Reckless attacks on START II

Presidential campaigns can become occasions for a protracted debate about crucial issues. When the debate is conducted with respect for the voters and without demagoguery, the candidates' disagreements can serve an educational function, offering the public an indispensable opportunity to form the judgments that make accountable self-government possible.

But in an era when candidates are too often marketed like toothpaste, campaign discourse can descend to the level of hucksterism. So it was Tuesday in New Hampshire, where candidate Phil Gramm called for a Senate vote against ratification of the START II treaty unless it would not prevent the United States from developing an antimissile defense system.

In staking out a position that distinguishes him from the Republican front-runner, Bob Dole, Gramm denigrated an arms reduction treaty that is very much in the national interest. START II will eliminate entirely Russia's land-based multiple-warhead missiles - the weapon that long haunted the nightmares of US strategic planners.

Gramm compounded this folly by suggesting that the dubious project of developing a technological shield against long-range missiles has a security value that makes it worthwhile to hold START II hostage. His fellow presidential candidate Stephen Forbes tried to justify this inversion of US security interests by contending that the purpose of developing an antimissile system would be to defend not against a ``massive attack'' from Russia but against ``a terrorist attack or an attack from a terrorist state.''

In reality, the threat from terrorists without missile delivery systems cannot be thwarted by lasers pointed at the sky. The World Trade Center bombing and the poison gas attacks on the Tokyo subway system illustrate the nature of the terrorist threat that needs to be parried.

Meanwhile, the irresponsibility of the position taken by Gramm and Forbes threatens to play into the hands of Russian nationalists, who are eager to escape the provisions of START II and preserve Moscow's full arsenal of nuclear weapons.

This story ran on page 10 of the Boston Globe on 01/04/96.