The Washington Summit : Ratification Prospects for Pact Appear Good

Despite strong opposition from Republican conservatives, President Reagan has reason to be confident that the treaty that he and Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev signed Tuesday will be approved by the Senate next year, making it the first U.S.-Soviet arms control pact to win approval in 15 years.

Senate Majority Leader Robert C. Byrd (D-W.Va.) said he believes the “prospects are good” that the pact eliminating medium- and shorter-range nuclear weapons will be ratified by the necessary two-thirds vote, perhaps as early as mid-April. Senate vote-counters are predicting privately that only 12 to 18 senators will vote against it.

Chance to Study It

The President also has expressed hope that the treaty will be ratified once senators get an opportunity to study its provisions.

“I hope it’s going to sail through,” he said last week.

Nevertheless, the newly signed treaty is expected to provoke a fierce ideological battle between the GOP conservatives and liberal Democrats--with the ironic twist that Reagan, a conservative, will be depending on the liberals to make his case.

And while the opponents may be unable to defeat the treaty altogether, liberals fear that a coalition of conservative Republicans and Democrats might be able to enact at least one--if not many--amendments or “reservations” that could effectively scuttle the pact by forcing Reagan to reopen negotiations with the Soviets.

Amendments can be adopted by a simple majority vote.

“We could undo all the good in this agreement if each one of the 100 senators here wants to change every little jot and tittle to fit his or her own wishes,” said Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa). “We can have 100 different amendments--maybe 200 or 300 different amendments.”

Byrd said he believes serious revisions can be avoided.

Ample Precedent

Certainly, there is ample historical precedent for the President to be cautious in his approach to the ratification process. The Senate has failed to approve the last three arms control treaties submitted to it over the last decade--including two pacts dealing with nuclear testing and the controversial strategic arms limitation treaty of 1979.

Presidential politics also could complicate matters for Reagan. On the Republican side of the aisle, Senate Minority Leader Bob Dole (Kan.), who remains uncommitted to voting for the treaty, will be seeking to use the debate to gain an advantage over his chief opponent for the GOP nomination, Vice President George Bush, an early supporter of the pact.

Four other GOP presidential contenders--Rep. Jack Kemp of New York, Pat Robertson, Alexander M. Haig Jr. and Pierre S. (Pete) du Pont IV--are opposed to the treaty.

Focus on Strong Defense

And Senate Democrats, particularly presidential hopefuls Paul Simon of Illinois and Albert Gore Jr. of Tennessee, both of whom support the pact, will seek to use the deliberations to demonstrate that their commitment to arms control, like Reagan’s, is consistent with maintaining a strong defense.

“If we do it right, we can come out of this with Democrats looking stronger on defense than ever before,” said a Democratic staff aide.

Byrd had these political objectives in mind last week when he announced that Senate consideration of the treaty will be slow and deliberate.

“We cannot be slipshod in examining the fine print,” he declared.

Three Senate committees--Foreign Relations, Armed Services and Intelligence--will hold hearings on the treaty early next year. Chairman Claiborne Pell (D-R.I.) of Foreign Relations has already announced that hearings will begin Jan. 19.

While the Foreign Relations Committee focuses on the actual terms of the treaty and the Intelligence Committee looks at the provisions to verify compliance, Chairman Sam Nunn (D-Ga.) intends to use the hearings of his Armed Services Committee to bring pressure on the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to take steps to correct the Soviets’ advantage in conventional weapons in Europe.

“NATO doesn’t know where it’s going with force improvements in the conventional arena to compensate for the overall conventional disadvantages,” Nunn complainedTuesday. “NATO doesn’t even have a conventional arms control proposal that, if accepted, would make a difference in the balance of power.”

In addition, specially designated Senate staff aides have moved into the recently vacated offices of the Senate Iran-Contra investigating committee to begin a painstaking review of the voluminous, seven-year negotiating record of the treaty. Senators demanded the right to review the record as a direct result of recent efforts by Reagan to reinterpret the negotiating record of the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, the last such pact ratified by the Senate.

Administration officials and liberal Democrats led by Assistant Majority Leader Alan Cranston (Calif.) have expressed frustration with Byrd’s slow-paced approach to the ratification process. They argue that progress toward a new strategic arms reduction treaty (START) covering long-range nuclear arms will be halted unless the Senate acts quickly to approve the medium-range pact.

“We should move with dispatch because this is only a preliminary step,” said Cranston, who has set aside years of antagonism toward Reagan in order to press for ratification of the treaty. “I would still like to see a START treaty started while Ronald Reagan is in office. It’s going to stall the whole process if this goes on too long.”

At the other end of the ideological spectrum, conservatives argue that the treaty is probably flawed because Reagan negotiated it from a position of weakness in the wake of the Iran-Contra scandal.

Pressler View

“I see a President and his staff who seem to be looking for some escape from certain domestic problems such as the budget,” said Sen. Larry Pressler (R-S.D.), one of several conservatives who already have come out against the treaty.

House Speaker Jim Wright (D-Tex.) said Tuesday that Reagan’s own history of strong anti-Soviet rhetoric is to blame for conservative opposition.

“You can’t feed a tiger in your backyard and expect that when you run out of raw, red meat, he won’t turn on you,” he said.

Nevertheless, conservatives are not unanimously against the pact. A number of leading GOP conservatives such as Sens. Orrin Hatch (Utah) and Pete Wilson (Calif.) have announced that they will vote for it on grounds that it represents a major breakthrough in arms control and East-West relations.

In addition to voting up or down on the treaty, members of the Senate can express their views on it by attaching three types of statements: amendments, reservations or understandings. Amendments and strictly worded reservations could kill the treaty by requiring additional concessions from the Soviets; understandings--essentially comments that pose no new requirements--would have no impact on the outcome.

Conservatives are likely to offer an amendment or harshly worded reservation stating that the United States will not abide by the treaty as long as the Soviets continue to violate existing arms treaties. Such a measure would surely undermine the U.S.-Soviet agreement, but it is not expected to pass.

Another conservative reservation that appears to be headed for defeat is one likely to be authored by Sen. Daniel Quayle (R-Ind.) declaring that the verification procedures should not set a precedent for future treaties. According to Nunn, most Senate members view the medium range verification procedures as a good precedent for future treaties.

Treaty supporters see a much greater likelihood that the Senate might adopt one of the many less extreme reservations that are certain to be put forward by moderates and liberals who otherwise support the pact. Senate experts predicted that even these reservations, if toughly worded, would kill the treaty.

Among the most popular reservations being considered are ones calling for a correction of the imbalance in non-nuclear forces in Europe and continued U.S. compliance with the unratified SALT II treaty and the original interpretation of the ABM treaty.

In an effort to head off disaster, sources said, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee will try to incorporate mildly worded versions of these proposals into the resolution of ratification.

Times staff writers Karen Tumulty and Rudy Abramson contributed to this article.