Word: johnsons
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...Richard Nixon decide to deploy the Johnson-planned ABM system, though in "substantially modified" form? The decision was an astute attempt at compromise between all-out advocates and all-out opponents of the system. But it would be wrong to ascribe to the President only political or public relations motives. Last June, during his campaign, he praised the proposed Sentinel system as essential to the credibility of the U.S. nuclear deterrent. At his second news conference as President a month ago, Nixon observed that "this system adds to our overall defense capability...
...press conference, the President left the impression that the new ABM program would be severely cut back from Johnson's blueprint. He mentioned only two proposed installations, designed to protect Minuteman ICBM sites in Montana and North Dakota-compared with 17 Sentinel bases planned by Johnson primarily to defend major U.S. cities. As it turned out, the two installations will be built first, but later, Nixon's proposal calls for 14 ABM bases in all. The system's function has been shifted from the protection of cities to the defense of the nation's nuclear deterrent...
Strength and Weakness. The Nixon plan provides more radar equipment to detect incoming ICBMs and guide the defending missiles than did Johnson's. Since the first two installations will not be completed before 1973, the system could be canceled somewhere along the line-after having cost vast amounts of money. Nixon promised that his system, quickly dubbed "Safeguard," would be reviewed annually and revised, if necessary, to meet possible changes in the strategic situation and in weapons technology, and to take into account any developments in arms-control talks...
...differences between the Johnson Administration's Sentinel program and Nixon's Safeguard are more in emphasis than in scale. Johnson's 17 Sentinel sites would have covered all the continental U.S., Hawaii and Alaska with Spartan rockets designed to intercept incoming missiles up to 400 miles above target, backed up by shorter-range Sprints to knock down any ICBMs that penetrated the Spartan screen. Nixon's plan, while providing extensive area defense, will concentrate not only on Minuteman ICBMs in their concrete silos, but also on bomber bases, Washington, and the Charleston base for Polaris submarines...
...making haste slowly-very slowly-in putting its stamp on the federal bureaucracy. When the Viet Nam "11 o'clock group," composed of middle-level officials from several agencies who review important operational questions, convened at the State Department last week, all the faces were familiar from the Johnson era. Though hardly trifling, the vitriolic, five-month-old dispute with Peru over seizure of U.S. oil properties is just now receiving close attention. The new Assistant Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs, Charles Meyer, a former Sears, Roebuck vice president in charge of hemisphere operations, was selected only...