Engineer Memoirs
helped close loopholes and strengthen the verification of the treaty. In the end, I
surpassed the goal assigned me-only five senators voted against the treaty.
The second part of our preparation for the Moscow summit, advancing START,
went less smoothly. Although we concluded that many of the remaining obstacles
to START had been resolved at Reykjavik, the Soviets would not agree to the fine
print. During the experts' meetings we held with the Soviets in the spring of 1988,
two things became clear. First, that the Soviets wanted to link progress in START
to an advancement of their own ideas in the defense arena. They wanted to
preserve the ABM treaty and the narrow interpretation they gave it. They still
wanted to kill our U.S. SDI programs.
The Soviets were in no hurry to conclude a START agreement and were
determined to do so only on their terms. Informal discussions I had with Marshal
Akhromeyev and General Chervov convinced me that the Soviets were intent on
remaining a superpower. And to remain a superpower in the face of their declining
economic power and their internal political difficulties convinced them that they
should retain their nuclear strength. The Soviets were willing to reduce their
conventional forces because the geographic location made them confident their
security would not be endangered. Besides, they needed the resources to be saved
by conventional force reductions. Since strategic forces cost only one-seventh as
much as conventional forces, the Soviets decided they could afford the strategic
expenditures.
Faced with evidence of Soviet intransigence on START, President Reagan told Lou
Cannon, in an interview, not to expect a START agreement to come out of the
Moscow summit.
Our third task during the run up to the Moscow summit was to advance President
Reagan's broad agenda. In a series of ministerial meetings with Foreign Minister
Shevardnadze, Secretary Schultz hammered away at President Reagan's desire to
get some agreement on human rights and regional issues. Constant pressure on the
Soviets' performance in human rights was beginning to pay small but discernible
dividends. However, there was little if any progress on regional affairs. The two
ministers continued to talk past one another. Still, each side was able to explain
its positions and elaborate on it; at the very least each side clearly understood
where the other side stood.
In the preparations for the Moscow summit, I was once again struck by the
important role speech writers played in gaining support for the President's policies.
Some of the fiercest interagency battles were fought-usually behind the scenes-
over what went into these speeches. Several days before we left for Moscow, a
speech Reagan was to give in Helsinki came across my desk. I thought it was an
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