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There is even dispute over ABM's likely adversary. Sentinel has long been billed as a "thin" defense, suitable only against a Chinese attack. Yet some of its strongest supporters—and critics—view it as the beginning of a "thick" shield to counter Russian strength. One point seems certain: if Washington and Moscow decide to invest heavily in ABMs, the world will see a new watershed in nuclear weaponry.
Senatorial Strife
If the stakes are immense, the controversy is vociferous and widespread. The scientific community has been hotly arguing the issue for months. A series of student-faculty protests against the ABM have taken place on university campuses. In areas where ABM facilities might be situated, there have been angry citizens' meetings and demonstrations that the Pentagon's representatives have been unable to mollify. The protesters resent such use of desirable sites, fear that the missiles might be unsafe and, furthermore, insist that their presence would make the host community a special target for the enemy in the event of war.
On Capitol Hill, the Senate particularly has been riven by the issue. Members have been choosing sides without regard to party affiliation. Last week the Foreign Relations Committee, which normally has no jurisdiction over weapons procurement, issued a formal call for delay in Sentinel's deployment. One of the committee's main arguments is that the ABM program contravenes the intent of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty just at a time when Moscow at last seems genuinely interested in exploring ways to curb the arms race. The ABM dispute may also provide the first major confrontation between Richard Nixon and his possible 1972 opponent, Senate Majority Whip Edward Kennedy, who has become a leader of the anti-Sentinel faction and is sponsoring preparation of an exhaustive anti-ABM report.
Dramatic and significant as the controversy is, most of the issues involved are neither new nor applicable only to the ABM among major military pro grams. The weapon itself has been under discussion for many years without ex citing the degree of fervor it has prompted recently. Why now?
Hollered Objections
One precipitating factor has been that in recent months the Army actually started selecting missile and radar sites and began physical work on the system. Some of the areas considered were choice suburban locations near big cities, and many of ABM's neighbors-to-be hollered their objections so loudly that their representatives in Congress had to take notice. For legislators who were already skeptical of Sentinel, time to do anything about it seemed to be running out. Since the first appropriations for construction and pro curement were approved last year, this year's defense budget might be the last opportunity to halt or slow the undertaking.
The presidential election might have served to bring the issue into focus earlier, but it failed to do so. It was the Johnson Administration that had started Sentinel, and Vice President Hubert Humphrey chose not to campaign against it then (he is now a vocal opponent). For his part, Nixon was warning against a possible "security gap" vis-à-vis the Soviet Union and thus encouraging the ABM's backers. A new Administration and a new Congress offered an