Word: mx
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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Geneva figured heavily in another pending U.S. weapon decision, namely the fate of the MX in Congress. Reagan seemed on the verge last week of rescuing the controversial missile yet again from a funding cutoff by the Legislative Branch. In a highly polished lobbying campaign, he spoke to 150 members of Congress in small groups at the White House, constantly stressing that the U.S. would lose vital leverage in Geneva without the MX, which is scheduled to come up for a series of funding votes in the next few weeks. Using his favorite name for the missile, the President pleaded...
This "heavy-duty brainwashing," as one Administration official called it, showed every sign of working. Majority Leader Jim Wright, a Democrat, expressed a widely held view that the arms-talk link "enhances the likelihood" that Congress will release funds for production of an additional 21 MX missiles, bringing the total to 42. One key backer was Democratic Congressman Les Aspin, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, who told several colleagues that he planned to vote in favor of the MX, though he declined to make his position public. Democratic Congressman Norman Sisisky of Virginia, who moved from opposing...
...their own. Later, increasingly alarmed by the Reagan Administration's deepening commitment to a space-based defense system, the Soviets proposed convening a separate round of talks aimed at controlling these weapons alone. The Soviets are more worried about strategic defenses than about new American offensive weapons like the MX. They already have in their arsenal counterparts to the MX, while an all-out competition in defensive systems would require vast new expenditures and a drastic restructuring of their forces. The U.S. refused to negotiate on space alone. The Administration pointed out that the Soviet buildup in offensive weapons...
Another potential side issue that arose was a White House campaign linking progress in Geneva to the MX missile. Attacked by critics for its high cost and questionable basing mode, the missile is scheduled for a series of crucial funding votes in Congress in the weeks after the arms talks resume in Geneva. Without congressional approval of the MX, argued Defense Secretary Caspar Weinberger, "the Soviets have little incentive to negotiate seriously." Complains Georgi Arbatov, director of Moscow's Institute for the Study of the U.S.A. and Canada: "It looks more and more as if the new negotiations are being...
Clancy had gone directly to N.I.P. with the manuscript of The Hunt because his only previously published writing, a letter to the editor and a three-page article about MX missiles, had appeared in the press's monthly magazine, Proceedings of the U.S. Naval Institute. N.I.P. grabbed Clancy's book; as it happened, the editors had just decided to publish original fiction, provided it was "wet"--about the Navy...