Turner Calls for Nuclear Protests

A former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) chief called on Harvard students to fight for nuclear arms reduction with the fervor of Vietnam era protest movements in an exclusive interview with The Crimson yesterday.

Retired Admiral Stansfield Turner, who was director of the CIA from 1978-1981, was in Boston this week to promote his proposals for dramatic unilateral nuclear weapons reform.

While in Boston, Turner met with the editorial board of The Boston Globe, spoke with a group of academics and business executives at the John F. Kennedy School of Government and appeared in local media.

"I'm out in the hinterlands trying to get more pressure put on Washington," he quipped.

Turner said he will return to Washington today to prepare for a series of meetings next week with lawmakers and advocacy groups.

In his recent book, Caging the Nuclear Genie, Turner describes the arms-reduction plan that he came to Boston to promote.

The plan includes an initiative to physically separate nuclear warheads from the missiles that carry them and a call for an American pledge not to use nuclear weapons except in the event of a nuclear attack on American soil.

It also calls for the construction of national defenses against nuclear attacks when they become cost-effective and reductions in the total number of nuclear weapons in the U.S. arsenal.

"The arms control process has broken down [with the U.S.] in a very excessive position," Turner said.

He said that with the postponement of U.S.-Russia nuclear arms agreements and the increasing multipolarity of nuclear power, unilateral action is necessary to effect change.

According to Turner, unilateral nuclear weapons reform by the United States would motivate France, Germany, China and the former Soviet republics to undertake similar reform.

"You won't get [other countries] to take action if you don't show them that you're really serious," he said.

Turner said that some aspects of United States' nuclear policies are more reprehensible than comparable policies in nations whose nuclear policies we consider "irresponsible."

For example, he said that China has about 50 nuclear missiles capable of reaching the United States, whereas the United States has 7,000 weapons capable of hitting China.

"We are...seen by many nations without nuclear weapons as being hypocritical about wanting to reduce [our arsenals]," he wrote in Caging the Nuclear Genie.

Turner said his interest in nuclear weapons stems from "many years of seeing how ridiculous our nuclear policies were, first-hand."

He said that even though he signed some intelligence reports on nuclear weapons while he was at the CIA that are inconsistent with his current views, he was strongly in favor of nuclear arms reform while in power.

"I was a maverick when I was in a position of authority," he said. "Out of office you don't have the constraints on you that you did [in power]. When you have a few years between the immediacy of these things you develop more perspective."

Policy-makers, he said, remain "afraid to take a big jump because there are so many dangers, so many problems."