doing their best on this score — Caterpillar Tractors recently agreed a contract to export $90m worth of equipment to Russia and Pepsi Cola are hopeful that their 14 plants there will triple sales over the next six years. But time is pressing, as the gap left by the American withdrawal is being filled by trading rivals, notably Japan — another country which should be prevented on ideological grounds from trading with Russia. But the blood of profitable trade is thicker than any water of supposed principles; as Nikolai Zinovyev, boss of Russo/American trade affairs in Moscow, put it: "Let us sincerely hope that whatever results from the conference. they will produce favourable effects on our bilateral trade".

So what about that other issue the nuclear arms race? Reagan is said to be anxious to persuade the Russian government that the Strategic Defence Initiative — Star Wars — is a purely defensive project. Only the very gullible would believe that a powerful capitalist state would place such an expensive priority on defending human beings, who at other times are treated as coldly dispensable. The Russian government, who have participated wholeheartedly in the nuclear arms race, are not gullible; they see Star Wars as a shield from behind which America could launch the first, knock-out blow. Star Wars is really just another episode in the arms race, a typical defensive move which the Russian military will have to try to overcome. with the end result of intensifying the power and sophistication of the armaments concerned. Gorbachev put this clearly to the Supreme Soviet, on his return from Geneva:

We will find a response, just as we did in the past . . .  To restore the balance the Soviet Union will have to enhance the efficiency, accuracy and strike power of its arms, in order to neutralise, if we must, the electronic space machine of Star Wars.

It is perfectly normal, under this social system, for states to develop these enormously destructive weapons and then, on the pretence of promoting a more peaceful world, to talk to each other about controlling them. This stagnant ritual has been experienced many times in the past, while the development of ever more horrifying weapons has continued. The summits of 1955, 1959 and 1960. when Eisenhower was American president, were largely concerned with tensions in Europe, particularly over the division of Germany and Berlin. This area is not now of such immediate concern; others have taken its place as potential flashpoints in an uneasy world. In 1961 Kennedy met Khrushchev and the effectiveness of that meeting can be gauged by the fact that soon afterwards there was yet another crisis over Berlin and then the confrontation over Cuba. In 1962. Nixon and Brezhnev signed the Salt I treaty, which caused a lot of excitement: "the first step on the road to peace" declared a jubilant Nixon, adding himself to the long line of politicians who have made such a claim. It is nearer the truth to say that that summit and that treaty signalled American resignation to the fact that Russia must be dealt with as a super power, to carve up the world with and to act with to try to restrict the number of nuclear powers. Salt I opened the age of detente, when Russo/ American trade began to expand, but it did little to slow the pace of the arms race and it certainly did not make nuclear war less likely.

The same two leaders met again in 1973 and 1974 (when Nixon was in the throes of Watergate) and Nixon's successor. Gerald Ford, met Brezhnev in 1974 and 1975. One outcome was the projected Salt II treaty, which was eventually signed four years later, by Brezhnev and Carter (both of whose time was running out). So there has been no lack of contact between the leaders of Russian and American capitalism — no lack of talk about "disarmament" and about "peace". And what has been the result? The two super powers have enormous nuclear arsenals — about ten thousand warheads each, more than enough to lay each other waste, as well as most of the rest of the world. With "peace" talks like those, what arms manufacturer needs a war?.

Each summit has taken place on the assumption that it would lead to greater "understanding". It is almost as if the opposing ruling classes exist in deep ignorance of what goes on behind their frontiers and need the occasional friendly chat to enlighten themselves. But of course the ruling classes of the world understand perfectly well. They understand that they are in deadly rivalry over access to raw materials like oil, over the boundaries of their respective spheres of control, over the strategic dispositions of their imperialism. They understand that this rivalry must first be carried on through negotiation, with the negotiators backed by force which will be applied if the talks break down. Finally, they understand that all of this, which in a rational society based on human interests will be seen as an insane waste, is normal and sane under capitalism.

Summit talks are barren because capitalism's leaders are powerless to eradicate problems which are rooted in the system. Perhaps some of them even understand that and try to cover their impotence under such ballyhoo as Reagan's jokes and Mrs Gorbachev's clothes. If at present this seems to work for the leaders, it can only be because the world's people are dazzled by their distant view of the summit and ignore what is going on all around them on the ground.

Ivan

The Sorcerer's Apprentice (1983)

From the June 1983 issue of the Socialist Standard

How do the views of both CND and the government relate to the current state of military technology and its impact on arms control? Are their propositions — respectively preventing the deployment of Cruise and Trident and multilateral and verifiable disarmament — tenable within capitalism in general and contemporary military technology and doctrine in particular?

The main focus of present CND policy is to prevent the deployment of the Ground Launched Cruise Missile (GLCM) and the replacement of the Polaris A-3 missile with the Trident D-5 missile — a qualitiative improvement, they argue, which brings the doctrinal concept of nuclear war-fighting closer. Moreover, Britain can only avoid being a major target in the event of war by cancelling Trident and Cruise as a step towards unilateral nuclear disarmament. While it is correct to say that the Trident D-5 Submarine Launched Ballistic Missile (SLBM) is a qualitative improvement on Polaris (it has a longer range, 11,000 km compared to 4600 km; 14 independently targetable warheads with a yield of 150 kt each compared to 3 re-entry vehicles each with a yield of 200 kt; improved accuracy and terminal guidance) its cancellation will not make Britain any less of a target in the event of war.

Targeting is the key to military doctrine. The CND argument loses sight of this, focusing on particular weapon types, such as Cruise and Trident, without attempting to relate them to overall force structures and strategic doctrine or to the political and economic conflict from which they originate. In terms of military doctrine CND miss the main point — the vital importance of command, control, communications and intelligence (C3') to the capacity to wage and win a war. Without C3’ Cruise and Trident are useless. The location and targeting of C3' installations determines priority in target selection. In this respect Britain is high on the list, irrespective of existing military-targets, because of its strategic importance in relation to C3'.

C3’ includes all modern communications systems: radio, telephone, air traffic control, early warning systems, satellite tracking stations and airports. In war installations such as those at Cheltenham, Rugby, Preston and Fylingdales would be priority targets. These facilities are elemental to the use of weapon systems; for example, C3' is necessary for the rapid transmission of targeting information and directions to offensive forces. The vulnerability of C3’ is not restricted to a direct hit by a nuclear device. The air detonation (the higher the better) of a thermo-nuclear bomb several kilometres from a C3’ target is just as effective. This is because such an explosion produces an electromagnetic pulse (EMP) which creates a voltage surge in electrical circuits strong enough to be permanently- damaging; moreover, EMP can obliterate information stored in computer software. Other affects include “TREE" — transient radiation effects on electronics. The combined effect is the disruption and dislocation of C3', a communications blackout which seriously inhibits the capacity to wage war. An explosion at an altitude of 100 km would be more than sufficient to affect all of the British Isles.

Soviet military commanders could not allow C3' facilities in Britain to remain intact even though Britain possessed no nuclear weapons. (John Erickson, The War About Peace, Central TV, 21 April 1983 and a Radio Scotland Broadcast 2 April 1983). They would have to be "denied" to the Americans. So Britain is a major target, and from a military point of view, when C3' is so vital this is an eminently sensible policy. In this respect unilateralism is irrelevant. In fact, for Britain to avoid being targeted all telecommunication systems and airports would have to be dismantled, in effect reducing Britain to the level of a medieval agrarian society, and would then need to be towed to somewhere like the South Atlantic.

Target identification and location plays a major role in modern military strategy. Here the technical improvements to weapons, increased accuracy and yield to weight ratios for example, militate against a doctrine of "minimum deterrence" in which about 200 to 400 warheads would be enough to destroy either superpower. The identification of potential targets is no problem; there are 40,000 in the Soviet Union alone, and when one considers that there are only about 200 Soviet cities with populations in excess of 100,000 and relatively few specifically military targets, then it is clear that there are numerous non-military targets. C3' has already been mentioned, but other targets include petroleum refineries, power stations, railway yards, docks and shipyards. This form of targeting is known as "countervalue" and Britain has no shortage of such targets either; for example Grangemouth, Drax. Millerhill and Southampton.

The targeting of military sites, missile silos and troop concentrations is known as "counterforce” and despite the CND argument that preparation for fighting a nuclear war is something new, counterforce has been around since the late 1950s and early 1960s. The US Airforce was committed to counterforce by the early 1960s; this provided a rationale for the development of the Multiple Independently-Targetable Re-entry Vehicle (MIRV) which would make more targets available per missile.

In 1964 . . . the Mark 12 Task Group realised that the MIRV system it was developing could not be justified by any existing mission requirement. Its members made a conscious effort to find a strategic rationale. Counterforce targeting and growth of Soviet missile forces promised the solution. MIRV could be justified by the need for greater target coverage.

(Making the MIRV: A Study of Defense Decision Making, Ted Greenwood, Ballinger. Cambridge. Mass.. 1975. p.53).

So what appears to be happening is that technology is running out of control in relation to weapon systems, doctrine and C3’. In short it is the technical improvements to weapons that shapes doctrine and not the other way around. Just how the banning of Cruise and Trident is supposed to reverse this process is not clear.

As civil and military technology develop the distinction between nuclear and conventional weaponry becomes blurred. In effect the major difference between different types of weaponry is time — conventional, chemical and biological weapons will take a rather longer time to destroy the world. The notion that war can be sanitised by the removal or barring of specific weapon systems is ludicrous; for example, there is a fuel air explosive (Arms Control and Technological Innovation, eds. D. Carlton & C. Schaerf. Croom Helm, London, 1977, p.65) which can create the same overpressures as a small yield nuclear weapon; secondly, the new Soviet 5.45 x 39mm bullet contains a mild steel core surrounded by lead which forms a plug toward the tip of the bullet but fails to fill the tip. The centre of gravity is far to the rear ensuring that it will flip over when hitting the human body. It will thus very effectively deposit its energy in the body, causing an “explosive type wound". (World Armaments and Disarmament 1982, Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, Taylor & Francis, London, p.451). Efforts to contain these technological developments have not been conspicuous by their success. This brings us neatly to the whole question of arms control in relation to technological development.

The British government insists that multilateral arms control is the best road to disarmament; however, it is clear that disarmament has never been a serious possibility. The Russians claim that they have tabled 150 separate disarmament proposals since the 1950s, all of which were rejected. The West could no doubt make the same claim. Such proposals were, and still are, for propaganda purposes and chiefly for internal consumption; arms control, on the other hand, seeks to “stabilise" the arms race; it can never provide “security". The object is to institutionalise the arms race by avoiding or limiting major quantitative improvements to existing forces. The superpowers agree to put certain areas out of bounds to save the expense of developing or deploying new weapon systems; for instance, the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, the Antarctic Treaty, the Outer Space Treaty and the Seabed Treaty. In contrast, SALT actually fuelled the arms race since it placed no restrictions on qualitative improvements which in any case are very difficult to monitor, let alone enforce. SALT only limited launchers — holes in the ground or in submarines — not warheads or accuracy. The MIRV was left unchecked permitting a legitimate increase in the number of warheads. The US had 6784 in 1973, but 9000 in 1981. Since a Mirved missile is externally indistinguishable from a non-mirved one it is impossible for satellites to tell the difference. In this respect arms control achieved its principal aim which was to put the arms race on a more predictable course and avoid de-stabilising events. In any event technological improvements in weapons makes existing arms control procedures increasingly redundant.

As one American general said you cannot compare “apples and pears”; this refers to not only the asymmetries in superpower force structures, but also to their strategic doctrines. The Russians prefer large land based missiles, reflecting technological inferiority, 72 per cent of Russian warheads are land based. The Americans prefer to put their deterrent to sea, 50 per cent of warheads are on SLBMs. This presents accounting problems. Considerable time was spent in SALT II disputing the status of the Soviet Tu-22m, Backfire bomber. The Americans insisted that it was a strategic delivery system (intercontinental) whereas the Russians argued that it was for the Eurasian theatre only.

In the European theatre the asymmetries and technical complexities are even more acute making arms control more difficult, if not impossible, to come by. For instance, in the Intermediate Nuclear Force talks both sides cannot agree on what to count or include. The question of nuclear capable aircraft (those able to drop nuclear bombs) is a case in point; for example, should the Russian Mig 23/27 Flogger be classed as a “Primary long-range theatre aircraft" or a “marginal long-range nuclear aircraft"?

The inclusion of British and French forces is another area of contention. Both insist that their forces should be excluded; the Americans agree, but the Russians argue that anything that can hit Soviet territory, irrespective of origin, must be counted. All this despite the fact that a rationale for Britain’s “independent deterrent" is that it allows access to the “top table". Indeed the Nassau Agreement of 1962. when Britain bought Polaris from America, specifically allocated Polaris to NATO for targeting purposes, in other words a theatre role as opposed to a strategic one.

Conventional weapons control in Europe is equally confused and unsuccessful. The Mutual and Balanced Force Reduction talks have been going on since 1973 and have achieved little. NATO considered the number of Warsaw Pact divisions and tanks a problem, but then discovered that it could not even count its own. Arms control is more than a numbers game. The case of the British government, that deterrence has kept the peace since 1945, is quite irrelevant to the state of military technology. In fact no one really knows what deters in deterrence in the first place, and when one considers the technical barriers to arms control, the government’s position is untenable.

Nor has Britain been active in the field of arms control. Lawrence Freedman in Britain and Nuclear Weapons notes that Britain has judiciously avoided arms control since it would involve the complete dismantlement of Britain's nuclear force. Despite the fact that Britain signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty in 1968 in which Article VI puts the onus on the signatories "to negotiate in good faith on effective measures relating to the cessation of the nuclear arms race", Britain avoided the SALT talks, fearing that the US would bargain away the Polaris force or be restrained from transferring weapon systems in the future. Furthermore Britain has no interest in a Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and as Thatcher has stated, "The British deterrent has no place at the INF negotiations" (Hansard, 18 January 1983. col. 109 written answers). Therefore, in addition to the technical obstacles to arms control, Britain has little enthusiasm for it, as is made clear by the decision to buy the Trident D-5. Just how arms control is supposed to lead to disarmament is never made clear.

Many in the arms control fraternity fear that technology is out of control making arms control an impossibility. The focus of concern is that it will be impossible to reassert human control; likewise with the talc of the Sorcerer’s apprentice who, having summoned up magical powers, lost control and was unable to regain it by himself since he did not understand the power he had brought into existence. The reassertion of social control over military technology is impossible even within the confines of capitalism; arms control, whether unilateral or multilateral, is an irrelevancy. Supporters of CND or the government would do well to consider such a proposition.

John Walker

Pass the Salt II (1979)

From the August 1979 issue of the Socialist Standard

"God will not forgive us if we fail." 

In England there is a principle called the sanctity of contract, which means that if two parties make a binding agreement for, say, the sale and purchase of a house and one seeks to renege, then the court will enforce the provisions of the contract. The losing party cannot thumb their nose at the decision of the court because they know it to be the servant of the all-powerful state. While many people think they can apply this principle to contracts between capitalist states (usually called treaties), the analogy is false for the simple reason that here each party is a power in its own right and there is no superior power or court which will hold the scales — and the even more important sword — of 'justice' between them. 

Capitalist states nevertheless do make treaties when it suits them (which usually means that one side is strong and the other weak). History is littered with treaties, and when it is convenient they may even be adhered to, sometimes for long periods. But history is also littered with broken treaties. There was one to respect the 'neutrality' of Belgium in 1914. And again, that of Norway in 1940. In each case Germany broke the pact; the western allies were most indignant and accused Germany of regarding treaties as scraps of paper. How right they were; scraps of paper is just what treaties are. 

The indignation is of course faked and fraudulent. In both cases the western powers had been seriously contemplating doing the violating themselves. Germany just got in first. And, as we mentioned in a recent issue of this journal, the ballyhoo surrounding the signing of a treaty at Camp David between Israel and Egypt could not hide the fact that while both sides clearly thought the piece of paper was worth having, there were simultaneous arrangements whereby both sides made sure they had enormous armaments on the new Sinai dividing line. These capitalist states were not going to defend themselves with a scrap of paper. 

Such facts are a necessary corrective, should anyone be foolish enough to imagine that the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (SALT) recently signed between Carter and Brezhnev is going to bring peace to the capitalist jungle. The treaty Russia and America have just solemnly entered into is SALT II; there was once a SALT I, and already the papers are telling us that the next stage is SALT III. If two neighbours agree to love each other, or at any rate not to strike each other, that's fine. But if they need a complete series of agreements to say they won't hurt each other, their sincerity is clearly a sham. It all sounds too much like the dictum of that puritan militarist Cromwell: trust in god, but keep your powder dry. 

The question may well be asked: why do these superpowers go through this meaningless rigmarole? The answer is that, as with Camp David, a piece of paper can have some value. It can give a breathing space. Sometimes it can be respected — if it suits the parties — for a very long time. The 1704 Treaty of Utrecht gave a piece of Spain called Gibraltar to England, whose ruling class still own it (much as they would like to get shot of it!). The reality behind SALT II is that it has dawned upon both super-powers that the cost of continual 'improvements' of nuclear weapons is becoming astronomical — and more and more ludicrous. Each side clearly has in its arsenals enough H-bombs and nuclear submarines and missiles and impregnable silos to ensure that if it came to the crunch, both sides could be wiped out — and the rest of the human race too — in a short, sharp, mutually destructive holocaust. 

In 1956, at the time of Suez, when Khruschev was sabre rattling against England, CNDers and leftists generally were quick to point out that Russia would have no difficulty in blowing England off the map, and 'our' little H-bombs could not stop her. But it is a leftist defect not to see what does not suit their arguments. The fact is that one little British Polaris submarine carried sixteen warheads, each one of which packed a punch a hundred times as violent as the pea-shooter which devastated Hiroshima and killed about 100,000 'little yellow bastards', as they were then affectionately called. A Polaris submarine is almost undetectable in the depths of the oceans and would have no problem in hitting — and wiping out — Moscow or Leningrad. 

So the balance of terror, though overwhelmingly on the side of Russia, still left Khruschev with same tricky problems; for example, would he and the rest of the red fascist gang in the Kremlin be there to smell the roses after the ball was over? Capitalist politicians (which term includes Brezhnev, of course) may not be very clever, but it does occur to them from time to time that continuous multiplication of the 'overkill' factor is enormously expensive. It is therefore in the interests of both sides to see if they can reach same accommodation on the matter. Leftists tend to think that states belong to armament makers and militarists and that consequently the more money that is spent on arms, the more the capitalist class likes it. This is nonsense, The enormous costs are paid out of the collective pocket of the capitalist state. If one section — the arms manufacturers — make huge profits, the others have to pay huge taxes. So it is in the interests of the state as a whole to try and curb all expenditure — on H-bombs as well as on the NHS. But it's a tricky job because neither side is so stupid as to trust the other. Even the capitalist class can't win 'em all, so they do the best they can. 

If you want to see the best commentary on the whole ludicrous negotiations, read Punch (16 May) with its article headed "SALT talks break down in utter confusion or maybe success". But it is nearly as hilarious to read serious papers. The Guardian (21 June) had an article by Hella Pick (their Russia expert , whose writings would always look better in Punch) headed: "Pravda warns against changes to letter or spirit of SALT". The following piece of the article is worth quoting: 

Pravda also sought to convince Americans of the Soviet Union's good faith by promising not only to observe the treaty itself', together with its accompanying 'common statements of understanding' but also all other commitments signed by Brezhnev in Vienna . . .  Pravda evidently tried to insist that Brezhnev's word, even if not put altogether into writing, was good and would be carried out." 

So it seems we can now not only trust our lives to politicians' scraps of paper, but even to the breath that comes out of their lying lips. No doubt if Brezhnev reneges (or Carter, of course) we can send him a summons to appear in the Small Claims Court. 

That other journal for leftist would-be intellectuals, The Observer, had one of its most ponderous leading articles on the subject (24 June), headed: "We must back SALT". It gave a number of reasons. The first will be enough: 

While SALT II is a disappointment because it allows both sides to build new weapons systems, it is a necessary step towards arms reductions in future.

The entire article reads like a satire worthy of Swift or Voltaire. The appalling thing is that these highly paid pundits take their own guff seriously, and no doubt Observer readers nod sagely as they read these words of wisdom. This is very sad; as ordinary people allow themselves to be fooled by this, so long will this horrific social system remain. 

As an addendum, I must not forget to give the ascription to the little quote in the sub-heading to this article. It is taken from The Observer (24 June) 'Sayings of the Week'. I fancy it is really the saying of the century. It was uttered by one of the two Great Men at the SALT talks. Carter. No — it was the other fellow. And no newspaper - not even the Morning Star - saw fit to comment on it. The mind, in this case, does not boggle. 

L. E. Weidberg