The ABM Treaty and Missile Defense Testing: Does the United States Need to Withdraw Now?
Executive Summary
President Bush is apparently poised to announce that the United States will withdraw from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty-the first time in history that the United States has withdrawn from a major international arms control agreement.
The key question is: Why now? What is driving the Bush administration's urgency to pull out of the treaty now despite continuing objections from Russia, China, and US allies?
Bush administration officials argue that the ABM Treaty is standing in the way of US efforts to develop and test a system to defend against long-range missiles. However, our technical analysis shows that this testing rationale is specious. There is no compelling reason for the United States to withdraw from the treaty now.
The Bush administration has said it plans several activities in the near term that would violate the treaty. First, the Pentagon plans to use the SPY-1 radar on Aegis ships to observe an intercept test of the ground-based defense system that is currently under development. We find that there is no sound reason to conduct such tracking tests in the near future. By the Pentagon's own assessment, the SPY-1 radar is not capable enough to be used for a midcourse defense against long-range missiles. While a modified version of the radar may eventually play a role in a boost-phase defense, such a system is only in the early R&D stage and the modified radar is not available for testing.
The administration also plans to build five interceptor silos at Fort Greely, Alaska beginning in the summer of 2002, and to deploy interceptor missiles there by 2004. However, because safety considerations prevent the test launch of the interceptor missiles from Fort Greely, these silos would not be useful for testing. Administration attempts to justify Fort Greely as an "emergency defense" are also not compelling because the technology that could be deployed there by 2004 would not provide an effective defense. The 2004 date seems instead to be driven by domestic political factors, such as a desire to begin deployment before the next Presidential election.
What about the longer term?
We find that there is no compelling reason for the United States to withdraw from the ABM treaty for at least the next several years.
First, the ground-based defense system that is the centerpiece of the Bush program can be fully tested under the ABM Treaty. The many limitations and artificialities of that test program have nothing to do with the treaty.
Second, while the treaty restricts the testing of sea-based, air-based, space-based, or mobile ground-based defenses against long-range missiles, it does not prevent research and development on these technologies. The United States could conduct a robust development and testing program on the various defense systems it is pursuing for at least several years without bumping into ABM Treaty restrictions. In particular, the other defenses the Pentagon is developing against long-range missiles-the space-based systems and the sea-based boost phase system-are in the very early stages of research and development, and will not be ready to test in ways that violate the treaty for at least several years.
Finally, Russia was reportedly willing to give the United States extensive freedom to conduct missile defense tests, but wanted to proceed within the framework of the ABM treaty and retain some limits on systems that could eventually be deployed. Thus, had the United States been willing to proceed cooperatively with Russia, it appears that the treaty would not have become a barrier to future testing.
If the testing rationale were the real justification behind withdrawal from the treaty, there would be no reason to withdraw from the treaty now, or in the foreseeable future.
Instead, the real reason for the timing of the US withdrawal appears to be political. The Bush administration has made clear its desire to pull out of the treaty, and a near-term withdrawal appears designed to take advantage of muted domestic and international criticism in the wake of the war in Afghanistan.
Taking the unprecedented step of withdrawing from a major international treaty should not be done in haste or without solid strategic reasons. Withdrawal at this time is simply not justified. We examine these issues in more detail in the remainder of the paper.
