Word: moratorium
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1980-1989
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Soviet Leader Mikhail Gorbachev endorsed still another arms-control idea last week, this one for a zone in central Europe free of chemical weapons. The U.S. rejected the notion as quickly as it thumbed down Gorbachev's suggestion last month for a moratorium on underground nuclear tests. Presidential Spokesman Larry Speakes called the chemical-free zone a "resurfacing and repackaging of ideas we have heard before" and added that, besides, it would be difficult to verify...
This we are witnessing against the background of a negative response to our proposal for the U.S. to join the moratorium on nuclear explosions. The U.S. does not want to join that moratorium for one simple reason, among others: the U.S. needs nuclear testing to provide the nuclear element for space lasers. It has to be used to produce an X-ray laser effect. All these are elements in the space-based antiballistic missile defense. Think then what would happen if the whole thing goes full steam ahead. We believe America should give honest thought to these matters before proceeding...
...that when the disarmament negotiations have resumed and preparations are under way for a first summit meeting in six years, we are persistently seeking ways to break the vicious circle and bring the process of arms limitation out of the dead end? That is precisely the objective of our moratorium on nuclear explosions and of our proposal to the U.S. to join it and to resume the negotiations on a complete ban on nuclear tests as well as of the proposals regarding peaceful cooperation and the prevention of an arms race in space. We are convinced that we should look...
...Administration has regrettably taken a different road. In response to our moratorium, it defiantly hastened to set off yet another nuclear explosion, as if to spite everyone. And to our proposals concerning a peaceful space, it responded with a decision to conduct a first operational test of an antisatellite weapon. As if that were not enough, it has also launched another "campaign of hatred" against the U.S.S.R...
Speakes explained the motivation crisply: a moratorium on tests would only "perpetuate" a Soviet "monopoly" since Moscow has an operational ASAT system and Washington does not. "They have one and they don't want us to have one," said Speakes. But the U.S. must try to catch up to ward off a "clear threat" to its satellites, he said, and to that end "we have to test, and we have to test...