Weapons Treaties and the Summit
Within two weeks of the Washington summit, with its hopeful retreat from the nuclear weapon buildup madness and its aura of new thinking, Secretary of State George Shultz (Part I, Dec. 14) “rebuked Denmark for spending only 2% of its gross national product on defense and warned that a proposed Baltic nuclear-free zone cannot protect the area from Soviet missiles.”
What happened to the new summit spirit? Sounds exactly like the same old angels vs. devils propaganda. Does Shultz seriously propose that Gorbachev intends to nuke Copenhagen? (and just incidentally touch off the end-of-the-world nuclear war). Would the secretary explain just why the Russians would want to hit Denmark?
The Danes clearly don’t believe it. Like New Zealand, they apparently would rather not be “protected” from phantom foes by nuclear arms.
An American secretary of state should be commending Denmark for being smart enough to spend only 2% of its resources on weapons, and for urging nuclear-free zones rather than nuclear proliferation. He should be proposing that other countries, on both “sides,” start doing likewise.
Or just what was the summit all about?
LES RODNEY
Torrance
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