Prospects for Missile Pact ‘Very Good,’ Baker Asserts

Prospects for an agreement between the United States and the Soviet Union to eliminate medium- and short-range nuclear missiles from Europe have become “very good” because of a developing agreement between the United States and its allies, White House Chief of Staff Howard H. Baker Jr. declared Tuesday.

The United States and its North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies are nearing a consensus that is “remarkable, little short of historic” to support the major outlines of a Soviet proposal to abolish European nuclear missiles, Baker said.

Baker, interviewed during a breakfast session with The Times’ Washington Bureau, said that an agreement could be signed at a summit meeting between President Reagan and Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev.

Some countries, especially West Germany, remain nervous about eliminating short-range missiles, which they regard as a deterrent to Soviet aggression, Baker conceded. But he asserted that such concerns are waning and that there is an “increased likelihood” that short-range missiles will be part of U.S.-Soviet arms negotiations.

The Soviets have proposed eliminating both medium-range missiles, which can strike targets at ranges between 1,000 and 3,000 miles, and short-range missiles (300 to 1,000 miles) from Europe. But they would allow each side to keep 100 medium-range missiles in Soviet Asia and in the United States.

The Soviets have 922 warheads on medium-range missiles and 92 short-range warheads in Europe, while the United States has 316 medium-range warheads and no short-range warheads.

While the German government has not yet signaled its support for the Soviet proposal, Britain recently gave it a qualified endorsement. And U.S. officials quickly indicated that they agree with the British position.

An ‘Emerging Consensus’

Britain wants to eliminate all medium-range missiles and to forbid residual forces in Asia and the United States. Although the United States earlier had indicated that it would accept the Soviet approach, Baker said Tuesday that part of an “emerging consensus” among the allies is to “push hard” to eliminate all medium-range missiles.

NATO is expected to take a united stand on the Soviet proposal after West Germany announces its decision. Baker said that it may be necessary to convene a NATO summit to reach a formal consensus and that if there is one, it probably would be followed by a Reagan-Gorbachev summit to negotiate the final shape of an agreement.

If accord is reached over medium- and short-range missiles, Baker said, the Administration will seek “an agreement to proceed then with early and effective talks on the reduction of conventional weapons.” As nuclear forces are scaled down, Western Europe will want to reduce the threat from superior Soviet conventional forces, he indicated.

Otherwise, even though each side will still have battlefield nuclear weapons--those with the shortest range of all, less than 300 miles--NATO might find it necessary to increase its conventional strength to balance that of the Soviets. Such a buildup, Baker said, would be the job of NATO’s European members “instead of the U.S. job.”

During the interview, Baker also vehemently defended the recent White House decision to argue that Reagan was not covered by the congressional ban--commonly called the Boland Amendment after Rep. Edward P. Boland (D-Mass.), its author--on direct aid to Nicaragua’s contra rebels for most of 1985 and 1986.

The White House first began advancing the argument after more than two weeks of congressional hearings on the Iran-contra affair produced testimony indicating that Reagan knew much more about covert operations to aid the rebels than he previously had acknowledged publicly.

‘No Person Above Law’

Senate Majority Leader Robert C. Byrd (D-W.Va.) called it “preposterous” to argue that the President was not covered by the law. “No person in this country is above the law,” he said in an interview, “and that includes the President of the United States, who is charged with faithfully executing the law.”

But Baker dismissed statements by Byrd and other Democratic leaders that the new White House position represents a serious political mistake.

“It would have been a greater political mistake, in my view, to let the perception continue to grow that the Boland Amendment in some way made it illegal for the entire government, and the President in particular, to be involved in any aspect of support for the contras, and that’s where it was headed,” Baker said.

Baker said he did not know of “a single person” involved in the debate on the adoption of the Boland Amendment, including Boland, “who has ever alleged that it applied to the President.”

Baker insisted that the White House has consistently declared that the President did not know that some profits of U.S. arms sales to Iran had been diverted to the contras but that he “did know of private efforts to aid the contras and that there was nothing illegal about that, even from the Boland Amendment or otherwise.”