There is not enough evidence to conclude, or even to speculate persuasively, that the Administration missed an opportunity to reach what would have been a very good agreement for the West...On the contrary, it is at least as plausible that the package deal would have come apart and been repudiated in Moscow, regardless of how Washington responded.

SO MUCH FOR American perfidy in INF. Talbott completely his book with an even harsher slashing of the U.S. approach to strategic arms reduction.

Not only does Talbott allow no doubt about his more negative feeling concerning START, but he also negates much of his harange against U.S. conduct at the INF talks with his very first sentence in Part Two "White INF was largely an inherited dilemma for the Reagan Administration, its conduct of START--the Strategic Arms Reduction Talks--was beset by problems much more of its own making."

He follows the same pattern as in Part One: balanced treatment of the historical dynamics behind each actor's position, followed by a much longer slap at American policy. We are told that the Cuban Missile Crisiy "probably contributed to the Soviets' decision to embark on the sustained accumulation of every category of weaponry: conventional and nuclear, battle-field range and globe-spanning, tanks, aircraft, surface ships, submarines, and most of all, rockets." We are told that SALT I and II tended to codify the trends in each side's weapon inventory--for the Soviets' development of heavy, land-based, multiple warhead intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs): for the U.S., reliance on a strategic "triad" of ICBMs, submarine-launched missiles, and intercontinental bombers. Talbott acknowledges the relative danger involved in the Soviet choice of arsenal, which is easily targetable and therefore might predispose them toward a policy of "launch first, ask questions later." And we are told that SALT II left the Soviets with a five-to-two edge in land-based warheads and in "throw-weight," the ability of a rocket to launch a certain amount of payload.

But once again Talbott launches into a wholesale trashing of the Administration's approach. Apparently these Soviet advantages in the most volatile of nuclear weapons--land-based." MIR Veo ICBMs--mean nothing to Talbott after his highly intelligent opening chapter.

Strobe Talbott has written by far the most valuable, detailed, thoughtful treatise on the nuclear dilemma since the most recent furor over these deadly devices began some five or six years ago. His knowledge of the material is unparalled; his writing skill outstrips that of any other writer on this subject; his access to the people involved is unmatched. But perhaps this last fact is what really dooms Deadly Gambits as a useful guideline for decisions about nuclear policy. How Byzantine and deceitful have the men in the Kremlin been? We do not know: neither does Talbott. What have been their reasons for the most massive nuclear buildup in history? Talbott doesn't say.

Talbott does not have access to the Politburo and their advisors: he can't discover the process by which they determine their opening positions or even faithfully describe their forces, since no one really knows what they have. America's open approach to the nuclear negotiating table allowed Talbott to write the best nuclear handbook for the layman, to conduct the most exhaustive research available on the nuclear negotiating process, and to one-sidedly trash the Reagan Administration's approach. This mixture of good information and slanted analysis makes Deadly Gambits worthless, and even dangerous, as a guideline for the U.S. government and the American voter.