Reagan Back Home With New Warning for Terrorists

A buoyant President Reagan returned home today after a 13-day Far East trip, saying that U.S. talks with Western allies in Tokyo brought understandings that will make it “tougher from now on” for terrorists.

“It certainly is good to be back in the good old U.S.A.,” Reagan told the crowd that greeted him and his wife, Nancy, on the South Lawn of the White House. Afterward, the two walked about the lawn under a brilliant sun, greeting the well-wishers.

The Reagans arrived shortly before 11 a.m. PDT after a 15-minute Marine One helicopter ride from Andrews Air Force Base in nearby Maryland.

In Tokyo, Reagan said in his formal remarks, “we agreed that the time has come to move beyond words and rhetoric. Terrorism, as expected, was high on the agenda. I am more than pleased by the commitments made in Tokyo by our summit partners in this regard.”

Terrorists ‘Put on Notice’

“Terrorists and those who support them--especially governments--have been put on notice,” the President told a large crowd of White House aides, Cabinet members and other supporters who, accompanied by a band from Martin Luther King Jr. High School here, greeted him.

Reagan served notice to terrorists that “it is going to be tougher from now on.”

Turning to the economic issues of the summit, Reagan said the seven participating nations arrived at “a new framework for strengthening effective coordination of international economic policy.”

Reagan also said he is pleased with the outcome of meetings last week with members of the Assn. of Southeast Asian Nations, saying that the sessions just before the opening of the economic summit “ . . . gave me a chance to bring their concerns to Tokyo. It also gave me a chance to confirm our ties with the industrious people of the Pacific Rim.”

Fueling Stop in Alaska

Air Force One had landed at Elmendorf Air Force Base in Alaska just after 3 a.m. PDT for a 45-minute refueling stop en route to Washington.

Aides traveling with Reagan on the 14 1/2-hour flight home from Tokyo sought to emphasize the President’s successes at the summit.

“I don’t think we avoided any issues,” presidential spokesman Larry Speakes said. “The controversies weren’t there. Everybody was in agreement.”

But other U.S. officials, declining to be named publicly, acknowledged that the United States had to sidestep several principal summit economic goals--including launching New World trade talks in September and direct discussions on agricultural export subsidies.

Essential to Strategy

This strategy had to be followed, these officials said, so that the Administration could devote its energy in Tokyo to other goals which had better prospects for success.

Some potentially contentious issues were muted to accommodate “a desire by the host country (Japan) to have a friendly and non-confrontational summit,” said one senior official who spoke only on the condition of anonymity.

The officials spoke in Tokyo before the President’s plane departed.