New Reagan Offer on ‘Star Wars’ Reported : President Proposes to Gorbachev a 5-Year ABM Pact Extension, Eased Rules on Space Project

President Reagan, following weeks of debate within his Administration, formally responded Friday to Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev’s latest arms control proposal with a plan that, sources said, would extend the existing anti-missile treaty for five years, but under more permissive rules that would allow research and testing of space defenses.

The White House announced in a brief statement that the President’s long-awaited response had been sent to Moscow but provided no details of the Reagan proposal. The statement, as well as White House sources, made clear that the President intends to push ahead with at least the research phase of the program, officially called Strategic Defense Initiative and popularly known as “Star Wars.”

“We look upon the energetic research effort of our government toward finding a defense against these weapons of mass destruction to be an essential part of the task of reducing the effectiveness and the very need for these offensive weapons,” the White House said.

Moscow, which has sought to ban the “Star Wars” program in arms control negotiations, is expected to balk at the new U.S. position. But U.S. officials say they expect the Soviets to continue formal negotiations over both offensive and defensive weapons.

“The prospects for progress on the array of U.S.-Soviet issues are enhanced by conducting a confidential dialogue and therefore we will not comment on the content of the President’s letter,” the White House said.

Administration officials said, however, that as the centerpiece of his proposal, the President offered a five-year extension of the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, conditioned upon a more permissive interpretation of the kind of work that can be conducted on “Star Wars.” The President said that the United States would consider itself free to go ahead with research, testing and development of defensive systems during that time.

At the end of the five years, the officials said, Reagan suggested an additional two-year period during which the United States and the Soviet Union would negotiate the terms of deployment of a “Star Wars” system in order to achieve what Reagan envisions as a new superpower relationship, in which each side’s security would be assured by a missile defense system.

Implicit in the proposal, officials said, is the understanding that both sides would be free to go ahead with deployment of a missile defense system after seven years unless new restrictions are established by mutual consent.

This suggests that Reagan is offering to ban deployment of a “Star Wars” system for seven years, but in fact even the most avid proponents of “Star Wars” admit that no deployment is possible for at least eight to 10 years, given the state of space-defense research.

On the offensive side of the equation, Reagan reiterated his proposal of 50% cuts by both sides in long-range strategic systems, combined with a 50% cut in total warheads. However, officials said, the President indicated that he would be willing to negotiate the cuts in stages if the Soviets prefer that approach.

‘Zero-Zero Option’

Reagan called again for total elimination of intermediate-range nuclear missiles from Europe and Asia, the so-called “zero-zero option.” But officials stressed that he is open to other proposals, as long as they produce deep proportionate cuts in intermediate-range weapons to equal levels on both sides.

Moscow has made clear that its objective is to put additional restraints on research as well as to ban development, testing and deployment of the anti-missile systems for 15 to 20 years.

In his proposal, Gorbachev called for 33% cuts in long-range missiles and bombers, and 20% cuts in missile warheads and bombs. But the Soviet leader conditioned his proposal on restrictions on defensive systems, which Reagan found unacceptable.

The White House statement was couched in conciliatory language toward Gorbachev. Reagan earlier Friday struck a similar pose, telling a group of high school students in the Rose Garden that Gorbachev was “a modern man, in contrast to some we have dealt with in times past.”

‘He Can Be Dealt With’

“He realizes there are great economic problems” in the Soviet Union, Reagan added. “And I believe he can be dealt with.”

“The President is hopeful that the ideas he has put forward in this letter will continue the process of building a firm basis for progress in a number of critical areas,” the White House announcement said.

“The President finds his exchange of correspondence with General Secretary Gorbachev to be of great value in the search for understanding between our two countries,” it said.

“We hope that our efforts will produce an agreement, not only in arms control, but in the other important regional and bilateral issues that too often are sources of tensions between the United States and the Soviet Union. It is our policy to eliminate, where possible, these sources of tension,” the statement added.