Bombing the Wrong Target

More fallout from the nondecision on the neutron weapon

The neutron warhead was designed to stop Soviet tanks, but so far the only damage caused by the weapon has been within NATO. Relations between the two most important of NATO's 15 members, the U.S. and West Germany, have plunged to their lowest point in the postwar era. To Chancellor Helmut Schmidt and other West German officials, Jimmy Carter's wavering earlier this month about whether to develop the weapon seemed to confirm their doubts about the President's ability to lead the alliance effectively. Although Schmidt was publicly muting the impact of the episode last week, Bonn officials continued to complain privately, as one put it, that the neutron imbroglio "makes Carter's leadership even more questionable."

As it happened, questions were also being raised about Schmidt's handling of the matter. The flap erupted when it seemed that Carter was going to cancel production of the neutron weapon because, among other things, it had received no public support from the West German government. In the face of a scare campaign against the "inhuman" warhead that was skillfully fanned by Moscow, Schmidt apparently would not risk backing the weapon openly, although he did so privately. While the President eventually made no decision--he neither authorized the weapon's development nor definitively dropped it--the episode triggered a political flurry in Bonn. The Bundestag's Foreign Affairs and Defense committees last week summoned Schmidt to clarify the problems in U.S.-West German ties in a secret joint session. The Chancellor also had to take the Bundestag's rostrum to open a neutron bomb debate demanded by his conservative opposition.

Schmidt's Bundestag audience was so concerned over the deteriorating relations with Washington that he stoutly had to proclaim the obvious: "West German-U.S. relations are so deeply entrenched that they cannot be uprooted by occasional differences of opinion." Schmidt then made a significant concession to Carter, who has linked eventual development of the bomb partly to Bonn's willingness to deploy it on West German soil. For the first time, the Chancellor openly backed the new weapon and stated that it could be based in his country if it would "be a decision of the [NATO] alliance as a whole" and if it would "not be stationed in West Germany alone."

Christian Democrat Helmut Kohl, leader of the opposition, scowled that Schmidt's gesture was "too late." The Chancellor, he said, should have had the "courage" to back the bomb when Carter needed such support. "Your silence was irresponsible. You are responsible for the strains in West German-U.S. relations." A top official of Schmidt's government privately agreed, in part, admitting: "We could have done more to help Carter on the bomb issue. But for purely domestic [political] reasons we were afraid."

U.S.-West German relations had been severely troubled even before the neutron bomb issue. For one thing, Schmidt had difficulty concealing his distaste for what he regards as Carter's messianic approach to foreign policy. For another, Bonn resents the lecturing by Washington that the German economy should expand faster in order to aid the West's economic revival. Schmidt is concerned that accelerated expansion would kick up his country's inflation rate, now an enviably low 3.1%. Bonn is also displeased with Carter's do-little attitude toward the plummeting dollar.

With all these grievances against Washington simmering, U.S. Defense Secretary Harold Brown found himself in the uncomfortable position of arriving in Bonn last week on a long-planned visit. There he faced the task of following a Carter decision that he himself had opposed; it was no secret that he favored developing the neutron weapon.

Brown especially feared that the neutron flap would get in the way of the original purpose of his visit. That was principally to explore ways to bolster NATO's antitank capability and to press Bonn to agree to pay about one-quarter of the $2.16 billion it will cost NATO to buy 18 U.S.-developed AWACS (Airborne Warning and Control System) planes. Brown and Schmidt got along reasonably well. The notoriously acerbic Chancellor did not tongue-lash his guest, and discussion about the neutron bomb was kept short. Noted a senior U.S. official after the meeting: "Schmidt wants to be on good terms with the President. How that gets worked out, we'll have to wait and see. Everyone wants the planned NATO summit in May and the economic summit in July to be big successes."

As for the bomb, observed the U.S. official, "we don't have to decide its future this week. We will have to see what the Soviets do. That will influence, though not determine, what we do." The U.S. will be watching for signs that the Kremlin has decided to limit deployment of the new SS-20 missile, which can hit targets in Western Europe, and the Soviets' willingness to pull back some of the 16,000 tanks they have in the Warsaw Pact countries.

The Russians, however, are not buying any such tradeoff. Leonid Brezhnev last week ridiculed the concept of linking a U.S. decision on the neutron bomb to the status of any Soviet weapons systems. Pravda scoffed that "the attempt to pressure the U.S.S.R. has never brought success and never will." Brown, for his part, has emphasized that the U.S. is pushing ahead with modernization of the missiles and artillery that eventually could fire a neutron warhead. Moreover, improvements are also being made on the 7,000 "conventional" tactical nuclear weapons already based in Europe. These, ironically, are bigger and more destructive, to both lives and property, than the much maligned neutron weapon.

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