Chapter 2 - Critical Months, Intense Preparations

Using these National Security Council guidelines, the 10-person, JCS task force began its work. Brigadier General Eugene L. Daniel, U.S. Army, Assistant Deputy Director for International Negotiations, JCS, led the team. General Daniel, who had commanded the 1st Brigade, 24th Infantry Division and who had been involved with the INF negotiations in the preceding months, pulled the task force together and moved into temporary quarters at Buzzard Point in Washington, D.C. "There was no money," he recalled, "no people for a new agency, no structure, just an operational concept embedded in the INF Treaty."¹The task force also faced the pressure of events. A week after its first meeting, General Secretary Gorbachev arrived in Washington. The following day, December 8, 1987, Gorbachev and Reagan signed the INF Treaty. With the treaty signed, pressure mounted for defining roles, missions, requirements, resources, and service responsibilities.

"There was no money, no people, ...just an operational concept embedded in the INF Treaty."

General Daniel

Gates of the Hercules Plant Number 1 at Magna, Utah, site of the Soviet Union's continuous portal monitoring inspections.

General Daniel led the overall effort. Major Paul P. Trahan, U.S. Army, task force member and an armor officer trained in organizational theory and corporate planning, began analyzing and visualizing the treaty's requirements for inspectors, escorts, and aircrews. He developed a briefing concept illustrating the types of on-site inspections, the years they were permitted, and the level of people required. Working together, Daniel and Trahan incorporated this concept into a series of briefings presented to the military service chiefs, the chairman, the senior members of the Office of the Secretary of Defense, and the leadership of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency. Another task force member, Major Jerome E. Johnson, USAF, began working on arrangements for training courses for inspectors and escorts with the Defense Intelligence College. Marine Corps Lt. Colonel Sebastian V. Massimini began defining computer and communications requirements for tracking the INF on-site inspections and treaty-related items. Lt. Commander William G. Evans, U.S. Navy, started defining requirements and resources for Russian linguists. Another Air Force Lt. Colonel, Nicholas G. Caramancia, worked on the difficult issues of air transportation mandated by the rigid schedules written into the Treaty protocols concerning on-site inspections and eliminations. Lt. Commander Robert P. Barton, U.S. Navy, and Army Captain Leon Hutton, developed initial cost estimates of personnel, transportation, and portal housing for the INF mission. Finally, Lt. Colonel Ken Keating, U.S. Army, who had experience as an INF negotiator in Geneva, helped with all manner of issues: logistics, linguists, operations, and organizational structure.²

The answer to the most pressing question, whether to recommend that the new on-site inspection organization be placed in the Department of Defense or the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, came quickly. General Daniel and the task force concluded that the Department of Defense, because of its size (3.3 million people) and resources ($293 billion FY87), had the people, assets, and responsiveness to organize, train, and set up the new inspection agency within 90 days--by April 1, 1988, the anticipated U.S. Senate ratification date. If the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency (ACDA) (188 people, $29 million FY87 ) were assigned the mission of establishing the new agency, then Defense Department people and resources would probably have to be reassigned to it for up to three years. In addition, the task force acknowledged the concerns of the Joint Chiefs of the Army, Navy, Air Force, and Marine Corps, about the presence of Soviet INF inspectors on U.S. military bases. Combining these concerns with the assets available in the Defense Department, Daniel's task force recommended that the new on-site inspection agency be assigned to the Department of Defense. Further, they suggested that the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, along with the Department of Defense's Undersecretary for Acquisition, and Undersecretary for Policy should constitute a three person executive oversight committee.

Turning these recommendations into a decision did not come easily. General Daniel explained the task force's operational concept, placement rationale, executive oversight, and training schedule to senior officials at the State Department, Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, Office of the Secretary of Defense, Joint Chiefs of Staff, and finally, on December 17, 1987, to General Powell and a National Security Council interagency group. There were some objections, principally from State and ACDA officials who advocated a larger role in treaty implementation. The State Department was the lead department in foreign relations between the U.S. and Soviet governments. The Arms Control and Disarmament Agency had already been assigned special responsibilities by the National Security Council to chair the interagency policy process supporting the United States' delegation to the INF Treaty's Special Verification Commission. As stipulated in the treaty, a small, bilateral U.S.-USSR treaty commission would work on resolving those treaty compliance issues that might arise during the baseline, elimination, closeout, or portal monitoring inspections and to agree on measures to improve the effectiveness of the treaty. In its deliberations, the NSC interagency group considered the task force's recommendations and the objections. They recommended that the President place the new on-site inspection organization in the Department of Defense. Because of the urgency of the moment, the National Security Council directed that the Secretary of Defense should take the "appropriate steps" to see that the new organization would be ready to begin operations when the INF Treaty entered into force.³

Major General Eugene L. Daniel, first Task Force Leader.