Toward Talks

The drama of the Soviet Union's Major German Stepanovich Titov as he whirled in orbit around the planet was of a sort to excite the spirit of men everywhere. But the cold war was still to be won or lost on earth itself, with Berlin the major battleground. And last week, as the whole German question seemed to be reverting to a talking matter, the U.S. was moving with an increasing confidence that might well prove to be more important than space rivalry.

In overwhelming approval of President Kennedy's cold war television speech last fortnight, the U.S. was arming surely for any trouble ahead. As the Congress went swiftly to work on emergency measures, the nation's confidence grew, too, with the realization that the real Berlin problem was the civic unrest and economic weakness of Communist East Germany--and that the real discomfiture was the Russians', Despite increasing surveillance by Dictator Walter Ulbricht's Volkspolizei, refugees from East Germany crossed into West Berlin last week at the rate of 1,000 a day; Ulbricht himself flew off to Moscow for a worried conference.

By turning on alternate currents of bellicosity and reasonableness, Khrushchev had tried to play Western tensions over Berlin as he would (in the current Washington phrase) "with a yo-yo." But his freehanded game was clearly hampered by East Germany's troubles. The U.S. was determined to control its own response, not bounce up and down as Khrushchev wished. Off to Paris flew Secretary of State Dean Rusk, for a meeting of the Western foreign ministers at which free world diplomatic strategy is to be hammered out. As the talks began, it was clear that there would eventually be some kind of negotiations over Berlin. U.S. planners were convinced that there should be a Western summit in the fall, as prologue to a diplomatic showdown with the U.S.S.R. possibly in December.

Khrushchev also was talking about negotiations--in peevish, uncertain terms. Reporting back to Kennedy from a conference with Khrushchev at the Soviet leader's Black Sea dacha, Disarmament Adviser John McCloy found the Russian to be totally belligerent in mood--and irrational in manner. Khrushchev, said McCloy, was "absolutely serious" about extracting what he called the "rotten tooth" of Berlin. To Italy's Premier Amintore Fanfani, who called on him last week, Khrushchev warned of a nuclear war that would wipe out Italy and Britain (where the U.S. has missile bases) if the West attempted to preserve its access to Berlin by force. But he also announced blandly that war over Berlin was unlikely, noted that negotiations were "opportune and possible." In a turgid, 15-page answer to the July 17 U.S. note on Berlin, Khrushchev again expressed a willingness to sit down and talk about a German peace treaty. The message, significantly enough, omitted his previous threat to sign a treaty with East Germany alone.

Both sides were firmly committed to established positions, and the question remained which, if either, would have to give way. The U.S. was looking around for prospects that would entail no surrendering but might, as one U.S. diplomat put it, "buy us a continuation of the status quo." Thanks to the U.S.'s obvious determination, its rapidly build ing military strength and its united will, President John Kennedy and his negotiators could undertake the talks with more face cards in their hands.

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