In many ways this is a strange time to be talking, even skeptically, about something as grandiose as stopping the nuclear arms race. Many people are in despair about the coming four years under Ronald Reagan. In less than a month, Reagan's administration has announced its plans to hike military spending and gut federal funding of vital aid to the poor.
Reagan has consistently opposed ratification of the long-dormant SALT II treaty. That treaty can now be declared clinically dead. In its place, Reagan has promised, like every president since Truman, to pursue genuine nuclear disarmament. But there is no reason to believe he will do any more toward realizing this goal than did his predecessors.
In this political environment one could well ask, "Why even talk about disarmament?" The only options seem to be to give up in despair or to stage a tactical retreat and salvage whatever crumbs one can from the militarist onslaught.
Only the hardest of heart could fail to empathize with the fear and despair felt by the poor, who will be the most immediate victims of Reagan's economic and military policies. But history, in ironic fashion, shows that the times of greatest danger can also be the times of greatest opportunity.
With the death of the SALT II treaty, there is a vacuum in the discussion of arms control. What seems to be lacking is a clear-cut alternative to the SALT process that could fill that vacuum.
But there is such an alternative. It is the idea of a complete moratorium on the testing, production, and deployment of all new or additional nuclear weapons and weapons delivery systems.
The moratorium proposal emerged more than a year ago as an amendment to the SALT II treaty when the treaty was being considered by the Senate. But in the past year, the moratorium (or freeze) idea has risen out of the ashes of SALT II and taken on a life of its own. It has been taken up by many churches and peace groups and is beginning to get a hearing throughout the nation.
It is difficult to imagine Reagan, or any other president, initiating a nuclear arms moratorium. The same can be said for Congress. The bizarre internal logic of the arms race has captivated and paralyzed conservatives and liberals alike. To break the cycle of the arms race will take a fresh approach from outside the system.
The moratorium proposal is particularly timely at the present stage of the arms race. For the past several years, the U.S. and Soviet nuclear arsenals have been at what has been called "rough parity." More than ever before, each side can be assured of its ability to efficiently destroy the other. From the start, the U.S. has led every quantitative and qualitative escalation of the arms race. But now the Soviets have, for all practical purposes, caught up. It is up to the U.S. to make the next move.
The next move in the plans of U.S. nuclear strategists is to develop counter-force (or first-strike) weapons. The counterforce weapons include the MX (a land-based mobile missile system), the Trident missile and submarine system, and the cruise missile, a small and extremely accurate weapon that is almost impossible to detect on radar. All these weapons are designed to be accurate enough to destroy enemy missiles while they are still in their silos. They are not designed to deter a nuclear war, but to fight and "win" one.
The planning of counterforce hardware has been accompanied by an official change in U.S. strategic doctrine. Jimmy Carter's Presidential Directive 59, released during the 1980 election campaign, made public a shift from a policy of deterrence through the threat of massive retaliation to one of aiming U.S. missiles specifically at military targets. This policy makes sense only if the U.S. plans to hit Soviet missiles before they can be launched.
Counterforce weapons represent the most dangerous step in the 36-year history of the arms race. They make nuclear war more likely than ever before. A moratorium in the next few years could help nullify this threat.
A moratorium could also have a significant impact on the proliferation of nuclear weapons to dozens of countries. So far, non-proliferation agreements have been designed primarily to maintain the superpowers' monopoly on nuclear weapons. Other nations have seen little reason to resist the nuclear temptation when the U.S. and the USSR continue to build up their stockpiles. A freeze could give the superpowers' talk of non-proliferation some credibility.
A nuclear arms freeze would also have important social and economic benefits. Billions of dollars, important skills, and creative energies would be freed to meet long-ignored needs in housing, mass transit, health care, and alternative energy sources. Stopping the MX alone could save more than $100 billion.
As important as it is to stop the deployment of counterforce weapons, the spread of nuclear weapons to other countries, and the waste of resources, a nuclear arms moratorium could have an even greater benefit. It could open up the possibility of actual disarmament.
If the human race is ever going to eliminate the curse of nuclear weapons altogether and have a world in which the threat of a holocaust no longer hangs over every moment, we will have to begin by stopping the production of more weapons. Only a freeze on new and additional nuclear weapons can make disarmament possible. All the arms control talks since the bombing of Hiroshima have not resulted in the elimination of one nuclear weapon. They have only fostered the illusion that our government is interested in disarmament. Even the two SALT agreements, purportedly arms limitations pacts, allowed new and additional nuclear weapons to be produced in great numbers.
One way in which a nuclear weapons freeze could come about would be for the U.S. to propose a bilateral freeze to the Soviet Union as the basis for new arms control negotiations. The Soviets have made similar proposals themselves in the past and would probably be amenable to one now if they could be convinced that it was not just another U.S. ploy to gain a strategic advantage.
The basic problem with trying to negotiate a freeze before it happens is that the Soviets have no reason to believe that our government really wants disarmament. Our whole history has been to use arms control talks as another way to maintain our superiority. The only way the Soviets would agree to a moratorium is if a bold initiative were taken by the U.S.
This brings us to another possible route to a moratorium. The U.S. could unilaterally declare a freeze on the testing, production, and deployment of all new U.S. nuclear weapons and delivery systems. The U.S. started the race. We fired the first shot on August 6, 1945, and have been loading up for the final battle ever since. So the U.S. bears primary responsibility for stopping the race as well.
While this approach may at first seem Utopian, it is probably the only one that could actually work. It would effectively convince the Soviets that we are not going for a total first-strike capability and are seriously interested in disarmament.
One of the first questions asked of advocates of a unilateral U.S. moratorium is, of course, "What about the Russians?" The assumption is that the Soviets would take advantage of a U.S. freeze to obliterate us and gain world dominance. If they do, they will have precious little world left to dominate after such an exchange.
Even after a freeze, the U.S. would have enough invulnerable warheads on submarines alone to effectively destroy the Soviet Union. A unilateral U.S. moratorium would give the Soviets no incentive to attack the U.S. In fact it would probably have the opposite effect.
The Soviets have amassed their present nuclear arsenal only by following the United States' every step. Given their past statements, difficult domestic and economic conditions, and the probable climate of world opinion, they would be under strong pressure to follow the U.S. with a freeze as well. But one can never be absolutely sure. A unilateral moratorium would involve a degree of risk. However, the risk involved in stopping the race pales to insignificance when compared to the risk of continuing it.
Some people who would tend to agree with the freeze idea in principle might say that it is politically unrealistic to push for it during a Reagan administration. Yet no administration is going to declare a moratorium simply because it is a good idea. A moratorium will come only if enough people in the U.S. and around the world demand it.
If a moratorium does not happen, it will more likely be because its supporters did not convince the people and build a movement than because there was a conservative in the White House. In fact it might be easier for Reagan to declare a moratorium than it would be for a liberal president, for the same reason that Nixon was able to open relationships with China; Reagan's right-wing past makes him immune to charges of being soft on communism.
Another advantage of the moratorium approach is the potential it has for building a disarmament movement. The idea is profound in its simplicity: The way to stop the arms race is to stop. It is in everyone's self-interest, and it sets a goal that gets to the root of the issue, avoiding the problem some movements have faced of fighting immediate brushfires while the overall problem goes unaddressed.
A movement for a nuclear arms moratorium is already in its beginning stages. A coalition including most of the national peace groups is holding a conference this spring in Washington, D.C., to plan strategy for a freeze campaign. Some church bodies have already endorsed the moratorium proposal, and several religious groups are planning to make raising the moratorium issue in local churches a major priority of their work.
A moratorium movement will probably not emerge as a single organization with a single plan of action but as an amalgamation of a number of local and national groups, each with a different perspective and locus of activity. "Halt the arms race" could become the overarching goal that will unify the broader disarmament movement.
While the moratorium will eventually need people lobbying the Congress and working in electoral campaigns, it will also need nonviolent, direct action at the grassroots. The laws banning segregation in this country were finally passed by Congress because it had become politically safe to do so. The political environment that made those laws possible was created by the courageous, mostly black, and Christian people who put their lives on the line.
In the same way, if a movement to stop the arms race ever gains the broad support necessary to move the government, it will be partly because the stage was set by Christians who took risks and participated in acts of public witness on the streets, in the churches, and at nuclear facilities around the country.
A moratorium can be the umbrella goal of a movement that includes education, lobbying, public protest, and civil disobedience. It has a specific public policy aim that is, if not likely right now, at least possible. It also has room for a position of non-cooperation and resistance toward the continuing arms race.
The moratorium goal also ties in quite naturally with the organizing and direct-action campaigns already under way at various nuclear facilities. Converting Rocky Flats, Lockheed, Electric Boat, and the others to peaceful production, and closing the Trident base in Washington state, will be necessary parts of putting a freeze into effect.
The churches will be crucial to building a movement that can make a moratorium possible. In the abolitionist, suffragist, civil rights, and anti-war movements of the past, the church has provided vital moral leadership, commitment, and vision. The need for these qualities will be greater than ever in a movement audacious enough to take on the nuclear arms race. As in movements past, Christians will probably form the core of those who take costly actions that inspire others.
Involvement in a moratorium movement could also provide an opportunity for renewal and greater unity in the churches. The issue of nuclear weapons is one that challenges the very core of our faith, our profession that Jesus Christ is Lord. It transcends theological traditions. The moratorium approach is one that could cut across traditional boundaries between pacifists and just war proponents, and between those who espouse non-cooperation and those who favor more conventional political activity.
The moratorium concept could also give a focus to the diverse peace work already happening in churches. More and more Christians are turning away from nuclear weapons and discovering their vocation as peacemakers, but that peacemaking must be made concrete and historically specific.
When John the Baptist called on the Hebrew people to repent and prove it by the fruit they bore, they asked him, "Then what are we to do?" John replied, "The one with two shirts must share with the one who has none and anyone who has food must do the same." The revivalist preachers of the 19th century called for repentance and when asked, "Then what are we to do?" they said, "Start working for the abolition of slavery." The call to stop the arms race gives Christians in the U.S. today a similar opportunity to make their faith concrete.
Jesus' call to be peacemakers requires that Christians intervene politically to try to stop the nuclear arms race. But Christians should also be able to enter the political fray with the knowledge that their hope and their faith is primarily in God and not in historical circumstances or apparent political success. The struggle for a nuclear arms freeze is one that will be fought against great odds and powerful interests. It is possible to stop the arms race. It could happen. There is hope. But success is far from assured, and any optimism must be of the most cautious variety.
All the political possibilities set forth in this article are just that: possibilities. They could all come to nothing. But even if the disarmament cause remains an unpopular one, even if it meets with repression, the need for Christians to act on behalf of peace in the politics of their time will remain the same.
That is probably the greatest contribution the churches could bring to a movement to stop the arms race. We should be in it for the long haul because we have a hope for this world that is beyond optimism.
Mernie King worked with Sojourners Peace Ministry and Danny Collum was on the Sojourners staff when this article appeared.
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