Edward
Rowny
seems that whenever the Soviets were ready to strike a deal, they appointed a top
military man to head their team.
Marshal Akhromeyev, a spare, bespectacled man in his 60s, was obviously in
charge. When Karpov tried to intervene, Akhromeyev simply ignored him. The
marshal proposed that we begin with START, proceed toINF, and then to the
elimination of all nuclear weapons. Akhromeyev further suggested that we build
on the progress made by the experts and reduce strategic weapons to 6,000
"charges, a reduction of 50 percent. We said we could agree, but only if the
aggregate number of weapons did not include individual bomber weapons. To my
pleasant surprise, Akhromeyev suggested a solution along the lines Chervov,
Bessmertnykh, and I had discussed in September: that is, to count bombers carrying
only bombs as a single weapon in the 6,000 aggregate. This was entirely
satisfactory to us. Next, Akhromeyev turned to SLCMs [sea-launched cruise
missiles], and again, as Chervov,Bessmertnykh, and I had discussed, proposed that
we establish separate limits for these weapons outside the aggregate. This triggered
a prolonged and inconclusive discussion lasting several hours on how a SLCM limit
could be verified.
During the all-night marathon session, I spoke several times to Akhromeyev. He
was the only person on the Soviet side who spoke no English, and I was the only
person on our side who spoke some Russian. Our one-on-one informal sessions
revealed Akhromeyev's sense of humor. When I asked him if he was one of the
few remaining military men on active duty who had seen combat in World War II,
he said, `What do you mean by world War II? Do you mean the Great Patriotic
War?"
"Okay, have it your way," I said.
He replied: " D a , ya posledneye iz Mahikan" [Yes, I'm the last of theMahicans].
When I asked him where he had picked up that expression, he said with a wry
smile, "It's an old Russian saying."
Some six hours after we had started, about 2 a.m., Akhromeyev offered us
conditions we could accept on strategic forces and shifted to intermediate-range
forces. We said we were willing to reduce globally to 200 warheads on each side,
of which 100 would be in Europe. Akhromeyev said he would go us one better
and proposed that we reduce to zero in Europe. We said we wanted the Soviets
to reduce their forces "proportionately and concurrently" in Asia and therefore
reduce them to zero as well.
"No," Akhromeyev said, "no reductions in Asia. When we pressed him to
reduce in Asia, Akhromeyev replied with a typically western expression: "That
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