Book Reviews : The Soviet Union & SALT. Samuel B. Payne, Jr. M.I.T. Press. £12.40
| Published date | 01 April 1981 |
| DOI | 10.1177/004711788100700113 |
| Date | 01 April 1981 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
1078
than
the
politics
of
carrying
on
as
before.
To
add
or
subtract
a
nuclear
capability
would
command
attention;
to
maintain
it
would
be
barely
noticed.
This
is
why
it
seems
likely
that
Britain
will
continue
to
be
a
nuclear
power
well
into
the
next
century&dquo;.
&dquo;The
world
is
likely
to
contain
vast
nuclear
arsenals
of
enormous
destructive
power
for
the
indefinite
future.
It
is
because
of
this
that
the
future
is
so
indefinite.
Some
four
decades
ago,
at
the
very
start
of
the
nuclear
era,
Britain
played
a
crucial
part
in
being
the
first
to
demonstrate
that
an
atomic
bomb
was
both
a
theoretical
and
a
practical
proposition.
Many
subsequent
decisions,
mainly
taken
in
Washington
and
Moscow,
have
ensured
that
the
overbearing
role
of
nuclear
weapons
in
contem-
porary
international
affairs
is
now
so
well
established
as
to
be
virtually
beyond
political
choice.
Whether
the
world
is
to
have
nuclear
power
is
no
longer
an
issue
for
British
policy;
the
question
is
how
to
exist
in
such
a
world&dquo;.
To
which
the
only
comment
is
&dquo;nunc
dimittis&dquo;.
The
Soviet
Union
&
SALT.
Samuel
B.
Payne,
Jr.
M.I.T.
Press.
£12.40.
In
reviewing
this
book
it
would
seem
that
one
cannot
do
better
than
to
quote
the
opening
paragraphs
of
its
author
&dquo;From
the
earliest
days
of
Soviet
power
the
leaders
of
the
Soviet
Union
have
professed
support
for
disarmament
and
a
sincere
interest in
reaching
accommodation
with
their
capitalist
neighbours
on
many
issues.
They
have
also
expressed
deep
hostility
toward
capitalist
regimes
and
the
conviction
that
conflict,
if
not
necessarily
war,
with
them
is
inevitable.
The
first
foreign
policy
initiative
of
the
new
Soviet
regime,
the
Decree
on
Peace
of
November
8,
1917,
was
simultaneously
an
appeal
for
peace
and
an
attempt
to
mobilize
the
peoples
of
other
countries
to
overthrow
their
governments.&dquo;
This
attitude
stem-
ming
from
Marxist-Leninist
doctrine
was,
of
course,
bolstered
by
the
fact
of
the
hostility
which
unavoidably
faced
the
emerging
Soviet
regime
at
the
end
of
World
War
I.
Professor
Payne
goes
on
to
emphasize
that
it
is
difficult
to
decide
whether
the
present
Soviet
desire
for
accommodation
is
genuine
and
ex-
pressions
of
Soviet
hostility
simply
pro
forma
remnants
of
a
fading
ideology,
or
whether
Soviet
hostility
and
aggressive
intentions
are
the
basic
reality
and
Soviet
arms
control
proposals
merely
attempts
to
mobilise
popular
pressure
against
other
governments,
or
to
secure
a
Soviet
advantage.
A
third
possibility
&dquo;is
that
this
seeming
contradiction
does
not
exist,
that
Soviet
arms
proposals
are
intended
both
to
advance
the
Soviet
Union’s
interests
in
its
conflict
with
the
capitalist
countries
and
to
make
that
conflict
less
dangerous
or
that
different
Soviet
proposals
have
different
objectives.&dquo;
In
the
light
of
the
great
successes
of
Soviet
foreign
policy
in
some
areas,
as
well
as
its
failures,
this
reviewer
would
favour
the
thesis
of
the
double
aims
of
the
Soviet
rulers
as
set
out
above.
The
author
goes
on
to
emphasize
both
the
conflicts
between
the
Soviet
Politburo
members
and
their
contrasting
agreement
on
the
objective
of
maximising
the
use
of
their
accretion
of
military
strength
to
advance
their
global
aims.
He
emphasizes
the
difiiculty
of
assessing
the
Soviet
Union’s
real
military
potential
since
it is
almost
impossible
to
obtain
reliable
in-
formation
and
newspaper
reports
are
usually
polemical
and
therefore
largely
unreliable.
He
examines
the
SALT
process
and
concludes
&dquo;The
significance
of
SALT
should
neither
be
denied
nor
overestimated.
The
strategic
arms
limitation
agreements
already
concluded
have
restrained
the
strategic
weapons
race.
They
are
the
even
partially
successful
attempt
to
grapple
with
the
chief
menace
of
the
Atomic
Age;
the
strategic
nuclear
arsenals
of
the
United
States
and
the
Soviet
Union.
It
is
possible,
although
improbable,
that
future
agreements
will
halt
the
strategic
weapons
race,
entirely.
However,
the
cold
war
continues.
SALT
has
not
blunted
the
Soviet
drive
for
power,
and
it
is
very
unlikely
to
bring
about
the
’genera-
tion
for
peace’
for
which
President
Nixon
hoped.&dquo;
The
book
makes
a
very
important
contribution
to
all
those
studying
or
interested
in
arms
control,
American
foreign
policy
and
US-Soviet
relations.
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