Why Are These Men Smiling?

By Howard G. Chua-Eoan

With so much going on in Moscow and in the Germanys last week, it was tempting to prejudge the meeting between the foreign ministers of the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. as a matter of minor consequence. The Soviets seemed so distracted -- understandably so -- that even as Secretary of State James Baker flew into Moscow to prepare for the June superpower summit, he was uncertain whether his schedule would hold up. His engagement with Soviet counterpart Eduard Shevardnadze had already been rebooked twice. Then an apologetic Shevardnadze was forced to push their first appointment back an hour and had to duck out of the historic party conference to keep his date.

But it was worth the wait. When Baker and Shevardnadze emerged from 2 1/2 days of marathon meetings, including nearly four hours with a visibly weary Gorbachev, they had accomplished a remarkable amount. Not only had they cleared many of the hurdles blocking a treaty to decrease strategic weapons but the Soviets came close to agreeing with Bush's week-old proposal to cut back troops in Europe.

Though criticized for not reaping a peace dividend, Bush has insisted that U.S. weapons were the necessary collateral for deals with Moscow, and his tenacity apparently paid off. For years both sides have been dickering over the fine points of a strategic missile treaty and got nowhere on reducing troops in Europe. But in the past week they went a long way toward settling crucial issues brought up during previous negotiations, including the December summit in Malta. Baker and Shevardnadze settled in principle two major sticking points and agreed to finesse a third that had been holding up an agreement reducing long-range nuclear weapons. The Soviets accepted the U.S. plan for a phased abolition of chemical weapons. And Moscow formally eliminated linkage between missile reductions and the U.S. Star Wars program, as Gorbachev had earlier hinted he would. "I think it's moved the process along very, very smartly," declared Baker.

Perhaps most important, Gorbachev said he would agree to limit conventional forces in Europe on both sides to the 195,000 troops that Bush had proposed a week earlier, but with a key difference. Bush's plan would have allowed the U.S. to keep an additional 30,000 soldiers on the continent outside Central Europe -- in Britain and Turkey, for example. The Soviet leader rejected that asymmetry, saying he would accept either 195,000 or 225,000 for both sides. Whatever the final total, Gorbachev made it plain he agrees with Bush that the changes in Eastern Europe allow sizable reductions in forces. But he also in effect accepted Bush's premise that the U.S. should retain a large military presence in Europe.

The U.S. had expected Moscow to ask for even deeper cuts in troop strength, so the simple parity demanded by Gorbachev seemed almost certain to find approval in Washington, especially since the U.S. has tried to eliminate the Soviet asymmetrical advantage in conventional forces for 16 years. Baker called Gorbachev's counteroffer "very close to the President's proposal." It could all make for a satisfying summit in Washington next June.

With reporting by Michael Duffy with Bush and Christopher Ogden with Baker