Speakes Bristles, Says Reagan Won’t Be Phoning Shultz

President Reagan received updates from the U.S.-Soviet arms talks in Geneva today by diplomatic cables and had no plans to consult by telephone, White House spokesman Larry Speakes said.

Speakes bristled at repeated questions about why Reagan did not plan to talk by phone with Secretary of State George P. Shultz after meetings with Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei A. Gromyko.

“You’re really making far more of this than necessary,” Speakes said. He said Reagan would receive detailed cables and added: “If there was a need for the delegation to confer with him, they would do so.”

Asked if Reagan weren’t interested or curious enough to want to talk with the delegation by phone, Speakes replied: “He will be quite aware of these things. . . . If you strive to paint him in a corner of not knowing or not caring, you’d be dead wrong as usual.”