"You have fallen behind in your deactivation of your missile forces." Fowler observed after pleasantries were dispensed with. He eased the blow by handing over a glass of wine.

"Thank you, Mr President. As we told your people last week, our disposal facility has proven inadequate. We can't dismantle the damned things fast enough, and our nature-lovers in parliament are objecting to our method of neutralizing the propellant stocks."

Fowler smiled in sympathy. "I know the problem, Mr President." The environmental movement had taken off in the Soviet Union the previous spring, with the Russian parliament passing a new set of laws modeled on - but much tougher than - American statutes. The amazing part was that the central Soviet government were abiding by the laws, but Fowler couldn't say that. The environmental nightmare inflicted on that country by more than seventy years of Marxism would take a generation of tough laws to fix. "Will this affect the deadline for fulfilling the treaty requirements?"

"You have my word, Robert." Narmonov said solemnly. "The missiles will be destroyed by 1st March even if I must blow them up myself."

"That is good enough for me, Andrey."

The reduction treaty, a carryover from the previous administration, mandated a 50 percent reduction in intercontinental launchers by the coming spring. All of America's Minuteman-II missiles had been tagged for destruction, and the US side of the treaty obligations was fully on track. As had been done under the Intermediate Nuclear Forces Treaty, the surplus missiles were dismantled to their component stages, which were either crushed or otherwise destroyed before witnesses. The news had covered the first few destructions, then grown tired of it. The missile silos, also under inspection, were stripped of their electronic equipment and, in the case of American structures, fifteen had already been declared surplus and sold - in four cases, farmers had purchased them and converted them to real silos. A Japanese conglomerate that had large holdings in North Dakota had further purchased a command bunker and made it into a wine cellar for the hunting lodge its executives used each fall.

American inspectors on the Soviet side reported that the Russians were trying mightily, but that the plant built for dismantlement of the Russian missiles had been poorly designed, as a result of which the Soviets were 30 percent behind schedule. Fully a hundred missiles were sitting on trailers outside the plant, the silos they'd left already destroyed by explosives. Though the Soviets had in each case removed and burned the guidance package in front of American inspectors, there were lingering intelligence evaluations that it was all a sham - the erector trailers, some argued, could elevate and fire the missiles. Suspicion of the Soviets was too hard a habit to break for some in the US intelligence community, as was doubtless true of the Russians as well, Fowler thought.

"This treaty is a major step forward, Robert," Narmonov said, after a sip from his wine glass - now that they were alone they could relax like gentlemen, the Russian thought with a sly grin. "You and your people are to be congratulated."