A Study For SALT In Nixon Years(1969-1972)

The emergence of nuclear weapons not only changed the United States national strategy, but also changed the process of the Cold War. While the United States has an advantage in nuclear weapons, it increased the Soviet Union's sense of insecurity. And the arms race between two countries was becoming more and more intense. In order to prevent the nuclear war, since the Eisenhower administration, each government of the United States tried to limit the nuclear weapons.In the Nixon administration, the United States and the Soviet Union started the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks, and finally signed the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and the Interim Agreement between the United States of America and Union of Soviet Socialist Republics on Certain Measures with Respect to the Limitation of Strategic Offensive Arms. This article analyzes the process and the result of SALT and reveals the relationship between SALT and detente.Chapter one reviews the characteristics of the nuclear arms policy of the United States before the Nixon administration, and describes the development of the U.S. nuclear arms policy. While the Soviet Union developed the nuclear weapons, the United States had lost the dominant position in making nuclear weapons, and thus America gradually limited the development of nuclear weapons. Chapter two discusses the United States'preparation and the first round of the negotiation in the Helsinki. Chapter Three describes that the negotiation reached an impasse due to the conflict of the different interests. In the end of the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks, with the influence of the complicated international and internal factors, both sides obtained a consensus and finally reached an agreement. In the conclusion part, the article summarizes the historical significance of the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks, and point out that the meeting promotes the development of the detente.