In Defense of "Good Judgment"

By Harold Brown

Last week TIME published an open letter from former Defense Secretary James Schlesinger challenging Michael Dukakis' "views" and "instincts" on national security. Schlesinger accused Dukakis of snubbing military installations in Massachusetts, opposing most new weapons systems, having a questionable commitment to nuclear deterrence, alarming U.S. allies with his calls for enhancing NATO's ability to "fight and win" a conventional war, and underestimating the cost of a conventional buildup. Another former Defense Secretary, Harold Brown, who has consulted with the Dukakis campaign, responds:

Jim Schlesinger is an able, experienced practitioner in national security matters, but his attack on Governor Dukakis' defense positions is seriously misleading. We should examine issues rather than count visits to military bases.

Schlesinger notes that Dukakis has criticized several strategic-weapons systems. So have I. So has Schlesinger. The question, especially in a time of tight defense budgets, is which strategic programs to pursue. The B-1 bomber and the Strategic Defense Initiative suffer from serious technical problems. To question these programs is evidence of Dukakis' good judgment. On the other hand, cruise missiles, the Stealth bomber and an SDI program limited to research and development make sense. Dukakis supports all three.

The issue of a new intercontinental ballistic missile is more complex. The Reagan Administration wants to deploy the ten-warhead MX on railroad cars -- a scheme that might be even more vulnerable to surprise attack than our current system of triple-warhead Minuteman ICBMs in underground silos. Many in Congress (along with Schlesinger and myself) favor the single-warhead Midgetman deployed on mobile launchers, but the very high cost of such a system cannot be ignored. Another option consistent with Dukakis' position would be the deployment of Minuteman in multiple protective shelters (the so- called shell game). The real test for the next President is whether he can achieve a consensus within his own Executive Branch and with Congress. This Administration has utterly failed to do that.

Schlesinger is right that "nuclear weapons and nuclear strategy hold NATO together" but wrong to accuse Dukakis of failing to understand that truth. Part of what deters conventional war in Europe is the possibility that such a conflict would escalate to general nuclear war. That is why our allies were so concerned when President Reagan, during his meeting with Mikhail Gorbachev at Reykjavik in 1986, was willing to abolish nuclear weapons and thus abandon nuclear deterrence altogether.

But it is also important to improve NATO's capability to wage conventional war, so as to convince Soviet decision makers that they cannot count on a quick victory in Western Europe. That does not mean giving NATO a capability to "win" in the classic sense -- any more than our ability to destroy the U.S.S.R. in retaliation for a nuclear attack on the U.S. means an ability to "win" in a strategic war. It is a combination of nuclear and conventional capabilities that deters. That is what Dukakis seeks.

Schlesinger questions whether an improvement in the East-West balance of conventional forces can be reconciled with Dukakis' fiscal conservatism. It can. In addition to a modest growth in allied budgets, some funds could come from more efficient allied procurement and deployments; there could be savings from less expensive strategic forces; and Soviet forces could be constrained through arms control. The current Administration is snarled in knots of its own making and cannot resolve these matters. The task for the next President will be to work with Congress to match defense and deterrence with arms reduction and economic reality.