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TIME: Almanac 1990
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1990 Time Magazine Compact Almanac, The (1991)(Time).iso
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1990-09-17
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NATION, Page 39A NATO Balancing ActBush comes up with positive ideas on arms control and tradeBy Dan Goodgame
George Bush's political gifts include a keen sense of balance:
when he finds himself out on a limb, he usually edges back to a
less shaky perch. After finally realizing that his Administration's
less than enthusiastic reaction to Mikhail Gorbachev's
headline-catching arms-control gambits was alienating the NATO
allies he will meet with this week in Brussels, the President
decided a more positive response was required.
It showed up last week in a bath of warm rhetoric toward
Gorbachev -- quite a turnabout from presidential spokesman Marlin
Fitzwater's denunciation of the Soviet leader two weeks ago as a
"drugstore cowboy" on arms control, long on talk and short on
action. In an interview last week with European journalists, Bush
insisted that his attitude toward Gorbachev's initiatives was "not
begrudging."
Later the President spent hours personally inserting "positive"
language into the graduation speech he delivered at the U.S. Coast
Guard Academy in New London, Conn. The address was the fourth in
a series summing up the conclusions of his Administration's vaunted
review of major foreign policy issues. While in his three previous
speeches he had voiced stern warnings against being taken in by
Soviet peace talk, Bush now praised Gorbachev for "being
forthcoming" in negotiations on conventional forces in Europe. He
emphasized that "our policy is to seize every -- and I mean every
-- opportunity to build a better, more stable relationship with the
Soviet Union."
One such opportunity would be the Brussels meeting, and as Bush
headed across the Atlantic, he considered springing an eye-catching
arms-control proposal at the NATO summit that would not only steal
some of Gorbachev's thunder but also, perhaps, help heal a deep
rift within the Western alliance. In the words of one of its
architects, it would be a "real attention getter": a reduction of
up to 10% of the 340,000 U.S. troops in Europe, with corresponding
cuts in NATO aircraft and helicopters, if the Soviets agree to
reduce their conventional forces to the levels the West has
proposed. He is also expected to relax sanctions on trade with the
Soviets imposed by the U.S. after the Red Army invaded Afghanistan.
The need for a bold step had been gnawing at Bush for some
time, but it really sank in when French President Francois
Mitterrand visited the President's vacation home in Kennebunkport,
Me., two weeks ago. Mitterrand warned, as have other NATO leaders
and U.S. diplomats, that the Administration was riling European
public opinion by reacting so negatively to the Soviet leader's
arms-control offers.
Bush summoned his top advisers and told them he wanted changes,
including more upbeat speeches and some arms proposals of his own.
As National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft bluntly explained
after Bush's Coast Guard speech, "The President felt he appeared
too negative before, so he's trying to appear more positive now."
Other White House officials added that Moscow had made "major
concessions" in its latest offer to cut tanks and other
conventional weapons. They pointed out, moreover, that the Soviets
had done so "in a serious way, at the bargaining table" in Vienna,
rather than in splashy public pronouncements.
A U.S. troop cutback would pose few military risks. In fact,
in their latest offer in Vienna, the Soviets came close to
accepting Western proposals for reducing their tanks and other
conventional weapons. If those negotiations lead to an agreement
on conventional arms, the way would be open to East-West talks on
the most divisive issue within the Western alliance: the reduction
of short-range nuclear missiles.
Bush, along with British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, is
convinced that rushing into missile negotiations with the Soviets
before a conventional-arms pact is struck would be a mistake. But
West German Chancellor Helmut Kohl has been pressing for a quick
start to missile talks to shore up his shaky domestic political
position.
Bush's emerging arms-control strategy is designed to offer both
a carrot and a stick to the West Germans. The carrot is a quicker
start to missile-reduction talks, even though the U.S. will
continue to insist on keeping some short-range nukes as an
essential deterrent to Soviet attack. The stick is a threat to pull
out even more U.S. troops from West Germany, which Kohl opposes.
"What we have to do," says a State Department official, "is show
the Germans that we have ideas for getting a conventional-arms
agreement fairly quickly, so they could then get the talks they
want on short-range nuclear weapons."
Whether or not NATO manages to heal the rift over short-range
nuclear missiles, there has been remarkable progress on balancing
Soviet and Western conventional forces -- and the President will
now be able to take some credit for it. Balancing, after all, is
one of the things George Bush does best.