Gorbachev Tells Party Congress He May Delay Summit

Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev suggested Tuesday that he may delay a second summit meeting with President Reagan unless there is greater hope of agreement on arms control issues.

Gorbachev, in a five-hour speech opening the 27th Congress of the Soviet Communist Party, assailed Reagan’s response to his proposal to abolish all nuclear weapons by the end of the century. Reagan’s message to Gorbachev, proposing the elimination of all medium-range nuclear missiles from Europe and Asia over a three-year period, was delivered in Moscow on Sunday, virtually on the eve of the party congress.

Gorbachev charged that Reagan’s latest proposal, unveiled in Washington on Monday, was “swamped with reservations, linkages and conditions which, in fact, block . . . radical arms reductions.”

“In a nutshell, it is hard to detect . . . any serious preparedness in the U.S. Administration to get down to solving the cardinal problems in eliminating the nuclear threat,” he declared.

Justifying the Summit

The Soviet leader then suggested that Moscow and Washington must agree to halt nuclear testing and eliminate all medium-range missiles from Europe in order to justify another meeting by the two leaders.

“If there is readiness to seek agreement (on these two points), the question of the timing of the meeting would be resolved on its own,” he told 5,000 delegates and several hundred foreign guests. “But there is no sense in holding empty talks.”

Gorbachev, who will celebrate his 55th birthday on Sunday, presented his report to the congress in three parts, with 30-minute breaks in the morning and afternoon and a two-hour lunch period.

His voice was firm throughout, and he seemed to be as strong when he finished as when he began. The delegates interrupted him repeatedly with applause.

It was Gorbachev’s first opportunity to address a party congress--they take place at five-year intervals--since he succeeded the late Konstantin U. Chernenko last March. The audience stood in silence in memory of Chernenko, Leonid I. Brezhnev and Yuri V. Andropov, all of whom have died since the 26th congress in 1981.

His Second-in-Command

Yegor K. Ligachev, a Politburo member who is said to be Gorbachev’s second-in-command, took a prominent role at the congress, presiding over the approval of appointments and adoption of the agenda. He and Andrei A. Gromyko, the former foreign minister who is now president, flanked Gorbachev at a special table where no one else sat.

Gorbachev’s speech was also noteworthy for its pointed criticism of Brezhnev’s policies, which he said had contributed to a slowdown in Soviet economic growth. Although he did not name Brezhnev, who died in 1982, the target was clear to most of his listeners.

During the 1970s, “the situation called for change, but a peculiar psychology--how to improve things without changing anything--took the upper hand in the central bodies, and, for that matter, at the local level as well,” Gorbachev said.

Gorbachev said the party, which directs all aspects of Soviet life, now must break with the “stagnation and conservatism” of the 1970s and modernize the economy through efficient management, new technology and flexible new mechanisms.

Not Setting Preconditions

After Gorbachev concluded his speech Tuesday, Alexander N. Yakovlev, chief of the propaganda department of the party Central Committee, said that Gorbachev was not setting preconditions for the next summit meeting.

“Geneva was a very, very good meeting,” Yakovlev told reporters, “but there is no need to repeat the same thing. . . . Now we need practical steps.”

Reagan has proposed that he and Gorbachev meet in the United States in June, but Moscow has not responded, according to Western diplomats. Under an accord reached at their first meeting, last November in Geneva, Reagan is to visit the Soviet Union in 1987.

Gorbachev made it clear that the Kremlin will study Reagan’s reply closely, but he said nevertheless that “it looks as if some people in Washington have got used to living side by side with nuclear weapons.”

‘Will Have to Answer’

“The Western politicians,” he went on, “will have to answer the question: Are they prepared to part with nuclear weapons at all?”

Gorbachev made these other points:

--Relations with China have improved, although differences on international problems remain. “The potential for cooperation between the Soviet Union and China is enormous,” he said, because of common interests in socialism and peace.

--The Soviet Union has agreed with the Afghanistan government on a phased withdrawal of Soviet troops once a “political settlement” has been reached to stop intervention by “imperialists and counterrevolutionaries.”

--He proposed a meeting of the United States, the Soviet Union, China, Britain and France, all permanent members of the U.N. Security Council, to consider ways to strengthen international security.

--He attacked international terrorists who interfere with air and sea travel, and said the Soviet Union is ready to work with other countries to deal with the threat.

--He proposed a world congress on global economic problems, to take up such issues as trade barriers and the debt burden of developing nations.

Imperialist Policy Cited

Gorbachev began his speech with an attack on the United States, accusing its leaders of following an imperialist policy that rejects peaceful coexistence with the Soviet Union. He charged that American “leaders refuse to assess the realities of the world and draw sober conclusions.”

And he was also critical of the United States’ leadership among transnational corporations, accusing the American-controlled firms of monopolizing world production and trade.

But most of his speech dealt with problems of the Soviet economy, and his hopes for doubling output in the next 15 years by raising labor productivity.

Gorbachev said that problems that arose in the 1970s grew faster than did solutions. The result, he said, was inertia and stagnation. Now, he went on, the nation must take the boldest of measures to produce more and better housing, consumer goods, medical care and food supplies.

Modernized Factories

A total of 200 billion rubles (about $250 billion) will be invested in the modernization of factories, he said, with heavy emphasis on machine-building industries.

Prices, he said, must be more flexible, and private farm plots must be encouraged, but he took no significant steps in the direction of a market-oriented economy. Centralized planning will be strengthened, he said, even though there will be less interference by Moscow in the day-to-day work of factories and other enterprises.

Gorbachev appeared at the congress in a dark gray suit with a neat striped tie, and he read the text of his remarks through steel-rimmed glasses.