Some Practical and Realistic Advise

Eight statesmen, American and foreign, suggest how to reduce tensions

What, concretely, can the U.S. and the Soviet Union do to lower the level of tension between them in the months ahead? How, in the longer run, can they manage their competitive relationship better so as to reduce the risk of armed confrontation? TIME asked eight statesmen, both in and out of office, to offer some practical recommendations.

CLAUDE CHEYSSON

French Foreign Minister

Enormous ideological and moral differences are at the root of the difficulties in relations with the Soviet Union. Nothing will make these differences disappear in the foreseeable future. However, we should aim to develop three types of relations: exchanges and contacts that benefit both sides, arms negotiations, and a high-level dialogue that will enable the participants to explain their intentions and so avoid misunderstandings.

Let us not overdramatize the crisis. It is serious, but it has not undone everything. Trade and all kinds of contacts have not been broken off. The Soviets value these as do the European countries and the U.S. in the sectors that interest them. We must maintain and reinforce these exchanges, exercising caution, but without seeking to use them as instruments of political pressure.

The thread of negotiations must not be broken. The START negotiations must stay alive. In Stockholm, a conference is to open on conventional disarmament in Europe, which has great political importance. There is no justification for the Soviet Union's walking out of the INF negotiations. We would view a return to the negotiations not as a defeat for the U.S.S.R. but as a reasonable exercise of responsibility by its leaders.

High-level dialogue between leaders of the U.S.S.R. and those of the West, in particular the U.S., is badly needed at this time. Such dialogue is indispensable if we are to prevent misunderstandings over areas of tension leading to dangerous confrontations. Mistrust and suspicion have bred a vicious cycle that has to be stopped. Let us try to break out of it by making the most of all the good will that exists and of every initiative. France will not be last in this. What we can do, we will do without ever losing sight of the fact that overtures to dialogue must not be confused with weakness.

In the long run, lasting peace has to be based on recognition of the differences between the Soviet system and the system of countries that want to live in peace on the basis of equal rights and responsibilities. This presupposes that the West will not speak a crusading language and that the Soviets will cease to found their policy on the certainty of the collapse of the other system. It further presupposes their willingness to take into account the right of others to security instead of being content to assert their own, and that they modify their methods in places where the evolution of society and men's aspirations so require, as in Poland. With our historical links to Eastern Europe and sensitivity to the unjust division of our continent, we Europeans hope that the Soviet Union will gradually find a way to accept self-determination and observance of basic human rights in the area it controls.

RICHARD NIXON

Former President of the U.S. (1969-74)

There are those who believe that just acting tough and keeping the Soviets guessing is the best way to keep them restrained. That is a very dangerous attitude, and I speak as a hawk. I want the military balance restored. And I want an arms-control agreement that denies both sides a first-strike capability. The leaders of the Soviet Union and the U.S. must work out a process, rules of engagement, to prevent their mutual destruction.

The Soviet leaders may be wrong. They may be evil, and they certainly think we are evil, but they are rational. They are not like Hitler. They are concerned that the differences between the U.S. and them may explode into war. They want to win, but they want to win without war.

The first thing we need to do now, on the various arms-control fronts, is nothing. There would be no greater mistake than for the U.S. and the Europeans to say, "My God, we've done something wrong, and we have to make some concessions to get them back to the table." That would be negotiating under duress and would encourage walkouts in the future. In the longer term, I think they will come back because it is in their interest to do so.

We do need, however, to leapfrog the sterile arms-control debate and broaden the dialogue and the agenda to include other factors. We have to explore the possibilities of some initiatives in other areas that might attract their interest.

On the economic front, our current trade is too small to make it an effective weapon. But with the Japanese and the European shares added, it is large. I thought it was a mistake to give up on the grain embargo without getting something in return. But economic leverage must be used subtly and firmly.

On Third World problems, we share with the Soviets the desire of not wanting to leave our fate in the hands of others. The proliferation of nuclear weapons to other countries may be the most important new problem of the next 20 years. The Soviets have as much interest as we do in seeing that controlled. They do not want that danger any more than we do.

It is important to go forward with our military research in space, but this will be destabilizing unless we offer to share that information with the Soviet Union. As a gesture of good faith, and as a demonstration that we are not trying to build a shield that will let us win a nuclear war, we should offer our discoveries to the Soviet Union.

All this argues that there needs to be a relationship between the Soviet Union and the U.S. at the highest level, a relationship of hardheaded detente. Since the Secretary of State or the National Security Adviser are too busy, I think a special person should be named by the President to focus entirely on the relationship with the Soviet Union. The Soviets should have a similar person. Then there could be summitry without the leaders themselves.

Finally, it is vitally important that these two men, Reagan and Andropov, meet. I don't want them to meet just to shake hands, but they can meet to agree on a process whereby more negotiations will take place on arms control and other matters. But because it is the right thing, my instincts tell me it will happen.

BOB HAWKE

Prime Minister of Australia

We should not allow ourselves to be overwhelmed by a sense of global pessimism or imminent disaster. Australia does not accept that the nuclear-weapons states alone have the right to determine these issues. Their calculations--or miscalculations--could have terrible consequences for all of us. We do not consider that unilateral disarmament would be an effective way of bringing about an end to the arms race. What is required is realistic, concrete and balanced proposals that have at their heart a recognition of the national security interests involved.

The Australian government has greatly elevated arms control and disarmament goals within our foreign policy. As a member of every multilateral disarmament body, Australia is promoting the negotiation of treaties to end nuclear testing and to ban chemical weapons, and measures to prevent an arms race in outer space. We are also helping to strengthen measures against the spread of nuclear weapons. For countries such as ours, there is no substitute for the hard slog of multilateral negotiations designed to engage the interests and support of the superpowers. We were recently encouraged by a U.N. vote in which this year the U.S. changed its vote, thereby bringing us closer to negotiation of a comprehensive test-ban treaty.

The withdrawal of the U.S.S.R. from the INF talks of course worries us. The Soviet position on this seems to me to overlook the fact that their deployment of SS-20s threatened the balance of power in Europe in the first place. I urge Mr. Andropov to think again on this. In the longer term, I believe that both superpowers have compelling reasons of acute national interest to pursue arms-control agreements. Progress will probably be achieved in gradual steps and only after difficult negotiations.

I would stress that adequate and effective provision for verification is the crucial precondition for progress. Australia wants to make a constructive and realistic contribution within our means. In this connection, the joint U.S.-Australian facilities on our soil play an important role in arms-control verification as well as maintaining Western security. We are upgrading our capacity to monitor nuclear explosions by seismic means.

On the assumption that the more lurid public accounts of disarray in the Soviet leadership are not true, I would like to see a properly prepared summit between Presidents Reagan and Andropov next year. As well as putting arms control back on track, I would be looking for some sign of greater understanding between them on the Middle East in particular. Frankly, the convergence of superpower rivalry and indigenous instability there at the moment worries me more than the arms race itself.

ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI

National Security Adviser (1977-81)

The U.S.-Soviet relationship is today quite normal, and this is all to the good. Unlike the past, when American public opinion tended to swing from euphoria about detente to hysteria about the cold war, the public correctly perceives Soviet-American relations as basically antagonistic and competitive, though linked by a common interest in survival.

We should have no illusions, however, that the antagonism will quickly wane. Our histories, geographies, politics and global interests are so varied that for a long time to come we will remain rivals. Regional conflicts in the Middle East and Central America will continue to fuel that global rivalry. Accordingly, we should concentrate on what can be done to minimize the chances of a direct collision. Three initiatives would help:

1. Instead of seeking a comprehensive and complex START treaty, with all its negotiating and verification pitfalls, we should settle for a limited, interim agreement. For the time being, I would forgo the more ambitious Reagan proposals for across-the-board reductions, including major cuts in throw-weight and warheads. Instead, I would accept the most recent Soviet counterproposal for a mutual scale-down to 1,800 launchers, but with an added joint limit of, say, 7,500 warheads. Such a simple interim agreement would break the logjam, be easier to verify, provide the basis for a wider treaty later, and we could have it by next summer.

2. Initiate genuinely consultative annual U.S.-Soviet summits. I first proposed this back in 1977, and the idea has been endorsed recently by both Mr. Nixon and Mr. Mondale. Our leaders should simply get together once a year for three or so days of truly informal talks so that we gain gradually better understanding of our differences, but without expecting unattainable accommodations. Greater mutual sensitivity to our conflicting positions would in itself help to keep the competition more stable.

3. Widen the annual economic summit with our principal allies into a strategic-economic summit, so that we can review together more systematically how best to handle the East-West relationship, thus minimizing the differences among ourselves, which the Soviets are always tempted to exploit.

In brief, in order to avoid a head-on collision we have to collaborate with our political enemy even while competing assertively.

RICHARD VON WEIZSACKER

Mayor of West Berlin and sole candidate for election as President of West Germany

We must concentrate our efforts on conducting a positive policy vis-`a-vis the Soviet Union, today more than ever. This means on the one hand that we must not tempt Moscow into regarding our defense capacity as something we are prepared to compromise. Thirty-eight years of experience have taught Berliners better than anyone else that the protection of our freedom rests above all on the American commitment. For this help and engagement, we are deeply grateful.

But a decisive point is that we use our freedom to achieve good relations with the Soviet Union, rather than confrontation. East-West relations today are preoccupied with disarmament, rearmament or arms control. Experience teaches that it is not disarmament that points the way to peace, but rather that peaceful relations open the door to disarmament. States arm themselves against one another when there are poor relations between them, when they have no common interests or when these are not developed, when cooperation is rejected or not even attempted. But where concrete fields of cooperation are exploited or created, arms problems present a smaller obstacle to peace. Neither rearmament nor disarmament, neither confrontation nor peace movements, neither hawks nor doves bring about peace. Peace is the consequence of practical cooperation.

The Helsinki accords divide East-West relations into three categories: security, cooperation and the free movement of people. Wisely, it was agreed that all three categories should be regarded only in context and as being of equal value. Security matters, taken on their own, offer too little chance of success. The same applies to an isolated policy concerning the free movement of people. Cooperation is of paramount importance. If we succeed in extending, step by step, cooperation in the fields of science, food, ecology, transportation, economics, energy and development policy, then arms control and even free movement of people will ultimately come into the range of what is possible. However, if we refuse to cooperate with the Soviets in these fields, in which they have always lagged behind, and if we instead demand concessions in the only area in which they are equal or superior to the West, namely in armaments, we shall have to wait a long time for security, human rights and a secure peace. Our goal is a policy that combines strong defense and cooperation with the Soviet Union.

FRANCIS PYM

Former British Foreign Secretary (1982-83)

My first recommendation is to stop shouting. A period of relative silence would be healthy.

My second is to begin a process that will lead to increased dialogue. After recent years, that would take time anyway: Andropov's illness means the Soviet Union has a leadership problem in the immediate future. That has to be understood and may cause delay.

My third is for us in the West to be ready for the time when the Soviets return to the negotiating table, which in my judgment is likely to happen by the summer months, and be prepared, if that were helpful, to continue medium-range missile talks in a different arms-control format, possibly through the START talks.

In the meantime, NATO should mount a major drive in all 16 member countries, with the total support of each government, designed to explain and explain again to our electorates the strategy of deterrence and its effectiveness in influencing the Soviet Union not to attack us. Confidence must be restored in the minds of our peoples. Nuclear weapons induce fear. Of course, so does some rhetoric. When confidence is restored and calmness returns, there will be a better environment for dialogue.

More attention must be given to European-American relations. Misunderstandings abound. To many Europeans, Reagan looks like a warmonger. To many Americans, Europeans seem unaware of the Communist threat from the Soviet Union and contribute too little to NATO. The causes of such misreadings are clear, but we cannot afford them.

We must coordinate more closely our perceptions and handling of regional disputes. The very interdependence of our world means that the interests of the West may be as directly threatened by events outside the NATO area as inside it, and I feel it may be time we reviewed our crisis-management mechanisms. Each component of the alliance, while accepting that agreement will not always be possible, should at least ensure that the others know the course of action it intends to pursue and try to evolve joint reactions.

The Soviet Union has enormous problems: economic, political and social. It will not solve them by continuing the political doctrine that created them. Let us understand, therefore, the nightmare that faces the Russian leaders and leave them alone to sort themselves out.

DEAN RUSK

Secretary of State in the Kennedy and Johnson Administrations (1961-69)

The U.S. and the Soviet Union share a massive common interest--the prevention of an all-out nuclear war. We are the only two nations that, if locked in deadly combat, could raise a serious question as to whether this planet can any longer sustain the human race. It follows that Washington and Moscow bear a heavy and special responsibility toward the peace of the world and the survival of the human race. That should be the beginning of any consideration in both capitals of our mutual relations.

The rhetorical level between Washington and Moscow has reached unusual levels of acrimony. Both capitals should take care because there is a self-hypnotic effect in rhetoric that could cause one or both to begin to believe their own excessive vituperation and lead to dangers that we ought to try to avoid. We now have put behind us more than 38 years since a nuclear weapon has been fired in anger, despite many serious crises we have had since 1945. The Soviets have no more interest in the destruction of Mother Russia than have we in the destruction of our beloved America. Both sides must avoid the game of "chicken"--pressing to see how far one or the other can go without crossing that lethal threshold.

An urgent and immediate problem is to find some way to put a limit to what is becoming an insane race in nuclear weapons. Such negotiations cannot be easy, but the effort has to be made. Both in the Soviet Union and in the U.S. the influence of military thinking seems to be in the ascendancy, if for different reasons. Both capitals must find a way to put a brake on the demands of their respective military establishments for the commitment of increasingly massive resources for military purposes.

An immediate problem that needs the most serious attention is the prospect that we shall be moving the arms race into outer space. Without getting into the scientific and technical debate as to whether antiballistic missile capabilities are possible through such esoteric space weapons, two things should be clear. First, we must assume that the Soviets will be able to do whatever we manage to do, after spending hundreds of billions of dollars in the effort. Secondly, we can be sure that if we or the Soviets, or both, begin to approach success in devising such space weapons, there will be a frantic race on both sides to devise offensive missiles that can penetrate or evade such defenses. The prospect is, therefore, that we shall be spending hundreds of billions of dollars, perhaps trillions, with no perceptible underlying change in the strategic relations between the two countries. Before we pollute the wondrous heavens with the folly of man, surely we should put our heads together to try to find some way to avoid this dismal prospect. As common members of Homo sapiens, perhaps we can also find a way to put our heads together to address some of the urgent problems to be faced in the coming decades by the entire human race in such fields as energy, the environment, the population explosion and world hunger. Little by little such common necessities may lay a restraining hand upon the forces that would move us toward violent conflict.

PIERRE ELLIOTT TRUDEAU

Prime Minister of Canada

Following the commitment made by leaders of seven industrialized nations at the Williamsburg summit last May to devote our full political energy to the search for peace, I undertook a personal initiative to seek ways to improve East-West relations. When the two largest military powers each have over 20,000 nuclear weapons, any one of which is many times more powerful than the bombs that devastated Hiroshima and Nagasaki, their relationship is of vital interest to all nations. I believe each individual leader must see the search for stability as a personal responsibility. It is far too important to be left to the superpowers alone.

Despite periods of fruitful negotiations, and despite some valuable treaties, both sides bristle with nuclear arms, the number and sophistication of which increase every year. In seeking to reduce world tensions it is not sufficient to deal with abstract equations and the relative capabilities of this weapon over that. What is at issue is not just the capacity of these weapons for destruction, but the intentions of the governments that control them: the superpowers must each be convinced of the good intentions of the other.

I have met with NATO leaders in Europe, the Commonwealth heads of government in New Delhi, as well as Japanese and Chinese leaders, and most recently with President Reagan in Washington. I shared with them my conviction that we cannot hope to see real progress in the negotiations for arms control and disarmament until there is an injection of high-level political energy into these negotiations and into the East-West relationship itself.

I am very encouraged by indications that the process has now begun. At their recent meeting in Brussels, NATO foreign ministers accepted the need for mutual respect for the legitimate security interests of both superpowers. They reiterated their belief in genuine detente and a relationship between East and West based on equilibrium, moderation and reciprocity; perhaps more important, they eschewed aspirations to military superiority. The Western agreement to send political leaders, rather than diplomats, to Stockholm in January and NATO's commitment to make a new political effort at the Vienna negotiations on conventional forces indicate a growing acceptance that political leaders must personally involve themselves in the peace process.

It is also heartening that President Reagan, in his recent speech in Japan, stated his belief that a nuclear war is not winnable and must never be fought, noted his desire to eliminate all nuclear weapons and stressed his willingness to compromise in order to achieve significant reductions in the level of armaments threatening mankind. These are positive indications that improvements in the relationship are possible.

I believe that the Soviet Union shares the desire for peace, and I hope we will soon see similarly positive signs from them that we might aspire, not just to a more stable balance of terror, but to a real and lasting peace.