My fellow Americans, thank you for sharing your time with me tonight.
The subject I want to discuss with you, peace and national security, is both
timely and important. Timely, because I've reached a decision which offers a
new hope for our children in the 21st century, a decision I'll tell you about
in a few minutes. And important because there's a very big decision that you
must make for yourselves. This subject involves the most basic duty that any
President and any people share, the duty to protect and strengthen the peace.
At the beginning of this year, I submitted to the Congress a defense budget
which reflects my best judgment of the best understanding of the experts and
specialists who advise me about what we and our allies must do to protect our
people in the years ahead. That budget is much more than a long list of
numbers, for behind all the numbers lies America's ability to prevent the
greatest of human tragedies and preserve our free way of life in a sometimes
dangerous world. It is part of a careful, long-term plan to make America strong
again after too many years of neglect and mistakes.
Our efforts to rebuild America's defenses and strengthen the peace began 2
years ago when we requested a major increase in the defense program. Since
then, the amount of those increases we first proposed has been reduced by half,
through improvements in management and procurement and other savings.
The budget request that is now before the Congress has been trimmed to the
limits of safety. Further deep cuts cannot be made without seriously
endangering the security of the Nation. The choice is up to the men and women
you've elected to the Congress, and that means the choice is up to you.
Tonight, I want to explain to you what this defense debate is all about and why
I'm convinced that the budget now before the Congress is necessary,
responsible, and deserving of your support. And I want to offer hope for the
future.
But first, let me say what the defense debate is not about. It is not about
spending arithmetic. I know that in the last few weeks you've been bombarded
with numbers and percentages. Some say we need only a 5 percent increase in
defense spending. The so called alternate budget backed by liberals in the
House of Representatives would lower the figure to 2 to 3 percent, cutting our
defense spending by $163 billion over the next 5 years. The trouble with all
these numbers is that they tell us little about the kind of defense program
America needs or the benefits and security and freedom that our defense effort
buys for us.
What seems to have been lost in all this debate is the simple truth of how a
defense budget is arrived at. It isn't done by deciding to spend a certain
number of dollars. Those loud voices that are occasionally heard charging that
the Government is trying to solve a security problem by throwing money at it
are nothing more than noise based on ignorance. We start by considering what
must be done to maintain peace and review all the possible threats against our
security. Then a strategy for strengthening peace and defending against those
threats must be agreed upon. And, finally, our defense establishment must be
evaluated to see what is necessary to protect against any or all of the
potential threats. The cost of achieving these ends is totaled up, and the
result is the budget for national defense.
There is no logical way that you can say, let's spend x billion dollars less.
You can only say, which part of our defense measures do we believe we can do
without and still have security against all contingencies? Anyone in the
Congress who advocates a percentage or a specific dollar cut in defense
spending should be made to say what part of our defenses he would eliminate,
and he should be candid enough to acknowledge that his cuts mean cutting our
commitments to allies or inviting greater risk or both.
The defense policy of the United States is based on a simple premise: The
United States does not start fights. We will never be an aggressor. We maintain
our strength in order to deter and defend against aggression - to preserve
freedom and peace.
Since the dawn of the atomic age, we've sought to reduce the risk of war by
maintaining a strong deterrent and by seeking genuine arms control. Deterrence
means simply this: making sure any adversary who thinks about attacking the
United States, or our allies, or our vital interests, concludes that the risks
to him outweigh any potential gains. Once he understands that, he won't attack.
We maintain the peace through our strength; weakness only invites aggression.
This strategy of deterrence has not changed. It still works. But what it takes
to maintain deterrence has changed. It took one kind of military force to deter
an attack when we had far more nuclear weapons than any other power; it takes
another kind now that the Soviets, for example, have enough accurate and
powerful nuclear weapons to destroy virtually all of our missiles on the
ground. Now, this is not to say that the Soviet Union is planning to make war
on us. Nor do I believe a war is inevitable - quite the contrary. But what must
be recognized is that our security is based on being prepared to meet all
threats.
There was a time when we depended on coastal forts and artillery batteries,
because, with the weaponry of that day, any attack would have had to come by
sea. Well, this is a different world, and our defenses must be based on
recognition and awareness of the weaponry possessed by other nations in the
nuclear age. We can't afford to believe that we will never be threatened. There
have been two world wars in my lifetime. We didn't start them and, indeed, did
everything we could to avoid being drawn into them. But we were ill-prepared
for both. Had we been better prepared, peace might have been preserved.
For 20 years the Soviet Union has been accumulating enormous military might.
They didn't stop when their forces exceeded all requirements of a legitimate
defensive capability. And they haven't stopped now. During the past decade and
a half, the Soviets have built up a massive arsenal of new strategic nuclear
weapons- weapons that can strike directly at the United States.
As an example, the United States introduced its last new intercontinental
ballistic missile, the Minute Man Ill, in 1969, and we're now dismantling our
even older Titan missiles. But what has the Soviet Union done in these
intervening years? Well, since 1969 the Soviet Union has built five new classes
of ICBM's, and upgraded these eight times. As a result, their missiles are much
more powerful and accurate than they were several years ago, and they continue
to develop more, while ours are increasingly obsolete.
The same thing has happened in other areas. Over the same period, the Soviet
Union built 4 new classes of submarine-launched ballistic missiles and over 60
new missile submarines. We built 2 new types of submarine missiles and actually
withdrew 10 submarines from strategic missions. The Soviet Union built over 200
new Backfire bombers, and their brand new Blackjack bomber is now under
development. We haven't built a new long-range bomber since our B52's were
deployed about a quarter of a century ago, and we've already retired several
hundred of those because of old age. Indeed, despite what many people think,
our strategic forces only cost about 15 percent of the defense budget.
Another example of what's happened: In 1978 the Soviets had 600
intermediate-range nuclear missiles based on land and were beginning to add the
SS20 - a new, highly accurate, mobile missile with 3 warheads. We had none.
Since then the Soviets have strengthened their lead. By the end of 1979, when
Soviet leader Brezhnev declared "a balance now exists," the
Soviets had over 800 warheads. We still had none. A year ago this month, Mr.
Brezhnev pledged a moratorium, or freeze, on SS20 deployment. But by last
August, their 800 warheads had become more than 1,200. We still had none. Some
freeze. At this time Soviet Defense Minister Ustinov announced
"approximate parity of forces continues to exist." But the
Soviets are still adding an average of 3 new warheads a week, and now have
1,300. These warheads can reach their targets in a matter of a few minutes. We
still have none. So far, it seems that the Soviet definition of parity is a box
score of 1,300 to nothing, in their favor.
So, together with our NATO allies, we decided in 1979 to deploy new weapons,
beginning this year, as a deterrent to their SS20's and as an incentive to the
Soviet Union to meet us in serious arms control negotiations. We will begin
that deployment late this year. At the same time, however, we're willing to
cancel our program if the Soviets will dismantle theirs. This is what we've
called a zero-zero plan. The Soviets are now at the negotiating table - and I
think it's fair to say that without our planned deployments, they wouldn't be
there.
Now, let's consider conventional forces. Since 1974 the United States has
produced 3,050 tactical combat aircraft. By contrast, the Soviet Union has
produced twice as many. When we look at attack submarines, the United States
has produced 27 while the Soviet Union has produced 61. For armored vehicles,
including tanks, we have produced 11,200. The Soviet Union has produced 54,000
- nearly 5 to 1 in their favor. Finally, with artillery, we've produced 950
artillery and rocket launchers while the Soviets have produced more than 13,000
- a staggering 14-to-1 ratio. There was a time when we were able to offset
superior Soviet numbers with higher quality, but today they are building
weapons as sophisticated and modern as our
own.
As the Soviets have increased their military power, they've been emboldened to
extend that power. They're spreading their military influence in ways that can
directly challenge our vital interests and those of our allies.
The following aerial photographs, most of them secret until now, illustrate
this point in a crucial area very close to home: Central America and the
Caribbean Basin. They're not dramatic photographs. But I think they help give
you a better understanding of what I'm talking about.
This Soviet intelligence collection facility, less than a hundred miles from
our coast, is the largest of its kind in the world. The acres and acres of
antennae fields and intelligence monitors are targeted on key U.S. military
installations and sensitive activities. The installation in Lourdes, Cuba, is
manned by 1,500 Soviet technicians. And the satellite ground station allows
instant communications with Moscow. This 28-square mile facility has grown by
more than 60 percent in size and capability during the past decade.
In western Cuba, we see this military airfield and it complement of modern,
Soviet-built Mig23 aircraft. The Soviet Union uses this Cuban airfield for its
own long-range reconnaissance missions. And earlier this month, two modern
Soviet antisubmarine warfare aircraft began operating from it. During the past
2 years, the level of Soviet arms exports to Cuba can only be compared to the
levels reached during the Cuban missile crisis 20 years ago.
This third photo, which is the only one in this series that has been previously
made public, shows Soviet military hardware that has made its way to Central
America. This airfield with is Ml-8 helicopters, anti-aircraft guns, and
protected fighter sites is one of a number of military facilities in Nicaragua
which has received Soviet equipment funneled through Cuba, and reflects the
massive military buildup going on in that country.
On the small island of Grenada, at the southern end of the Caribbean chain, the
Cubans, with Soviet financing and backing, are in the process of building an
airfield with a 10,000-foot runway. Grenada doesn't even have an air force. Who
is it intended for? The Caribbean is a very important passageway for our
international commerce and military lines of communication.
More than half of all American oil imports now pass through the Caribbean. The
rapid buildup of Grenada's military potential is unrelated to any conceivable
threat to this island country of under 110,000 people and totally at odds with
the pattern of other eastern Caribbean States, most of which are unarmed.
The Soviet-Cuban militarization of Grenada, in short, can only be seen as power
projection into the region. And it is in this important economic and strategic
area that we're trying to help the Governments of El Salvador, Costa Rica,
Honduras, and others in their struggles for de mocracy against guerrillas
supported through Cuba and Nicaragua.
These pictures only tell a small part of the story. l wish I could show you
more without compromising our most sensitive intelligence sources and methods.
But the Soviet Union is also supporting Cuban military forces in Angola and
Ethiopia. They have bases in Ethiopia and South Yemen, near the Persian Gulf
oil fields. They've taken over the port that we built at Cam Ranh Bay in
Vietnam. And now for the first time in history, the Soviet Navy is a force to
be reckoned with in the South Pacific.
Some people may still ask: Would the Soviets ever use their formidable military
power? Well, again, can we afford to believe they won't? There is Afghanistan.
And in Poland, the Soviets denied the will of the people and in so doing
demonstrated to the world how their military power could also be used to
intimidate.
The final fact is that the Soviet Union is acquiring what can only be
considered an offensive military force. They have continued to build far more
intercontinental ballistic missiles than they could possibly need simply to
deter an attack. Their conventional forces are trained and equipped not so much
to defend against an attack as they are to permit sudden, surprise offensives
of their own.
Our NATO allies have assumed a great defense burden, including the military
draft in most countries. We're working with them and our other friends around
the world to do more. Our defensive strategy means we need military forces that
can move very quickly, forces that are trained and ready to respond to any
emergency. Every item in our defense program - our ships, our tanks, our
planes, our funds for training and spare parts - is intended for one
all-important purpose: to keep the peace. Unfortunately, a decade of neglecting
our military forces had called into question our ability to do that.
When I took office in January 1981, I was appalled by what I found: American
planes that couldn't fly and American ships that couldn't sail for lack of
spare parts and trained personnel and insufficient fuel and ammunition for
essential training. The inevitable result of all this was poor morale in our
Armed Forces, difficulty in recruiting the brightest young Americans to wear
the uniform, and difficulty in convincing our most experienced military
personnel to stay on.
There was a real question then about how well we could meet a crisis. And it
was obvious that we had to begin a major modernization program to ensure we
could deter aggression and preserve the peace in the years ahead.
We had to move immediately to improve the basic readiness and staying power of
our conventional forces, so they could meet - and therefore help deter-a
crisis. We had to make up for lost years of investment by moving forward with a
long- term plan to prepare our forces to counter the military capabilities our
adversaries were developing for the future.
I know that all of you want peace, and so do 1. I know too that many of you
seriously believe that a nuclear freeze would further the cause of peace. But a
freeze now would make us less, not more, secure and would raise, not reduce,
the risks of war. It would be largely unverifiable and would seriously undercut
our negotiations on arms reduction. It would reward the Soviets for their
massive military buildup while preventing us from modernizing our aging and
increasingly vulnerable forces. With their present margin of superiority, why
should they agree to arms reductions knowing that we were prohibited from
catching up?
Believe me, it wasn't pleasant for someone who had come to Washington
determined to reduce government spending, but we had to move forward with the
task of repairing our defenses or we would lose our ability to deter conflict
now and in the future. We had to demonstrate to any adversary that aggression
could not succeed, and that the only real solution was substantial, equitable,
and effectively verifiable arms reduction - the kind we're working for right
now in Geneva. Thanks to your strong support, and bipartisan support from the
Congress, we began to turn things around. Already, we're seeing some very
encouraging results. Quality recruitment and retention are up dramatically -
more high school graduates are choosing military careers, and more experienced
career personnel are choosing to stay. Our men and women in uniform at last are
getting the tools and training they need to do their jobs.
Ask around today, especially among our young people, and I think you will find
a whole new attitude toward serving their country. This reflects more than just
better pay, equipment, and leadership. You the American people have sent a
signal to these young people that it is once again an honor to wear the
uniform. That's not something you measure in a budget, but it's a very real
part of our nation's strength. It'll take us longer to build the kind of
equipment we need to keep peace in the future, but we've made a good start.
We haven't built a new long-range bomber for 21 years. Now we're building the
B-1. We hadn't launched one new strategic submarine for 17 years. Now we're
building one Trident submarine a year. Our land-based missiles are increasingly
threatened by the many huge, new Soviet ICBM's. We're determining how to solve
that problem. At the same time, we're working in the START and INF negotiations
with the goal of achieving deep reductions in the strategic and intermediate
nuclear arsenals of both sides.
We have also begun the long-needed modernization of our conventional forces.
The Army is getting its first new tank in 20 years. The Air Force is
modernizing. We're rebuilding our Navy, which shrank from about a thousand
ships in the late 1960's to 453 during the 1970's. Our nation needs a superior
navy to sup port our military forces and vital interests overseas. We're now on
the road to achieving a 600-ship navy and increasing the amphibious
capabilities of our marines, who are now serving the cause of peace in Lebanon.
And we're building a real capability to assist our friends in the vitally
important Indian Ocean and Persian Gulf region. This adds up to a major effort,
and it isn't cheap. It comes at a time when there are many other pressures on
our budget and when the American people have already had to make major
sacrifices during the recession. But we must not be misled by those who would
make defense once again the scapegoat of the Federal budget.
The fact is that in the past few decades we have seen a dramatic shift in how
we spend the taxpayer's dollar. Back in 1955, payments to individuals took up
only about 20 percent of the Federal budget. For nearly three decades, these
payments steadily increased and, this year, will account for 49 percent of the
budget. By contrast, in 1955 defense took up more than half of the Federal
budget. By 1980 this spending had fallen to a low of 23 percent. Even with the
increase that I am requesting this year, defense will still amount to only 28
percent of the budget. The calls for cutting back the defense budget come in
nice, simple arithmetic. They're the same kind of talk that led the democracies
to neglect their defenses in the 1930's and invited the tragedy of World War
II. We must not let that grim chapter of history repeat itself through apathy
or neglect.
This is why I'm speaking to you tonight - to urge you to tell your Senators and
Congressmen that you know we must continue to restore our military strength. If
we stop in midstream, we will send a signal of decline, of lessened will, to
friends and adversaries alike. Free people must voluntarily, through open
debate and democratic means, meet the challenge that totalitarians pose by
compulsion. It's up to us, in our time, to choose and choose wisely between the
hard but necessary task of preserving peace and freedom and the temptation to
ignore our duty and blindly hope for the best while the enemies of freedom grow
stronger day by day.
The solution is well within our grasp. But to reach it, there is simply no
alternative but to continue this year, in this budget, to provide the resources
we need to preserve the peace and guarantee our freedom.
Now, thus far tonight I've shared with you my thoughts on the problems of
national security we must face together. My predecessors in the Oval Office
have appeared before you on other occasions to describe the threat posed by
Soviet power and have proposed steps to address that threat. But since the
advent of nuclear weapons, those steps have been increasingly directed toward
deterrence of aggression through the promise of retaliation.
This approach to stability through offensive threat has worked. We and our
allies have succeeded in preventing nuclear war for more than three decades. In
recent months, however, my advisers, including in particular the Joint Chiefs
of Staff, have underscored the necessity to break out of a future that relies
solely on offensive retaliation for our security.
Over the course of these discussions, I've become more and more deeply
convinced that the human spirit must be capable of rising above dealing with
other nations and human beings by threatening their existence. Feeling this
way, l believe we must thoroughly examine every opportunity for reducing
tensions and for introducing greater stability into the strategic calculus on
both sides.
One of the most important contributions we can make is, of course, to lower the
level of all arms, and particularly nuclear arms. We're engaged right now in
several negotiations with the Soviet Union to bring about a mutual reduction of
weapons. I will report to you a week from tomorrow my thoughts on that score.
But let me just say, I'm totally committed to this course.
If the Soviet Union will join with us in our effort to achieve major arms
reduction, we will have succeeded in stabilizing the nuclear balance.
Nevertheless, it will still be necessary to rely on the specter of retaliation,
on mutual threat. And that's a sad commentary on the human condition. Wouldn't
it be better to save lives than to avenge them? Are we not capable of
demonstrating our peaceful intentions by applying all our abilities and our
ingenuity to achieving a truly lasting stability? I think we are. Indeed, we
must.
After careful consultation with my advisers, including the Joint Chiefs of
Staff, l believe there is a way. Let me share with you a vision of the future
which offers hope. It is that we embark on a program to counter the awesome
Soviet missile threat with measures that are defensive. Let us turn to the very
strengths in technology that spawned our great industrial base and that have
given us the quality of life we enjoy today.
What if free people could live secure in the knowledge that their security did
not rest upon the threat of instant U.S. retaliation to deter a Soviet attack,
that we could intercept and destroy strategic ballistic missiles before they
reached our own soil or that of our allies?
I know this is a formidable, technical task, one that may not be accomplished
before the end of this century. Yet, current technology has attained a level of
sophistication where it's reasonable for us to begin this effort. It will take
years, probably decades of effort on many fronts. There will be failures and
setbacks, just as there will be successes and breakthroughs. And as we proceed,
we must remain constant in preserving the nuclear deterrent and maintaining a
solid capability for flexible response. But isn't it worth every investment
necessary to free the world from the threat of nuclear war? We know it is.
In the meantime, we will continue to pursue real reductions in nuclear arms,
negotiating from a position of strength that can be ensured only by modernizing
our strategic forces. At the same time, we must take steps to reduce the risk
of a conventional military conflict escalating to nuclear war by improving our
non-nuclear capabilities.
America does possess - now - the technologies to attain very significant
improvements in the effectiveness of our conventional, non-nuclear forces.
Proceeding boldly with these new technologies, we can significantly reduce any
incentive that the Soviet Union may have to threaten attack against the United
States or its allies.
As we pursue our goal of defensive technologies, we recognize that our allies
rely upon our strategic offensive power to deter attacks against them. Their
vital interests and ours are inextricably linked. Their safety and ours are
one. And no change in technology can or will alter that reality. We must and
shall continue to honor our commitments.
I clearly recognize that defensive systems have limitations and raise certain
problems and ambiguities. If paired with offensive systems, they can be viewed
as fostering an aggressive policy, and no one wants that. But with these
considerations firmly in mind, I call upon the scientific community in our
country, those who gave us nuclear weapons, to turn their great talents now to
the cause of mankind and world peace, to give us the means of rendering these
nuclear weapons impotent and obsolete.
Tonight, consistent with our obligations of the ABM treaty and recognizing the
need for closer consultation with our allies, I'm taking an important first
step. I am directing a comprehensive and intensive effort to define a long-term
research and development program to begin to achieve our ultimate goal of
eliminating the threat posed by strategic nuclear missiles. This could pave the
way for arms control measures to eliminate the weapons themselves. We seek
neither military superiority nor political advantage. Our only purpose one all
people share - is to search for ways to reduce the danger of nuclear war.
My fellow Americans, tonight we're launching an effort which holds the promise
of changing the course of human history. There will be risks, and results take
time. But I believe we can do it. As we cross this threshold, I ask for your
prayers and your support.
Thank you, good night, and God bless you.
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