Vance in Moscow: 'A Frank Discussion'

When Secretary of State Cyrus Vance walked down the ramp of his Air Force jet into the glare of spotlights at Moscow's Vnukovo Airport late last week, he was, symbolically at least, taking a mighty leap in the dark. TIME Correspondent Christopher Ogden, who arrived with the Vance party, cabled that Vance's welcome was warm enough: "He was greeted properly by his Soviet counterpart, Andrei Gromyko, and he and his wife were given the traditional bouquet of red carnations. They posed for pictures with Gromyko on a clear, 35DEG night and, after a short and inconsequential arrival statement, entered a black ZIL limousine and were whisked to a dacha in Lenin Hills, just up the road from the one in which predecessor Henry Kissinger used to stay." As Vance's meetings with Soviet Party Chief Leonid Brezhnev began, however, the atmosphere was expected to be considerably chillier. In fact, there was only limited hope in Washington that the trip would produce any real progress in curbing the nuclear arms race and coping with a score of other problematical issues.

Vance's visit ended a long hiatus in top-level contacts between Moscow and Washington since the detente era began five years ago. Apart from an inconclusive meeting between former President Gerald Ford and Gromyko, the two sides had not sat down at a negotiating table since January 1976. U.S.Soviet relations, which progressively soured last year after pro-Moscow forces won the Angolan civil war, have not been helped by Carter's championship of human rights in general and Soviet dissidents in particular.

Mythical Menace. Last week, in a major speech before a congress of Soviet trade-union leaders, Brezhnev excoriated Carter's human rights policy in extraordinarily strong terms. Hammering furiously on the lectern, the Russian declared that such "interference in the internal affairs of the Soviet Union," plus a "slanderous campaign" in the U.S. about the "myth" of the Soviet military menace, stood in "direct opposition to further improvement of Soviet-American relations." He attacked "Washington's claim to teach others how to live" when, he said, neither U.S. domestic nor foreign policy can justify moralizing.

Despite his angry words and Khrushchev-like fist pounding, Brezhnev conceded that a new SALT accord, based on the 1974 Vladivostok agreement, was still "quite attainable." If that was achieved, the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. could "move forward to a mutual reduction of armaments." Brezhnev also sketched out a proposal for gradual Israeli withdrawal from occupied Arab territories and hinted that the Russians might be receptive to Carter's proposal to limit the international arms trade.

Carter and his foreign policy advisers, including Russian-speaking National Security Council Chief Zbigniew Brzezinski, dissected the Brezhnev speech line by line. "He's trying to get Vance on the defensive," said one Administration insider. "It's the classic Soviet prenegotiating position: 'What's ours is ours and what's yours is negotiable.' "

Reading beyond the rhetoric, analysts noted that Brezhnev did not directly link his attack on Carter's human rights statements with the need for a nuclear arms agreement. They were also encouraged because the Soviet leader did not explicitly turn down the President's proposal to defer an agreement on the American cruise missile and the Soviet Backfire bomber until after a SALT II agreement is signed.

At a breakfast with congressional leaders the day after Brezhnev's outburst, Carter cheerfully announced he had found some "very, very hopeful signs" in the speech. The Administration even managed to make a virtue of the Soviet leader's attack on the American system. Straight-faced, Press Secretary Jody Powell declared that the White House had noted "with interest and indeed approval" that the Soviets had views "on the order of things in our society," and invited the Russians to "an open and healthy debate" on the respective merits of the two systems. Carter even managed a bit of bluster himself. "Some people are concerned every time Brezhnev sneezes," he told Democratic Senator Alan Cranston of California.

Despite that apparent nonchalance, Carter spent hours last week with his National Security Council, hashing over the various bargaining positions that Vance might use in, the Moscow arms talks. By midweek the President had settled on a basic formula that involved the modification of nuclear force ceilings set by Brezhnev and Ford at Vladivostok. Instead, Carter instructed Vance to seek "deep cuts" in the 2,400 missiles the 1974 accord had allowed each side. By "deep" he meant more than the merely cosmetic 10% reduction the Soviets put forward--and the U.S. rejected--last year.

The Soviet leader will almost certainly not respond immediately: any decision to cut back substantially on nuclear force levels would require lengthy debate within the Politburo. For the Kremlin, the crucial issue will be the U.S. cruise missiles, which would ultimately be able to survive a Soviet strike and retaliate with devastating accuracy.

The Kremlin's desire to curb further development of cruise missiles offers the U.S. some leverage in this week's talks. Thus Vance may offer to limit the range of the cruise to 400 miles for sea-launched missiles or 1,500 miles for air-launched missiles and to stop insisting on restrictions in the number of Soviet Backfire bombers; in return, he would expect a Kremlin pledge to confine use of Backfires to tactical warfare. If the Russians refuse, Vance may again propose that cruise missiles and Backfire bombers "run free" until after a SALT II agreement is signed. Since the Russians dislike this option the most, they may ultimately come forward with some concessions on Soviet missile programs.

Whether or not that happens, Vance and his aides look forward--even with some eagerness--to tough SALT bargaining. As one senior Vance adviser put it, "It's time for a frank discussion."

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