Maynard W. Glitman | Led nuclear talks, 77

Maynard W. Glitman, 77, a diplomat who led the American side in negotiating the intermediate-range nuclear forces treaty, signed by the United States and Soviet Union in 1987, died Tuesday from dementia complications in Shelburne, Vt.

The INF treaty represented a significant advance in U.S.-Soviet relations amid the Cold War; from 1985 onward, Mr. Glitman, a respected veteran of the Foreign Service with expertise in arms control, was the chief U.S. negotiator. The treaty was the first nuclear-arms agreement to require the reduction of weapons by both sides, rather than simply capping the number each was allowed to possess.

Signed by President Ronald Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev on Dec. 8, 1987, the treaty banned all land-based medium- and shorter-range nuclear missiles - ballistic and cruise missiles with ranges from about 300 to about 3,400 miles.

The treaty was approved by the Senate in May 1988. It was the first major U.S.-Soviet arms accord the Senate had approved since the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty of 1972.

For Mr. Glitman, a career diplomat who was later the U.S. ambassador to Belgium, the accord was the culmination of more than six years of talks. He chronicled their progress, frustrations, reversals, and eventual resolution in a memoir, The Last Battle of the Cold War: An Inside Account of Negotiating the Intermediate Range Nuclear Forces Treaty, published in 2006.

He joined the State Department as an economist in the 1960s and served on the staff of the National Security Council. In 1976, he was named deputy representative to NATO in Brussels. Other foreign postings included the Bahamas, Canada, and France. He served as ambassador to Belgium from 1988 to 1991, then taught political science at the University of Vermont.

- N.Y. Times News Service