TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/032089/03208900.034

Text File | 1992-09-23 | 11.1 KB | 210 lines

                                                                                WORLD, Pag 32

EAST-WEST

Let's Count Down


The superpowers want to shrink conventional arms, but don't
agree how

By Jill Smolowe


    For omen seekers, the outward signs were propitious.
Secretary of State James Baker bounded down the stairs, hurried
to Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze's side and
offered a hearty handshake. Smiling and pumping arms, they then
began their maiden meeting in the glittering, baroque Festsaal
in the sprawling Hofburg, that imperial crescent of stone
buildings in the heart of Vienna. The locale was rich with
inspiration: in 1815 the Congress of Vienna convened at the
nearby chancellery to redraw the political face of Europe. Last
week's gathering of 35 foreign ministers ushered in a modern-day
reprise to redraft the Continent's military map. The talks,
called CFE -- Negotiations on Conventional Armed Forces in
Europe -- are destined to be the arms-control battlefield of the
1990s.

    Certain to become every bit as familiar and contentious as
the SALT talks on limiting nuclear arsenals that dominated the
1970s, the far more complex CFE talks aim to eliminate the
threat of conventional war in Europe. At issue are not only the
more than 5 million armed troops deployed throughout the
Continent but also, by NATO's count, some 70,000 tanks, 140,000
armored troop carriers, 68,000 artillery pieces and 12,000
combat aircraft. The overriding goals of the talks will be to
reduce the possibility of surprise attacks and large-scale
offensive operations and to diminish the oppressive levels of
firepower and military manpower. Optimally, both NATO and the
Warsaw Pact will be restructured along defensive lines, with no
country or alliance having the power to attack others.
Acknowledges a Soviet expert on conventional arms: "This is the
most complicated diplomatic task since the end of World War II."

    While the opening atmospherics were promising, the devil,
as arms controllers say, is in the details. The Soviets scored
early with ambitious unilateral initiatives that went a long way
toward meeting the basic Western criterion of trimming the
Warsaw Pact's alarming and unmatched capacity to overrun Europe.
Beyond that, the East bloc is prepared for a fundamental
restructuring of the Continent's military balance that could
sharply diminish the dangerous confrontation across Europe's
political fault line.

    By way of response, the U.S.-led NATO proposal sounded
modest and a bit miserly. British Foreign Secretary Sir Geoffrey
Howe spelled out the West's starting position, warning that NATO
was not interested in a "competitive striptease." The plan,
which he said went "far beyond bean counting," in essence called
for deep cuts in the Eastern forces, with only minor reductions
of up to 10% in NATO dispositions. Baker gave a more
philosophical speech, but it was thin on specifics and failed
to counter Shevardnadze's longer-range proposals.

    Despite the daunting negotiations ahead, which optimists
say will last at least two years, both sides showed a rare
eagerness to make these talks succeed. If a pragmatic tone
distinguished their formal speeches, a private meeting between
Baker and Shevardnadze at the official residence of U.S.
Ambassador Henry Grunwald plainly left the two statesmen in high
spirits. "My impression is that both sides are willing to
cooperate," Shevardnadze said enthusiastically. A relieved Baker
said, "The proposal (the Soviets) advanced was really remarkably
close to the NATO proposal . . . (we're) off to a pretty good
start."

    The atmosphere of promise contrasts sharply with the record
of CFE's moribund predecessor, the Mutual and Balanced Force
Reductions negotiations, known inelegantly as MBFR. For 15
years, NATO and Warsaw Pact negotiators never moved beyond a
stalemate over head counts, with both sides arguing fruitlessly
about how many troops and weapons the other had deployed. Soviet
leader Mikhail Gorbachev broke that logjam in April 1987 by
admitting that the East bloc has a clear edge in conventional
forces, then accepting the logic that the Warsaw Pact will have
to absorb deeper cuts. Says Stephen Ledogar, head of the U.S.
delegation to the CFE talks: "We're not hearing the old
thinking, `What's mine is mine, and what's yours is negotiable.'
"

    As Shevardnadze detailed Moscow's opening position last
week, several encouraging points of convergence emerged. By
calling for weapons reductions to 10% to 15% below present NATO
levels, he signaled Moscow's willingness to make asymmetrical
cuts. His proposal for an eventual conversion of remaining
forces to a "strictly defensive character" echoed NATO's call
for "the restructuring of armed forces to enhance defensive
capabilities." Perhaps most important, the two sides agreed that
verification of any conventional-arms pact must be rigorous.
Shevardnadze gave the nod to on-site inspections "without right
of refusal," adding that all verification measures would be
accepted, provided there is reciprocity. "We would like to
hope," he said, "that our way of thinking and acting is no
longer identified in the West with ill will or evil intentions."

    Still, the potential for irreconcilable differences looms.
In putting forward his proposal, Shevardnadze pushed beyond the
talks' mandate on several key points. Concerned about NATO's
superior air power, Moscow listed tactical aircraft and combat
helicopters among the "most destabilizing categories of
armaments" that need to be cut back. The West has consistently
maintained that aircraft should not be included in the
negotiations, as they cannot seize and hold territory.
Similarly, Shevardnadze indicated that while naval forces are
not officially part of the talks, they must eventually be
considered. Washington currently considers the matter
non-negotiable.

    Then there was Shevardnadze's vague mention of "zones" or
"strips" in which little or no military activity would be
allowed. Playing directly to West Germany, which shares the
longest frontier with the East, Shevardnadze suggested a
rollback of short-range nuclear forces and a lower conventional
presence in the zone bordering both Germanys. The idea has
appeal in Bonn, where some officials have been pressing for a
two-track approach in which reductions of short-range nuclear
forces would parallel those achieved in the CFE talks. They
suggest that if the Warsaw Pact agrees to eliminate its
conventional superiority, the West might agree to eliminate some
or even all battlefield nuclear weapons. NATO is divided,
however, over just how tightly the two weapons categories should
be knit.

    The alliance is also deeply rent over the question of
modernizing its short-range nuclear forces. Debate rages within
NATO over the replacement of 88 aging Lance missile launchers.
West Germany argues that any decision should be postponed until
after 1990, thus wielding the threat of modernization as a means
to increase pressure on the Soviets to make concessions on
conventional arms. The U.S., Britain and France counter that
the modernization should go forward, to position NATO better now
to negotiate reductions with the Soviets later. Determined to
keep West Germany firmly in the NATO camp, Baker reached out to
Bonn last week with an unexpected gesture. He suggested that the
Bush Administration might speed up the withdrawal of chemical
weapons from West Germany, currently targeted for 1992.

    But disagreements over issues like modernization
handicapped NATO as the CFE negotiations got under way. The
equivocations of West Germany's Ostpolitik troubled the U.S. and
Britain, and recent conflicts between Greece and Turkey nearly
scuttled the talks altogether. Negotiators are also wary about
the participation of the French, whose Gaullist aloofness toward
NATO led them to snub the MBFR talks; so far, the French have
shown a prickly independence in preparatory discussions for CFE.
France does not want to appear to be reintegrating its forces
into the NATO structure, so each of the 16 NATO and seven Warsaw
Pact countries theoretically stands independently in the CFE
talks, worrying the American delegation, which prefers to
control the course of negotiations.

    Western diplomats also anticipate difficulties within NATO
on the pace of the talks. Some, seeing in Gorbachev an eager
partner, will seek to speed up the bargaining. Others will try
to slow the process of disarmament for fear of bringing about
a greater erosion of NATO's will to defend itself or a complete
withdrawal of the American troops stationed on European soil.
Warns Martin McCusker, director of the military committee of the
North Atlantic Assembly, NATO's parliamentary wing: "The talks
are bound to bring out many of the intra-alliance tensions we've
tried to keep buried and which Soviet obstinacy has helped
stifle."

    The Soviets have looked decidedly less threatening since
Gorbachev indicated that he would consider asymmetrical cuts in
Europe's defenses. He went a well-received step further in his
address before the U.N. General Assembly last December by
announcing the unilateral withdrawal of 500,000 Soviet troops
and 10,000 tanks, to be made over the next two years. In recent
months the Soviets have further swayed public opinion in Western
Europe by adopting a 10% cut in defense spending and publishing
detailed figures of troop and arms levels. Moscow has also
acceded to Western demands that the talks cover all of Europe
-- not just Central Europe, as in the MBFR negotiations -- thus
taking into account some Soviet troops stationed on home soil.
Gorbachev expansively describes the new zone as running "from
the Atlantic to the Urals."

    At the heart of Moscow's newfound flexibility is
Gorbachev's need to transfer scarce resources from the military
to the civilian economy if he is to improve living conditions
at home. By paring the military, Gorbachev aims to free not only
investment resources but human resources as well. With public
pressure building to reduce or even abandon the Soviet Union's
unpopular conscription, Gorbachev said last October that the
length of military service may be shortened. Presumably, for
each good soldier lost, Moscow hopes to gain a good worker.

    As the two sides go through a diplomatic grope in search of
common ground, neither expects the CFE talks to be a
kaffeeklatsch. (The talks were originally given the acronym
CAFE, but that was discarded as too frivolous.) It is a
promising sign that negotiators chose last week to accentuate
the positive. "They called for several things which sound pretty
reasonable," said Ledogar of his East bloc counterparts.
Concurred Oleg Grinievsky, chief of the Soviet delegation: "The
very first hours witnessed an exchange of positions, rather than
recriminations." Baker and Shevardnadze boosted optimism by
setting a May date in Moscow to discuss resumption of Strategic
Arms Reduction Talks and explore the timing of a superpower
summit. But, cautions Baker, "we've got some hard bargaining
ahead of us."