Thatcher Hears Gorbachev Complaint: No U.S. Action on Arms

Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev told Britain’s Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher here Thursday that he is worried that the favorable momentum in East-West relations will be broken unless the Bush Administration responds more positively to Moscow’s disarmament initiatives.

The Kremlin leader apparently was reflecting growing Soviet impatience with what it sees as foot-dragging in Washington.

Soviet Foreign Ministry spokesman Gennady I. Gerasimov, who confirmed Gorbachev’s statements, also accused U. S. officials of trying to sabotage the Anglo-Soviet summit by planting exaggerated news reports about Moscow’s sale of advanced jet bombers to Libya. He said Moscow has supplied Libya with six Sukhoi-24 bombers under a three-year-old agreement--not the 12 to 15 warplanes claimed by Bush Administration officials on Wednesday.

Briefing reporters after the principal summit meeting between Thatcher and Gorbachev, Gerasimov commented: “The timing of this so-called news is very suspicious. I read about these sales months ago somewhere.”

His interpretation, he said, is that someone in Washington “doesn’t want the Soviet-British summit to go as smoothly as it is going.”

The Libyan jet sale and other arms control issues were said to have generated the most disagreement during nearly six hours of intense discussions Thursday between two political leaders who have developed an extraordinary affinity despite standing on opposite sides of the ideological divide.

The world’s top Communist and the British Conservative his predecessors once dubbed “the Iron Lady” were sometimes “solemn,” sometimes “passionate,” as they defended their respective views forcefully, but without rancor, said a Thatcher spokesman who requested anonymity.

The prime minister called the talks “very deep, very wide-ranging, and very friendly,” while Gorbachev said the discussions “reached a very high level.”

While the British side played down Gorbachev’s frustration with the Bush Administration, Gerasimov returned to the theme repeatedly during his meeting with correspondents.

“Generally, we are not happy with the West’s response to our initiatives,” he said. And he made it clear that Moscow blames Washington, as the leader of the Atlantic Alliance.

“We understand the new Administration needs time to study foreign policy,” Gerasimov commented icily. “There are new faces there, and some of them don’t know what foreign policy is about.”

The superpowers have made important strides in arms control in the last two or three years, and the atmosphere for disarmament negotiations remains good, he said. However, “continuity is the name of the game. . . . The main point is not to lose this momentum with prolonged reviews of foreign policy or with other obstacles,” he said.

His own analysis, Gerasimov said, is that “the new Administration tries to please everybody and it’s not easy. Also, we can feel a certain influence of some familiar names--(former Secretary of State Henry A.) Kissinger and (former National Security Adviser Zbigniew) Brzezinski--who tend to interpret Soviet-American relations in terms of confrontation.”

“The new Administration is not yet decided which position to take--how to interpret the international scene,” Gerasimov charged.

Asked if Gorbachev wanted the British prime minister to intercede in Washington, Gerasimov said: “It’s up to Mrs. Thatcher to follow up, to talk to the Americans. . . . We just expressed our concerns.”

Questioned about his Soviet counterpart’s characterization, Thatcher’s spokesman commented: “I suppose what they are reflecting is this transitional period” in Washington. As for anyone in the Bush Administration using the Libyan bomber issue to harm the Anglo-Soviet summit, he added, “I’m notoriously not in favor of conspiracy theories.”

Thatcher, the spokesman said, made passing reference to the Libyan bomber sale in her talks with Gorbachev, pointing out the danger of supplying weaponry to nations that support terrorism. Gorbachev reportedly made no response.

In Jerusalem, meanwhile, the Israeli government expressed “deep concern” about the bomber deal and urged the Soviets to reconsider it, wire services said.

A ‘Sharp Exchange’

The issue also caused what British sources called a “sharp exchange” in parallel talks Thursday between British Foreign Secretary Geoffrey Howe and his Soviet counterpart, Eduard A. Shevardnadze, who defended the deal as no different than British arms sales to Saudi Arabia and other Mideast clients.

Given Thatcher’s own views on arms control, meanwhile, it is debatable whether she would prod Bush into bolder action despite Soviet warnings about the danger of delay.

Countering Gorbachev’s calls for a nuclear-free Europe, Thatcher argued in an after-dinner toast that “both our countries know from bitter experience that conventional weapons do not deter war in Europe, whereas nuclear weapons have done so for over 40 years. As a deterrent, there is no substitute for them.”

Gerasimov recounted that more than half the discussion in the two leaders’ principal meeting Thursday was devoted to the Soviet domestic reform program, known as perestroika. He said Gorbachev “was extremely frank and talked not only about achievements, but also about all kinds of difficulties which we encounter.”

Whatever their other differences, on this score, the prime minister was totally supportive. “In barely more than four years since your first visit, we have seen changes in the Soviet Union which can only be described as a peaceful revolution,” she said in her toast. “We admire--very much admire--the vision and the boldness which have inspired those changes.”

Human rights played little role in the day’s discussions, although Thatcher did say at dinner that while Britain is pleased to see the emigration of those who want to leave the Soviet Union, “we also look forward to the changes in the law which you have promised, which will make these the rights of every person, so that they can be claimed and enforced and not given as privileges which can one day be taken away.”

Earlier, a few dozen supporters of Soviet Jews refused exit visas or Armenian activists demonstrated across Whitehall street from the prime minister’s residence where the two leaders met.

Underlining the special relationship between them, Thatcher hosted the Soviet leader in a study of her official residence at 10 Downing St., normally off limits for such meetings. The rapport between them is such that Gorbachev kidded her good-naturedly about the capacious handbag that some have dubbed Thatcher’s secret weapon. “Ah! That’s the handbag!” the Soviet leader said with a laugh when she reached into the bag for her index card at the start of Thursday’s main meeting.

To have more time with the Soviet leader, who heads back to Moscow today after only 40 hours in Britain, Thatcher has been riding with him in his armor-plated Zil limousine.

At one point Thursday, after he paid a visit to Westminster Abbey, Gorbachev ordered his car to stop so he could get out and cross the street to shake hands with British well-wishers. “I would like to thank you all for this reception,” he told them.

He is scheduled to make a major speech here this morning before lunching with Queen Elizabeth II and returning to Moscow.