Church against missile sites

Press, 11 May 1981, Page 8

Church against missile sites

NZPA-reuter Washington President Ronald Reagan is facing growing opposition over deployment plans for the new American mobile MX nuclear missile.

Environmentalists, local farmers and businessmen have objected to a plan to place the 200 MXs among 4600 concrete shelters in the thinly-populated western states of Utah and Nevada. Now the Utah-based Mormon Church, which wields much power in the region, has said it opposes the plan on religious grounds. Other options for the $4O billion MX programme include mounting the missiles on submarines and surface ships. But some senior military strategists have asked whether the MX will be a credible deterrent or instead simply spark a new round in the East-West arms race.

An independent panel named by the Defence Secretary (Mr Caspar Weinberger) is studying the problem of where to base the missile and will make its recommendation by June 1. But Mr Reagan will make the final choice.

Many strategists believe the present American landlaunched intercontinental

ballistic missile defence would be highly vulnerable to a Soviet attack. Some 1000 Minutemen and Titan 1.C.8.M.S are positioned in fixed sites, making them easy targets for Soviet missiles. The MX would be moved frequently, presenting a complex guessing game for the enemy. A typical MX site would contain 23 shelters connected by 30km of roads, one missile periodically shifted by truck among the 23 shelters. Twenty-three enemy missiles would be needed to assure destruction of a single MX. Ten such sites would be spread throughout the great basin of Utah and Nevada. Another option would be to place the missiles in Texas and New Mexico and a third is to spread the MX over both sites. Opponents say the vast construction necessary to build concrete shelters and man the missiles would upset the area’s delicate ecological balance.

They say that the construction would require 40 per cent of all American cement production for three years and entail moving more earth than in the build- . ing of the Panama Canal. I