At the Bridge of Sighs

By Frank B. Merrick

Discords abound as Carter meets the West's leaders in Venice

I stood in Venice, on the Bridge of Sighs;

A palace and a prison on each hand:

... and a dying Glory smiles

O'er the far times, when many a subject land Look 'd to the winged Lion's marble piles,

Where Venice sate in state,

throned on her hundred isles! --Lord Byron (1818)

Like Childe Harold, Jimmy Carter was on a pilgrimage to Venice this week, not to muse on the fate of a vanished empire but to confer with the leaders of six allies in an effort to repair their sadly weakened ties. It was the sixth such summit in as many years, and it promised to be the most rancorous. Not in years has the West seemed in such disarray, with a newly self-confident Europe going its own way on issues ranging from the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan to the deadlocked Middle East peace talks. Predicted a senior West German Foreign Ministry official in a gentle tone: "It will not be an easy meeting."

Such difficulties were very much on Carter's mind as he left Washington accompanied by Wife Rosalynn and Daughter Amy, and such key aides as Secretary of State Edmund Muskie and National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski. With real unity on the many political disagreements seeming impossible, Carter set a limited goal for the talks.

Said to Soldier his departure: "We are not the other's Pact, held together by one nation's tanks. Our alliance is based on understanding, not demands; on listening to each other's voices, not dictating terms... That is what makes these summit meetings so vital--and so difficult at times."

To sweeten the possibly bitter summit, Carter made a two-day stopover in Rome on the way to Venice and planned three days of sightseeing, fence mending and felicities afterward. The first stop: Yugoslavia, where he would try to make amends for his much criticized decision not to attend President Josip Broz Tito's funeral last month. Next: Spain and Portugal, as a way of celebrating their evolution from dictatorships to democracies.

In Rome the Italians welcomed Carter with an aerial tour of the city, taking him on a helicopter flight over the Appian Way, St. Peter's, the Forum. At times the helicopter flew at rooftop level. Soon after being greeted by President Sandro

Pertini at the 16th century Quirinale Palace, the President changed into jogging togs. He ran round and round the palace, through a vast garden of magnolia and palm trees. Next morning he met with Pertini in the Sala d'Ercole (Room of Hercules) and reported that he had run 10 km (six miles). Pertini, who is 83, amiably replied that he had just done 15 km on his exercise bicycle.

Carter spent much of the day with Rosalynn and Amy visiting Roman ruins. At the Colosseum the President quipped:

"In modern days it would be politicians" instead of Christians who would be fed to the lions. That evening, the Carters dined at the Quirinale with President Pertini, Communist Party Chief Enrico Berlinguer and other top Italian politicians.

Toasting Pertini with Ferrari spumante, Carter outlined his message to U.S. allies.

He noted that the Soviet Union was ARTHUR GRACE thrusting southward, both directly into Afghanistan and indirectly through Viet Nam and Cambodia.

Said Carter: "This represents a strategic challenge to the vital interests of the West, and the industrial democracies must face it together." He warned the allies against being tempted "into a false belief that somehow America or Europe can be an island of detente while aggression is carried out elsewhere." Pertini responded by urging the other nations of Western Europe to unite and "put aside our egoism and individual interests."

On Saturday the Baptist President flew by Marine helicopter to call on Pope John Paul II at the Vatican. After being greeted by tail-coated officials flanked by Swiss Guards in their strikingly colorful uniforms, Carter talked privately with the Pontiff in his study for more than an hour. After the session, Carter declared that they had reviewed such mutual "unfinished tasks" as the problems of "those suffering from hunger, from poverty and disease." The President thanked the Pontiff for his efforts to free the U.S. hostages in Iran.

That afternoon, the Carters arrived in Venice under extremely tight security. Three weeks earlier, Italy's dreaded terrorists had warned the summiteers: "We of the Red Brigades are waiting for you." Accordingly, Venice seemed to be under siege. Bersaglieri (crack army marksmen) lined the runways of Marco Polo Airport.

Flak-jacketed soldiers and carabinieri surrounded the hotels that housed the visiting heads of state, including the luxurious Hotel Cipriani, where the Carters stayed in a three-room suite. Nearby canals were closed to gondolas, and frogmen periodically searched the murky waters for mines and bombs. Plainclothesmen, including the U.S. Secret Service, mingled with tourists. For security reasons the Carters' hostess, Danielle Gardner, wife of U.S. Ambassador Richard Gardner, was forbidden to take Rosalynn and Amy to many landmarks, including Murano island, which is headquarters for the city's famed glassblowers. But Rosalynn and Amy were scheduled to visit St. Mark's Square and the Doges' Palace.

It was in the baroque library of the 17th century former Benedictine monastery on San Giorgio Maggiore island, a few minutes across the lagoon by launch from the Hotel Cipriani, that Carter finally had to confront the collective misgivings of America's allies: the leaders of Britain, Canada, France, Italy and West Germany and a delegation representing the caretaker government of Japan. On the official agenda were perennial economic woes, including recession, inflation and rising oil costs. But the most troublesome differences were on an unofficial agenda of international politics, complicated by personal chemistry: French President Valery Giscard d'Estaing feels ill-concealed disdain for Carter, while West German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt can barely contain his irritation at what he privately describes as Carter's bungling in foreign affairs. Even British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, normally a friend of the U.S., was not expected to ally herself automatically with Carter on the major political questions. Her views: "Everyone recognizes that Europe's future is closely tied up with that of the U.S." Then she added: "The moment the U.S. is ready once again to take a predominant and detailed role on what should happen in the future ... we'll do it as always in partnership."

No major decisions on international politics were expected at Venice. Observed a U.S. participant: "This summit is not designed to take action." But plenty of possibly acrimonious discussion was expected on the East-West tension that has arisen since the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. One point of potential discord was the U.S. worry that when Schmidt meets with Soviet Communist Party Chief Leonid Brezhnev in Moscow next week, he might accept a freeze on new medium-range nuclear missiles in Europe. NATO plans to install 572 medium-range nuclear missiles by 1983, while the Soviets have already deployed about 200 SS-20s targeted on "Western Europe and are continuing to add them at a rate of about one a week. On the eve of the summit Carter sent Schmidt a harsh letter cautioning him against any freeze. Schmidt replied, in a letter described by aides as "dripping with irony and sarcasm," that he had no intention of making such a move. After both leaders arrived in Venice, they met for 90 min. in Carter's hotel suite. At the end of their talk, the President said he had "absolutely no doubt" that the West Germans will carry out their agreement on the missiles. Added Schmidt: "I never thought that we did not agree in substance."

At the summit, Carter was to urge the allies to give more support to the U.S. ban on sales of grain and high technology to the Soviet Union until Moscow withdraws its troops from Afghanistan. The European allies, which only a week earlier renewed their appeal for a "neutral and nonaligned" Afghanistan, have been unwilling to do much that might jeopardize their trade with the Soviets.

Further friction was possible over the Middle East peace talks. The Europeans regard Carter as paralyzed on this issue for fear of alienating American Jewish voters. The allied leaders thus were in no mood to listen to criticism from him for their joint statement urging that the Palestine Liberation Organization be "associated" with any peace settlement. Said a Bonn aide on the eve of the summit: "If he starts finger wagging, we will blast back. We will tell him he had better get moving himself on the Middle East."

On Iran, Carter seemed willing to bow to European pleas for restraint; even Thatcher's Foreign Minister, Lord Carrington, has been telling him that economic sanctions will do nothing to free the hostages and may help push Tehran into the Soviet orbit. But there was a chance that Carter might still call for a general condemnation by the summit participants of terrorist acts.

Predicted a French official: "Venice will not be remembered as one of the great summits." But the value of such meetings lies in part in the opportunity for Western leaders to air, in Carter's words, "delicate shades of difference." By this most modest standard, Venice could only succeed, even when some of the shades become less than delicate.

With reporting by Christopher Ogden, Wilton Wynn

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