Gorbachev Offers Talks to U.S. Allies : Would Negotiate With Britain and France on Missiles

In a surprise move, Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev Thursday offered to negotiate directly with France and Britain to limit their growing nuclear arsenals in return for a cut in Soviet missiles aimed at Western Europe.

As expected, Gorbachev also confirmed that he has proposed to the United States a ban on all space weapons and a reduction of 50% in the number of Soviet and American missiles that could reach the other nation’s territory.

Gorbachev, on his first visit to the West since he took power in March, announced that the number of SS-20 missiles in the European part of the Soviet Union and targeted on Western Europe has been cut back sharply. The announcement was apparently timed to influence an upcoming Dutch government decision on the deployment of U.S. cruise missiles on its territory.

1st Soviet Disclosure

Gorbachev’s outline of the new Soviet arms control policy came in a 45-minute speech at the residence of the National Assembly president. It marked the first public Soviet disclosure of the details of the proposal put on the table this week at the U.S.-Soviet arms control talks in Geneva.

His statement, however, left some major arms control questions unanswered and raised new issues involving the separate French and British nuclear forces.

In London, a British spokesman reacted coolly to Gorbachev’s plan for separate bargaining on the relatively small but expanding British nuclear deterrent. He said the Conservative government of Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher prefers that the Soviets and Americans reach agreement first before it conducts its own talks with Moscow.

News Session Today

French President Francois Mitterrand delayed his reaction until he appears with Gorbachev today at a joint news conference. In the past, however, Mitterrand has said that the two nuclear superpowers must reach agreement on arms controls before smaller nuclear powers follow suit.

In Cincinnati, President Reagan brushed aside suggestions that separate Soviet arms talks with Britain and France would drive a wedge in the Western alliance and said it would be arrogant for the United States to negotiate on behalf of its allies. (Story, Page 11.)

Reagan also expressed skepticism about the Soviet arms-reduction proposal, pointing out that the Soviets already have a defense against nuclear weapons and that moving the Soviets’ intermediate-range weapons out of Europe is not significant unless they are destroyed.

Gorbachev defended his main proposal to the United States for a “radical” cut in strategic missiles and a ban on space weapons, a provision aimed at President Reagan’s Strategic Defense Initiative, a $26-billion space-based defense program popularly known as “Star Wars” that is still in its research phase.

“We propose a practical solution to the very same tasks that were agreed upon by both sides early this year as being the aims of the Geneva talks: not only to stop the arms race but also to drastically lower the level of armaments and at the same time avert an arms race in outer space,” he said. “There is hardly any need to say how all this would strengthen strategic stability and mutual trust,” Gorbachev added.

But Gorbachev did not provide any details about which Soviet and American missiles would be scrapped--a key issue for U.S. negotiators who are concerned by the overwhelming Soviet advantage in the powerful and extremely accurate land-based, intercontinental missiles.

As for the separate talks with France and Britain, the Kremlin chief said he thought it would be easier to reach an agreement on speedy reduction of medium-range missiles in Europe by sidestepping the Geneva talks.

“This road, as it appears to us, may be practical,” he said, adding that the French and British nuclear potential is “growing rapidly and we can no longer ignore it.”

The U.S. and Soviet intermediate-range weapons deployed in Europe are the subject of one branch of the three-part Geneva talks. Separate negotiations are also continuing on strategic nuclear weapons and defensive and space-based armaments.

While France and Britain now have only about 150 nuclear warheads each, their combined force will number more than 1,200 warheads in 10 years if they carry out plans to deploy more missile-carrying submarines. France recently deployed one submarine that can carry 96 warheads and has four more on order. The British are planning to acquire Trident submarines armed with more than 240 warheads apiece.

Arms control specialists said the proposal for separate talks with the French and British may be designed to widen the existing divisions in the Atlantic Alliance.

In addition, Gorbachev made a specific appeal to the Netherlands.

The Dutch government said it will make a decision by the end of October on accepting the cruise missiles, based on whether the total number of Soviet SS-20 missiles in Europe and Asia had increased above the 378 deployed as of of June, 1984. That is when the Soviets began setting up more SS-20s in the western part of the country, supposedly to offset the arrival of U.S. Pershing 2 and cruise missiles in West Germany and Britain.

Gorbachev said in his speech that the Soviet Union has reduced its SS-20 deployment to 243 in the European part of the Soviet Union, west of the Urals, which he said “precisely accords with the level of June, 1984.”

“The SS-20 missiles that were additionally deployed in the process (of countering the U.S. buildup) have been withdrawn from standby alert and the stationary installations for housing these missiles will be dismantled withing the next two months,” he said.

American arms control specialists, however, have questioned whether such a step has any significance. They point out that the SS-20 is a mobile missile that can be fired from nearly any location and does not require a special launching pad.

Gorbachev insisted, however, that the number of missile launchers (without counting the number of warheads) is now much smaller than it had been a decade ago.

“I think Europe is now entitled to expect a reply step by the United States--the termination of further deployment of its medium missiles on the European continent,” he said.

Mitterrand, however, has been a strong proponent of the American missiles in Western Europe, declaring that they provided nuclear balance in Europe against the Soviet arsenal.

The United States has about 12,000 nuclear warheads and bombs, compared to 9,900 for the Soviet Union, arms control experts have calculated. While the American force is split almost equally among bombers and land-based and sea-based missiles, the Soviet Union has about three-fourths of its nuclear power in the form of land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles.

Thus, a 50% cut in the nuclear arsenals of each superpower would not cut as deeply into the most powerful Soviet weapons.

Euromissiles Counted

In addition, the wording of the Soviet proposal indicates that the 50% cut may apply to the medium-range U.S. missiles in Europe, as well, because they can reach the territory of the Soviet Union. In contrast, the Soviets’ medium-range missiles, aimed at Europe, China and Japan and not the United States, presumably would not be included in the 50% reduction plan.

Gorbachev, in addition to outlining the new arms control package, also proposed closer ties between Western Europe and the Soviet Union in a number of fields.

He called for a treaty to stop the spread of chemical weapons and a zone in central Europe that would be free of such arms.

Europe, he said, is more vulnerable to an armed conflict because it is over-saturated with arms and has large population centers.

“This means Europe’s security cannot be ensured by military force,” he said, adding that this was a new situation that requires rethinking of centuries-old traditions.

“We are feeling this,” Gorbachev added. “We have started the rethinking.”

He also suggested the possibility of cooperation between the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and the Warsaw Pact, declaring, “Even in conditions of the existence of the two blocs, it is possible to create such a modus vivendi which would blunt the acuteness of the present confrontation.”

Moscow is ready to cooperate with the European Community as a political as well as an economic entity, he added, and proposed exchanges between the Soviet Union and the European Parliament.

Gorbachev said his policy is not anti-American because Moscow wants good relations with the United States as well as with Western Europe.

“We are realists,” he added, “and we know how strong are the ties--historical, political and economic--linking Western Europe and the United States.”

The French deputies politely applauded Gorbachev’s speech. Earlier, however, he received a sharp rebuff on human rights from the mayor of Paris, neo-Gaullist Jacques Chirac.

‘Deprived of Freedom’

“I think with emotion of all those deprived of freedom (in the Soviet Union) because of their convictions,” Chirac said while Gorbachev listened impassively at a City Hall ceremony. “I am also thinking of those Jews who are not allowed to leave the country.”

Later, French Premier Laurent Fabius handed Gorbachev a “list of cases . . . concerning freedom” of travel and emigration involving spouses or relatives of French citizens. “He took the list,” Fabius said later.

The French public has been increasingly concerned about human rights issues in the Soviet Union in recent years, Western diplomats have reported. There were several anti-Gorbachev demonstrations before his arrival and street signs have declared, “Gulag, No Thanks.”