A Serious But Not Fatal Blow to D&233;tente

When Moscow repudiated its trade agreements with Washington last week, three years of delicate and arduous negotiations between the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. were aborted. Was something else aborted as well--namely the whole carefully crafted structure of detente between Washington and Moscow?

The Kremlin action came in angry response to conditions imposed by Congress, such as the so-called Jackson Amendment (see box). In declaring their 1972 trade accord with the U.S. invalid, the Soviets rejected by extension the Trade Reform Act signed by President Ford early this year. Thus the U.S.S.R. spurned lower U.S. tariff rates and $300 million in Export-Import Bank credits, while reneging on their agreement to repay $722 million in wartime Lend-Lease debts to the U.S.

Isolated Incident. The Soviet action was a serious, though probably not fatal blow to detente. Both Soviet Party Chief Leonid Brezhnev and U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger have long stressed that the normalization of trade relations was a prerequisite for Soviet-American cooperation on such contentious issues as nuclear arms control and peace in the Middle East and Southeast Asia. Last week, however, Kissinger presented the Soviet cancellation as an isolated incident in the general course of detente. He characterized Moscow's move as merely an "interruption"--not "a final break." Shortly thereafter, the official Soviet news agency Tass declared that the Soviet Union is still "emphatically" in favor of detente.

In spite of these disclaimers, the Soviet decision to scuttle its trade accord with the U.S. constituted a major reversal of Kremlin policy. Determined to modernize their economy, the Russians --who will launch a vast, multibillion-dollar 15-year plan in 1976--want massive foreign investment, industrial know-how and sophisticated technology from the U.S. Although such aid has long been available from Japan and Western Europe, the Soviets calculated that only the U.S. could provide the technology for such grandiose enterprises as the $5 billion truck-manufacturing complex on the Kama River. In light of this hunger for credits, Moscow was stunningly humiliated when the Senate tacked an amendment onto an Export-Import Bank bill setting the paltry $300 million limit on the amount that would be available to the Soviets. It was probably this amendment, sponsored by Illinois Democrat Adlai Stevenson III, even more than the emigration amendment tacked onto the trade bill by Washington Democrat Henry Jackson, that finally prompted the Russians to scuttle the trade agreement. Kissinger, who opposed the credit ceiling, dismissed the sum as "peanuts." For the prideful Kremlin, it was an intolerable putdown.

Compounding the injury to Soviet national dignity was the wide publicity given in the U.S. to the understanding between Kissinger and Brezhnev on the issue of emigration from the U.S.S.R. The Soviets were initially disposed to comply with at least some congressional pressure to liberalize emigration policy --mainly toward Soviet Jews--in exchange for trade concessions. The Kremlin waived the oppressive "education tax" on applicants for exit visas, and in the past two years allowed 54,000 Jews to leave the country. But the Russians were appalled by the strident congressional debate on the issue and the publication of letters between Kissinger and Senator Jackson spelling out Soviet assurances to let out more would-be emigres "promptly." They perceived the public ventilation of diplomatic dealings --normal in a free society--as an affront to their sovereignty. As a Soviet intellectual in Moscow put it: "Jackson's triumphant statements were a mistake by him and a provocation to us." Besides, by refusing to submit to pressure, the Russians no doubt were hoping to damage the presidential chances of a man whom they regularly denounce as an "infamous cold-warrior."

Principal Victims. Paradoxically, U.S.-U.S.S.R. trade will probably suffer little from the Kremlin cancellation. Existing contracts between the Soviet government and American firms are likely to remain in effect. Nor are new contracts precluded by the nullification of the trade accord. Many analysts expect that the present $1 billion U.S.-U.S.S.R. annual trade volume will not be significantly reduced. As for the technology that the Soviets require, Tass has already indicated that Moscow is still looking toward the West, "not excepting the most economically powerful Western nation --the U.S.A." The Kremlin may now reckon that Congress, discouraged by its inability to make the Soviets change their internal policy and fearing a genuine breakdown in detente, will eventually abandon its demands. There is not the slightest indication that Congress will.

The principal victims of the Soviet cancellation may well be the 130,000 Russian Jews who are awaiting permission to emigrate. Since early December, harassment of would-be emigres has intensified and the number of Jews allowed to leave has dropped to a four-year low (TIME, Jan. 20). But Moscow-based diplomats, and Israeli Sovietologists, were hopeful that the U.S.S.R. would not entirely halt emigration. Said Israeli Analyst Alain Guiney: "While the cancellation has undoubtedly worsened the situation of Soviet Jews, it should not be forgotten that the Soviets are still interested in an economic agreement with the U.S., and they are aware that if they ring down the emigration gates altogether they will not get it."

The Soviet action also heightened worldwide speculation that yet another victim may be the man who, on the Soviet side, initiated, nurtured and negotiated the trade accord in the first place: Leonid Brezhnev. Top government officials in Washington and in European capitals continued to dismiss rumors of an impending Kremlin shake-up as fanciful. But persistent reports of the 68-year-old Brezhnev's ill health, coupled with the defeat of his trade policy, lent a bit more credence to conjectures that he may be ousted. And Sovietologists noted that even though Brezhnev was seen riding in his Zil limousine in Moscow last week, he did not receive Gough

Whitlam, the first Australian Premier ever to visit Moscow. Prime Minister Aleksei Kosygin did the honors. Whitlam was told that Brezhnev had a "heavy cold" and was "resting outside Moscow." This suggested that Brezhnev is actually incapacitated or that his Politburo colleagues mean him to appear so. "Reasons of health," was the official rationale for Nikita Khrushchev's forced resignation in 1964.

February Gauge. Brezhnev's failure to meet with Whitlam, however, could also be interpreted as a diplomatic gesture to the Egyptians, who were told that Brezhnev was too ill to make a scheduled visit to Cairo.

Brezhnev may have covered his flanks on the trade bill by preparing the way for an eventual turndown in the event that it did not come up to his--and his Politburo colleagues'--expectations. According to this line of reasoning, Brezhnev may have reduced the damage to his position. But there is no question that the trade blowup has caused him problems. Just how severe they may be will be better gauged when British Prime Minister Harold Wilson arrives in Moscow next month. Will Brezhnev meet with Wilson? And what success will he have in promoting another of his cherished and long-thwarted goals, a 35-nation summit of the Soviet-sponsored European Security Conference?

A telling test of Brezhnev's detente policy will come even sooner--at the SALT (Strategic Arms Limitation Talks) meeting that reopens in Geneva at the end of January. Top Administration officials in Washington concede that these second-stage talks, designed to implement the agreements reached by Brezhnev and President Ford at Vladivostok, will be "more difficult" as a result of the trade dispute. A Soviet diplomat issued the enigmatic warning that "there is a new psychological atmosphere." And at week's end Soviet Ambassador to the U.S. Anatoli Dobrynin was summoned to Moscow for a top-level reassessment of foreign policy.

Still, as a State Department expert put it, "SALT has survived the Cambodian invasion, the mining of Haiphong and the Middle East war." In spite of this week's serious setback, the Soviet cancellation of the trade agreement may well prove to be a tactical but not a strategic retreat from detente.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so viewer discretion is required.