he also made a second deal with brezhnev — he also made a second deal with brezhnev. those deals made the will and safer place. he was the longest lived of all american presidents. he lived for 30 — american presidents. he lived for 30 years after his presidential term. for 30 years after his presidentialterm. he promoted presidential term. he promoted human— presidentialterm. he promoted human rights and establish the carter— human rights and establish the carter centre. he won the nobel peace _ carter centre. he won the nobel peace prize and he achieved more — peace prize and he achieved more than any other president in history _ more than any other president in history. he more than any other president in history-— more than any other president in history. he was exceptional. with the passage _ in history. he was exceptional. with the passage of _ in history. he was exceptional. with the passage of time, - in history. he was exceptional. with the passage of time, and | with the passage of time, and the more fractious politics, looking at it from the perspective of

brezhnev at vladivostok in 1974. at -- you agreed on that occasion to try to achieve another strategic arms limitation, salt agreement, within the year. nothing happened in 1975, or not very much publicly at least. and those talks are still dragging and things got quieter as the current season approached. is there a bit of politics involved there, perhaps on both sides? or perhaps more important are interim weapons developments and i'm thinking of such things as the cruise missile and the soviet ss-20, an intermediate-range rocket, making salt irrelevant, bypassing the salt negotiations? mr. ford: first we have to understand that salt i expires october 3, 1977. mr. brezhnev and i met in vladivostok in december of 1974 for the purpose of trying to take the initial step so we could have a salt ii agreement that would go to l985. as i indicated earlier, we did agree on a 2400 limitation on launchers of ballistic missiles. that would mean a cutback in the soviet program. it would not interfere with our own program. at th

brezhnev from weakness and the kind of a defense program that mr. carter wants will mean a weaker defense and a poorer negotiating position. >> mr. trewhitt, a question for president ford. >> mr. president, my question is the other side of the coin from mr. frankel's. the america has a look at basis of communism we lost the first war in vietnam, a shoving match in angola, communists have threatened to come to power in italy and have cooled in the last few months. what do you do about italy and does the general drift does it mean we're drifting back to an old cold war with the soviet union. >> i don't believe we should move to a cold war relationship. i think it's the best for the united states and the world as a whole, that the united states negotiate, rather than go back to the cold war relationship with the soviet union. i don't look at the picture as bleakly as you have indicated in your question, mr. trewhitt. i believe that the united states has had many successes in recent years, in recent months as far as the communist movement is concerned.

but you had leonhard brezhnev to contend with. yes. menachem begin, anwar sadat. valerie's giscard d'estaing, jim callahan. and then margaret thatcher. some hefty names in in modern history. there was a notable person and an amateur, most notably maybe of the same heft as some of the other people. i named. but somebody you had to deal with when figuring out how to settle the 100 year old challenge of the panama canal, that was the most difficult political issue i ever faced. it was more difficult for me to get seven votes to approve a very unpopular treaty than it was to be president in the first place. really? yes. and i think that the vote of the senate, it was a right vote, was the most courageous act that any member of the congress has ever taken, just one quick statistic of a 20 people who voted for the treaty in the senate in 1978, they were up for reelection that year. out of a 20, only seven came back to the senate and they january and the attrition rate two years later in 1980 was almost as equal to that. but it was the right thing to do and it alleviated

brezhnev at vladivostok in 1974. you agreed on that occasion to try to achieve another strategic arms limitation salt agreement, ah within the year. nothing happened in l975, or not very much publicly at least. and those talks are still dragging and things got quieter as the current season approached. is there a bit of politics involved there, perhaps on both sides? or perhaps more important are interim weapons developments and i'm thinking of such things as the cruise missile and the soviet ss-20, an intermediate-range rocket making salt irrelevant, bypassing the salt negotiations? mr. ford: first we have to understand that salt i expires october third 1977. mr. brezhnev and i met in vladivostok in december of 1974 for the purpose of trying to take the initial step so we could have a salt ii agreement that would go to l985. as i indicated earlier, we did agree on a twenty-four-hundred limitation on launchers of ballistic missiles. that would mean a cutback in the soviet program. it would not interfere with our own p

. >> i was sitting across the table from brezhnev andboro -- grow mechanic co-and when bresch never said god will not forgive us it was a shock to the other soviet leader at the table. i think nowadays the issue between the rest of the world and pakistan is the same one i faced my last year in the white house when i refused to send nuclear fuel to countries that were reprocessing that fuel in order to create explosive material, plutonium. this is a long standing problem for the united states. how do we maintain an enormous nuclear arsenal and still insist other great nations lake india not have one explosive. so what i tried to do is set an example to reduce nuclear armaments as much as we could to adhere to the nonproliferation treaty and prevent any testing and set an example for the countries that were logically capable like indiana and pakistan but looked at the united states it set an example. so, i was distressed when indiana exploded more nuclear devices and pakistan followed suit. i still think we have a long way to go to ratify the comprehensive test ban and the salt 2 treaty. >

and when brezhnev said god will not forgive us it was a shock.articularly to the soviet leaders at the table. i think nowadays, the issue between the rest of the world and india and pakistan is the same when i was in the white house, when him refused to send nuclear fuel the countries reprocessing that fuel in order to create explosive material, plutonium. this is a long-standing problem for the united states, how do we maintain an enormous nuclear arsenal and insist that other great nations like india not have an explosive? so i wanted to set an example to reduce nuclear armaments as much as we could, to adhere strictly to the nonproliferation treaty. to negotiate a comprehensive test ban. to prevent any testing. and to set an example for the countries that were technologically capable. they looked to the united states for us to set an example. so i was distressed. when india excluded more devices and pakistan followed suit. i still think that that we have a long way to go in our own country to ratify the comprehensive test ban which we have not

brezhnev and i met in 1974 for the purpose of trying to take the initial steps so we could have any agreement that would go to 1995. as -- 1985. as i said earlier, we agreed on limitations of launchers of ballistic missiles. that would mean a cutback in the soviet program that would not interfere with our own program. at the same time we put a limitation of 1320 on mirz. our technicians have been working since that time in geneva trying to put into technical language an agreement that can be verified by both parties. in the meantime there has developed the problem of the soviet backfire. there are high-performance aircraft, which they say is not a long-range aircraft and which some of our people say is an intercontinental aircraft. in the interim there has been to development on our part the cruise missiles that could be launched from land based mobile installations, from a aircraft like b-52s or b-1's. cruise missiles that could be launched from submarine vessels. those weapon systems are creating some problems in the agreement for a salt 2 negotiation, but i can say i am dedicated to procee

if president brezhnev said, we will scrap this treaty, negotiated under three american presidents over a seven-year period of time, we insist upon nuclear superiority as a basis for future negotiations, and we believe that the launching of a nuclear arms race is a good basis for future negotiations, it's obvious that i, as president, and all americans, would reject such a proposition. this would mean the resumption of a very dangerous nuclear arms race. it would be very disturbing to american people. it would change the basic tone and commitment that our nation has experienced ever since the second world war, with al presidents, democratic and republican. and it would also be very disturbing to our allies, all of whom support this nuclear arms treaty. in addition to that, the adversarial relationship between ourselves and the soviet union would undoubtedly deteriorate very rapidly. this attitude is extremely dangerous and belligerent in its tone, although it's said with a quiet voice. mr. smith: governor reagan? gov. reagan: i know the president's supposed to be replying to me, but som