Regional Issues: A U.S. Summit Priority : Kremlin Has Also Put Easing Such Conflicts 2nd Only to Arms Control

With the Soviet evacuation of Afghanistan giving President Reagan the first dramatic success for his policy of backing anti-communist insurgencies in the Third World, American strategists hope to make the once-neglected subject of regional conflicts into a centerpiece for the Moscow summit.

And for once, U.S. hopes may run parallel to the thinking in Moscow. Kremlin leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev, in a series of statements echoed by other Soviet officials, has ranked the easing of regional tensions second only to arms control on the superpowers’ agenda and called for replacing military confrontations with political settlements that respect the interests of all parties.

“The Soviet Union is working consistently toward settling regional conflicts through political means on the basis of the balanced interests of all sides,” Gorbachev said last week. “The Soviet Union does not foist its approach on anyone and does not pretend to know the ultimate truth. We are for solving pressing problems through the efforts of all nations on the path of dialogue and extensive contacts.”

Areas of Tension

U.S. officials say Reagan and Gorbachev will discuss ways to defuse tensions in southern Africa, the Middle East, Cambodia, Central America and other regions where East-West rivalries have fueled long-running guerrilla wars.

Judging from pre-summit commentary in Washington and Moscow, the details of each regional dispute are so difficult, and the superpowers remain so far apart in their approach to Third World strife, that none of the conflicts is likely to be settled during the May 29-June 2 meetings.

Nevertheless, the prominence given to regional matters marks an astonishing turnaround in the superpower dialogue after years when discussion of the Third World amounted to little more than sloganeering.

“We are talking about regional conflicts, which is in many ways a euphemism for our concern about Soviet expansionism,” said Helmut Sonnenfeldt, a veteran U.S. summit staffer from the Administrations of Presidents Richard M. Nixon and Gerald R. Ford. “A few years ago the Soviets would not have given us the time of day.”

‘Forum for Discussion’

And the official Soviet news agency Tass, reflecting the new spirit which pervades the Kremlin’s expectations for the summit, wrote last week: “The meeting must provide a forum for discussing a joint approach to the solution of regional conflicts, with an eye to the increased striving of the world community to solve these conflicts by political means.”

Traditionally, both the United States and the Soviet Union regarded their relations with client states in the Third World to be no business of the other. Neither superpower wanted to yield a potential advantage or create the impression that it would sell out its friends as part of a larger Washington-Moscow deal.

Although both superpowers now acknowledge the importance of defusing East-West conflicts in the Third World, the old attitudes have not vanished entirely. The United States, for instance, is not prepared to negotiate changes in its policies in Central America. And U.S. officials have sought to assure Israel that the United States will make no agreement at Israel’s expense.

American and Soviet officials began talking seriously about regional conflicts shortly after Gorbachev came to power in 1985. Except for negotiations about Afghanistan, however, the discussions have been limited primarily to an exchange of views rather than the sort of give-and-take bargaining necessary to produce agreement.

Gorbachev’s Determination

Gorbachev made it clear at the outset of his tenure that he wanted to terminate the Soviet military intervention in Afghanistan. So the ultimate agreement on terms for the Soviet pullout was probably driven more by Gorbachev’s determination to cut his losses than it was by U.S. pressure. Nevertheless, U.S. support of an anti-communist Islamic insurgency certainly played a role in driving up the cost of the Soviet occupation.

The State Department’s point man on regional issues, Undersecretary of State Michael H. Armacost, described the Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan as “a real success” for Reagan’s Third World policies. He said the Afghan model could be extended to southern Africa, where the United States is pushing for withdrawal of Cuban troops from Angola, and to Cambodia, where Washington is demanding the withdrawal of Vietnamese troops.

But the Soviet Union clearly is unwilling to permit the United States to cast Afghanistan as an American victory in a zero-sum game of Soviet expansionism. Instead, the Soviets want to turn the withdrawal from Afghanistan into a diplomatic triumph.

“The world community welcomed the attainment of the political settlement of the Afghan problem, justifiably regarding it as an example for the peaceful settlement of other regional conflicts,” said Askold Biryukov, a political analyst for Tass.

Support for Rebels

From the American perspective, the primary remaining East-West business in Afghanistan is to make sure Moscow lives up to the timetable for withdrawal of its troops. But Soviet officials maintain that the United States and Pakistan are violating the Afghan accords by continuing to give military assistance to the anti-communist moujahedeen rebels. Soviet officials have said that they will demand an end to the support when the subject comes up at the summit.

At the time he signed the Afghan accords last month, Secretary of State George P. Shultz said the United States would continue aiding the insurgents as long as the Soviet Union continued to support the Afghan army. But Moscow contends that it has treaty obligations to support the Afghan government, a signatory to the accords, while the United States has no similar responsibility to aid the Islamic rebel organizations, which refused to sign the agreement.

“Each side will want to say something about Afghanistan, but it is difficult to say very much without getting to a disagreement,” said Stephen R. Sestanovich, a former Reagan Administration expert on the Soviet Union who is director of Soviet studies at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

And the two sides are even farther apart on other regional issues. Here are the major areas to be discussed and the prospects for progress on each:

SOUTHERN AFRICA

Armacost said progress made in recent lower-level meetings makes the interlocking issues of withdrawal of Cuban troops from Angola and independence for South Africa-ruled Namibia “ripe for discussion at the summit.” Although he said that Reagan and Gorbachev cannot solve the problems by themselves, “our hope, obviously, would be to use the summit meetings to spur another early engagement by the parties (Cuba, South Africa, Angola and the UNITA rebels in Angola) and to get down to the real issues.”

He said the United States would urge the Soviet Union to “utilize influence that they have with Luanda and Havana to encourage a realistic and prompt timetable for Cuban withdrawals . . . and encourage a process of national reconciliation within Angola.”

Armacost said no other regional issue is as close to a solution.

However, Soviet officials seem to have placed southern Africa close to the end of the list of regional matters they want to discuss at the summit, although Deputy Foreign Minister Anatoly L. Adamishin said recently that “the situation in Angola and Namibia is difficult, but we believe a solution is possible.”

Adamishin and Assistant Secretary of State Chester A. Crocker have conducted intensive pre-summit talks on the issue, but the Soviets may find it difficult to reach a settlement over the heads of Cuba and Angola, even if they want to. Cuba recently has reinforced its garrison in Angola and has shifted its troops closer to the South African border.

“I take the increase of Cuban military action as a signal to the Soviets that they are not getting out at any early date,” Sestanovich said. “This is not an issue that can be settled by the superpowers.”

PERSIAN GULF AND ARAB-ISRAELI CONFLICT

On the Persian Gulf War and the Arab-Israeli conflict, the United States and the Soviet Union profess similar objectives, but they are promoting apparently irreconcilable means to the end.

Washington is sponsoring a drive in the U.N. Security Council to impose an arms embargo against Iran for its refusal to go along with a Security Council resolution calling for a cease-fire and a negotiated solution to the war. Iraq has accepted the resolution and has pledged to stop fighting if Iran will do so.

“We feel a tremendous frustration on this issue,” Armacost said. “The Soviets agreed in December that they would work with us on a second (arms embargo) resolution. That work has not progressed very satisfactorily, and it seems clear the Russians are not disposed to move forward . . . anytime soon.”

One reason for Soviet reluctance to take decisive action, some American analysts believe, is that it fears the spread of radical Islam to Soviet Central Asia and is thus happy to let the war drag on as a means of weakening Iran.

Shultz has said he will seek Soviet support for his Middle East peace proposal, which calls for an international conference to launch direct Arab-Israeli talks but which would have no real power of its own. However, the Soviets have made it clear that they favor a conference with the power to impose a solution, something Israel totally rejects.

Moscow has become much more active diplomatically in the area in recent months. In a communique marking a visit to Moscow by Palestine Liberation Organization chairman Yasser Arafat, the Soviet government called for the PLO to formally recognize Israel’s right to exist. Israeli Foreign Minister Shimon Peres, for one, hailed the communique as a positive step.

But Shultz has said that his peace plan is so carefully balanced that he will not consider major changes in it, a position that seems to rule out an early Washington-Moscow agreement on the matter.

CAMBODIA

Officials on both sides suggest that the chances are better for an agreement on the early withdrawal of Vietnamese forces from Cambodia, and both say that the Afghanistan model can be stretched to fit here.

If Thailand could cut the Pol Pot-led Khmer Rouge out of a deal and persuade the other exile factions to negotiate, an agreement seems possible that would lead to a coalition government in Phnom Penh and a Vietnamese withdrawal. That is the interpretation placed on recent Soviet statements by diplomats in Moscow, and Soviet officials came close to saying publicly that Phnom Penh and Hanoi are ready for such talks with the anti-communist opposition.

But there has been very little discussion so far on the details of such a settlement, and what it expects from Washington, other than encouragement to Thailand and China to forget Pol Pot, is unclear.

CENTRAL AMERICA

Both the United States and the Soviet Union are expected to urge the other to reduce military supplies to their allies in Central America. But an agreement seems unlikely. The United States traditionally has been reluctant to negotiate over Central America--a region that it considers to be within its sphere of influence--with the Soviet Union or any other power.

Norman Kempster reported from Washington and Michael Parks from Moscow.