N-armed ships for S. Pacific?

Press, 11 January 1978, Page 4

N-armed ships for S. Pacific?

PA Auckland' The United States may be considering operating nuclear-armed Trident submarines in the South Pacific, according to the Oslo-based International Peace Research Institute. The institute, generally regarded as a reputable international authority, has told the Auckland Peace Squad-: ron that this may be the aim of the upsurge in American naval activity in the South Pacific over the last 18 months. "The long-term goal of rhis activity seems to be, directed towards retaining Australia and New Zealand as military allies,” said Mr N. P Gleditsch. executive' director of the institute, in a letter to the Rev. G. Armstrong, of the Peace Squadron. Perhaps more particularly. Mr Gleditsch said, the increased naval activity might be directed towards “ensuring favourable attitudes in the future towards deployment of Trident submarines in the Pacific. “The Trident system may well require some sort of shore installation in the South Pacific,” Mr Gleditsch said. This might be either for command or control facilities. or perhaps access to ports for nuclear vessels supporting Trident submarines.

The range of the Trident missile, he said, was such that a submarine could cruise almost as far south as I New Zealand and still be capable of landing its misIsiles on Soviet targets. At such distances, the American Senate Committee on Armed Services had been told in 1975: “The Soviets would; not normally on a routine i basis have the forces or the ’capabilities for sustained anti-submarine warfare.” Mr Gleditsch said that the institute had.no specific in-, formation on the numbers of! nuclear weapons in the iSouth Pacific. It was gener-i ally believed, he said, that; 8000 to 12.000 American, nuclear warheads were de-; ’ployed in the Pacific, all in I the Northern Hemisphere except for the occasional ships going south of the equator. No figures were available for the Soviet Union, he said,! I but presumably nuclear !weapons were aboard some; ‘vessels sailing out of Vladiivostok. including missile submarines on station off the; iwest coast of North America.! Expansion of Soviet fishing! activity in the South Pacific! might well be cause fori alarm on such grounds as over-exploitation of marine, resources, he said, adding:! , “There is scant evidence that; Soviet fishing activities are’ inevitably a prelude to Soviet! • military activities.”