Two Dissenters

One after another, previously uncommitted members of the U.S. Senate fell into line for ratification of the nuclear test ban treaty--Illinois Democrat Paul Douglas, North Carolina Democrats Everett Jordan and Sam Ervin, Nevada Democrat Alan Bible, Iowa Republican Jack Miller, Colorado Republican Peter Dominick, Nebraska Republican Roman Hruska and South Carolina Democrat Olin Johnston.

With all these Senators inching into the ranks, there was no question but that the Senate would ratify the treaty on a vote set for this Tuesday morning. But for all that, the two most notable speeches during last week's Senate debate were by members of the handful who plan to vote against the pact.

"With Childlike Faith." Georgia Democrat Richard Russell, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, was deeply concerned about absence in the treaty of a provision for on-site inspection. U.S. ability to detect cheating is "considerable," he noted; yet the Joint Chiefs of Staff hinged their O.K. of the test ban partly on improvement of detection devices. Russell argued that the treaty would handicap U.S. progress toward developing an effective anti-ballistic missile system, since warheads could only be tested underground. "What a paradox," he said. "We will not buy a simple rifle, or even the most primitive weapon in our arsenal, a bayonet, unless it has been subjected to exhaustive tests under every conceivable condition. Here we would accept, with childlike faith in mathematical formulas and extrapolation, the efficiency of the most intricate, complicated and costly weapon without even one test under war conditions."

But perhaps the gravest peril Russell sensed was that this was merely a prologue to future measures that could result "in an almost unilateral disarmament that could be ruinous." Added he, in a slap at the Administration: "It is my own belief that a comprehensive test ban that prohibited underground testing, but without adequate inspection rights, would have been entered into, except for the fear that the U.S. Senate would not consent to ratification."

"This treaty has been called a small step forward in the direction of world peace," said Russell. "I do not believe that reliance upon the signature of Gromyko or Khrushchev on a treaty which disadvantages this country in weaponry development is consistent with either world peace or the maintenance of our liberties."

"We Close the Door." Arizona Republican Barry Goldwater felt much the same way. He would vote no, he said, because of how he reads the past and predicts the future. "I see in our history, that what peace we have had has been possible because of strength. I see no change in the future until or unless the objectives of Communism, not just their weapons, change."

For his part, Goldwater felt the treaty exacted too high a price of the U.S. Said he: "Under this treaty we close the door on sure knowledge of the survivability of our second-strike capability, the very capability which, until now, has been the shield of peace in this world. We halt the search for the widest span of nuclear know-how at a point where the total test yields of the Soviet are a full third greater than our own. I will vote against this treaty because it will erode our military strength. I will vote against this treaty because it preserves the enemy's advances in high-yield weaponry while freeing them to overtake our lead in low-yield research. We pay a price; they do not."

Not forgetting for a minute his role of presidential possibility, Goldwater said: "I have been told that to vote against this treaty is to commit political suicide ... I commit it gladly."

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