‘Star Wars’: Allied Doubts

The Administration is making some progress in its campaign to win allied backing for President Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative, popularly known as “Star Wars.” But the support is tentative, to say the least.

Washington’s desire to nail down firm allied support for the American negotiating position at the Geneva talks on nuclear-arms reduction is understandable; the Soviets clearly hope that European concerns over the Strategic Defense Initiative, or SDI, can be exploited to Moscow’s advantage. But the Administration’s disinclination even to discuss limitations on the program plays into Soviet hands.

At a meeting in Luxembourg this week, defense ministers of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization voted unanimous support for the research phase of the Star Wars program, and several member governments are displaying an interest in the American invitation to participate in the research. But there is much less to the show of support than meets the eye.

The French government, which did not participate in the Luxembourg meeting, remains very skeptical of the whole enterprise. The British and the West Germans have made it unmistakably clear that, while they support the research phase of the SDI, they are not convinced of the desirability, much less the feasibility, of going beyond research to development and deployment of an anti-missile defense system.

Meanwhile, outside the NATO area, Australia has declined the U.S. invitation to participate in the research program, and the Japanese have said only that they will study the matter.

Geoffrey Howe, the British foreign secretary, gave the most comprehensive expression thus far of the evolving European view in a speech earlier this month.

Howe, noting that the Soviet Union has been conducting a “far-reaching” program of Star Wars research for years, agreed that it is only prudent for the United States to press forward with its own research efforts. He also agreed that treaty restraints on Star Wars research are impractical because there is no way of looking inside laboratories and research institutes to check on compliance.

However, the British foreign secretary expressed grave misgivings about ultimate deployment of missile defense systems on grounds of cost and the possibility that they would accelerate the nuclear-arms race instead of containing it as Reagan hopes.

As the wording of this week’s NATO statement made clear, the Europeans want Star Wars research to be conducted within the constraints of the 1972 ABM treaty. The West Germans, who endorsed Howe’s speech, fear that Washington’s reluctance to put the Star Wars program on the bargaining table may doom the Geneva talks to failure.

European interest in participating in Star Wars research grows from the realization that the highly sophisticated technology that is involved will have commercial spinoffs, and they don’t want to be left out. But it is already obvious that America and its allies will have a hard time agreeing on the acceptable limits of U.S. controls over use of the technologies. The West Germans, especially, resent U.S. pressure to make up their minds on participation within 60 days.

Reagan may get the joint declaration of support that he wants at the annual economic summit meeting in May. But European misgivings are real and deep-seated. They will not go away. Washington may not want to show all its cards at this early stage of the Geneva negotiations, but common sense requires that at some point the United States be willing to accept restraints on Star Wars testing and development in return for reductions in the huge Soviet offensive missile force.

That’s really what the Europeans are saying. And it makes sense.