Winners and Losers : Daniloff Deal Carries a Due Bill for Both Sides of a Summit

In a single day the focus of East-West relations has changed dramatically. On Monday the American people were waiting to see whether American journalist Nicholas Daniloff would be freed by the Soviet Union--and, if so, how. By Tuesday that was old news. Front and center is the forthcoming meeting of the world’s two most powerful leaders at Reykjavik, Iceland, on Oct. 11-12.

In public relations Ronald Reagan has again outfoxed his critics. Again he has used his patented technique of avoiding political trouble by changing the subject. Victory in Grenada overshadowed the bombing of the Marine barracks in Beirut. The drug issue has obscured hunger and the homeless. Now the prospect of a summit, on a date certain, will overwhelm close inspection of the deal for Daniloff.

Without the change in subject, the U.S.-Soviet agreement that secured Daniloff’s release would have been picked apart for weeks. Once the imbroglio began, neither Washington nor Moscow could afford to blink. Thus the outcome of complex diplomacy is that both sides gained and both lost. Daniloff is out, but so is the Soviet spy, Gennady F. Zakharov. A courageous Soviet dissident, Yuri Orlov, will be allowed to emigrate, but the United States compromised on its demand that 25 Soviet employees at the United Nations--all characterized as spies--go home.

In normal times these details would dominate discussion. And they are not irrelevant. Only through his courage in opposing a swap for Zakharov has Daniloff retained his integrity despite what is at heart a trade. Given the terms of the U.S.-Soviet deal, journalists and other Westerners in Moscow still risk being snatched by the KGB, although next time the Soviet leadership will likely think carefully about the reaction of Western media and politics.

But when there is a chance to revise relations between the United States and the Soviet Union, times are not normal, and the larger significance of the week’s events is driving out the lesser. Not only does President Reagan understand that new drama will displace the old, but also, when the analysis is done, a clear winner emerges: the people who want a superpower summit and arms-control agreements.

It is ironic that the Daniloff affair began as a serious threat to improved U.S.-Soviet relations and ended as the catalyst for a summit. Facing his first significant political confrontation with the Soviets, Reagan finally had to impose order in his Administration on the conduct of East-West relations; he had to take charge. Secretary of State George P. Shultz suddenly came into his own as the point man in dealing with his Soviet counterpart. He used this role to pin down the terms for a summit while his conservative critics kept their eyes on an American being held hostage in Moscow.

The most intriguing event was Mikhail S. Gorbachev’s proposal to meet Reagan informally in Reykjavik. Wittingly or not, he thus provided the President with a chance to fulfill his domestic political needs--plus the bonus of a high-visibility, low-risk summit just before the November elections. But it was not a gift, or a shrewd gesture by Gorbachev to do some subject-changing of his own.

Gorbachev has been insisting that a summit agenda be dominated by arms control. He clearly believes that he holds high cards on this subject, especially in influencing West European public opinion. He will press Reagan to join his moratorium on nuclear testing, and will try again to trammel the U.S. strategic defense program (“Star Wars”).

For its part, the Reagan Administration has said for many months that it wants a summit to focus on the broader political relationship. For Washington this means human rights, trouble spots like the Middle East, and Soviet misconduct in places like Afghanistan, Nicaragua and Cambodia.

Without doubt, however, the Iceland summit will focus on arms control. And it will provide Gorbachev with a chance to test the American waters before taking the symbolically important step of visiting the United States. If not satisfied, he can still try to blame failure on the U.S. President without that message’s being drowned out by the fact of his touching American soil.

It is far from clear, however, that a superpower agenda dominated by arms control will play into Soviet hands. Indeed, the two sides are now very close to an agreement, at least in principle, on the issue of medium-range missiles in Europe --the so-called Euromissiles. To be sure, many details remain to be worked out, and U.S. conservatives are already warning against a bad deal.

Yet any possible agreement on Euromissiles would be immensely popular. In the United States the fine print would be obscured by relief at a show of U.S.-Soviet understanding. In Western Europe an agreement would help governing parties in West Germany and Great Britain, and would soften criticism of American arms-control policy. Against this background it will be hard for Gorbachev to rise in Western opinion if he denies these benefits because of Star Wars or nuclear testing.

A Euromissile agreement may not come until a full-blown summit. It could founder altogether. The Reykjavik summit may be all smiles and no substance. But much seems possible, now, that was only a distant dream on the day the KGB seized Nick Daniloff.