Soviet ‘Star Wars’ Plan Denied

The Soviet Union’s leading expert on American affairs has denied that his government is developing a strategic defense system of its own to counter the U.S. “Star Wars” program.

Georgi Arbatov, director of the Soviet Union’s Institute on U.S.A. and Canada, said in an interview in the current issue of U.S. News & World Report that “there was some work done” by his country on such a defense system but that it was not completed.

“We never had it in mind that it’s possible to do it,” Arbatov said in the magazine interview. “It is a vision. We don’t believe it even now. We think it is practically impossible to implement.”

Reagan Administration officials have maintained that the U.S. “Star Wars” program is only keeping abreast of Soviet developments in anti-missile and anti-satellite technology.

Arbatov also said President Reagan’s insistence on continuing U.S. research on the satellite-based strategic defense program “will ruin all arms-control negotiations.”