Administration Puts Off Arms Sale to Jordan

Faced with certain defeat in Congress, Reagan Administration officials agreed Thursday to postpone indefinitely a proposed sale of $1.9 billion in arms to Jordan.

Although Republicans insisted that the decision does not represent a defeat for President Reagan, it was widely viewed as a setback for the Administration’s current efforts to foster peace talks in the Middle East.

Sen. Richard G. Lugar (R-Ind.), chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said Administration officials sought to defuse the issue by promising not to proceed with the sale as scheduled after March 1.

In exchange, according to Lugar, Senate opponents of the sale promised to cancel an anticipated vote on the issue Feb. 18. It was expected that at least 75 of the Senate’s 100 members would have voted against the sale at that time.

Admission of Defeat

Lugar said the sale proposal will not be withdrawn by the Administration, however, as Senate GOP leaders have urged. Withdrawing it would have been viewed as an admission of defeat by Reagan.

Instead, according to Lugar, the Administration pledged that it will not rekindle the proposal without giving Congress sufficient notice to review it and vote on it. Sources said Secretary of State George P. Shultz is drafting a letter to members of Congress that will make the pledge explicit.

Opponents of the sale, most of them staunch supporters of Israel, noted that the agreement will effectively kill the proposed sale of high-performance jets and air defense missiles with which Reagan was seeking to encourage Jordan’s King Hussein to enter into peace talks with Israel.

‘Victory Without Numbers’

But Sen. Alan Cranston (D-Calif.), a leading opponent of the sale, described it as “a victory without winners.” He noted that the sale would have had more support in Congress if Jordan had agreed to participate in peace talks with Israel.

In the House, opponents of the sale indicated they were equally satisfied by the Administration’s pledge to postpone it indefinitely. Rep. Larry Smith (D-Fla.) indicated that he would not press for a House vote on his resolution disapproving of the sale.

Richard W. Murphy, assistant secretary of state for the Middle East, told a House subcommittee Wednesday that Hussein has agreed to continue discussing the terms of possible peace negotiations with Israel even if Congress refuses permission to sell him the arms he has been seeking.

At the same time, Murphy emphasized that the failure to sell arms to Jordan would have a negative effect on his efforts to bring the two sides together.