Soviets Welcome NATO Proposals to Cut Forces

The Soviet Union on Thursday welcomed the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s new proposals to reduce conventional forces in Europe.

Ambassador Oleg A. Grinevsky, chief Soviet negotiator at the talks on cutting conventional forces on the Continent, said he hopes that the new ideas, first suggested by President Bush at the NATO summit in May, will “promote rapid progress,” and he promised that they will be carefully studied.

The NATO proposals, dealing with numbers of troops and aircraft, were presented to the Warsaw Pact nations earlier Thursday, the final day in the current round of talks. The proposals came about two months ahead of schedule, leading one veteran Western negotiator to describe the pace as “almost breathtaking.”

In Moscow, Soviet Foreign Ministry spokesman Gennady I. Gerasimov told a news conference that the Soviet Union regards the proposals as “serious and constructive and meeting our proposals halfway,” Reuters news agency reported.

“It would have been counterproductive to delay these proposals until September--this gives us an extra two months,” Gerasimov said. “We shall do everything we can to reach these agreements within six months.”

Although welcoming the ideas, Grinevsky noted here that they were previously stated at the Brussels summit. He also complained that NATO’s objections to excluding Soviet jet fighter interceptors as part of the cuts in air power in Europe were “totally at odds” with the concept of restricting the Vienna talks to offensive weapons.

Defining ‘Defensive’

The disagreement over including what the Soviets call defensive warplanes among the arms reductions is expected to be a major sticking point in the East-West conventional talks here.

The Western proposals added to the overall agenda important new cuts in combat aircraft, combat helicopters and troop strength.

Thus, the total number of military categories under discussion in Vienna was raised Thursday to six--along with the previous elements of battle tanks, heavy artillery and armored troop carriers.

Grinevsky was full of praise for the progress of the talks, which began early this year. “Up to now, there has been great progress,” he told a news conference here.

And despite his reservations about some of the new NATO proposals, he said it is possible to reach agreement next year, “if all sides are ready.”

“I’m not afraid of difficulties,” he added. “I’m afraid when difficulties are not resolved.”

The Soviets insist that their air interceptors are totally defensive and should not be included in the totals of combat aircraft to be reduced.

The NATO position is that an interceptor, although defensive, could be reconfigured within hours to become an offensive attack bomber. As Stephen J. Ledogar, Washington’s chief negotiator at these talks, put it: “If it’s combat-capable, it’s a combat aircraft.”

In the package presented Thursday, NATO negotiators proposed a reduction of combat aircraft in Europe to 5,700 planes and 1,900 helicopters on each side and a reduction of U.S. and Soviet troops stationed in Europe to 275,000 each.

According to NATO, the new level for combat aircraft would represent a 15% cut below NATO’s current level and almost a 60% cut below the East Bloc’s level. The current helicopter levels on both sides are apparently close to the desired figure. By NATO’s calculations, setting a ceiling of 275,000 troops would mean removing 30,000 American soldiers and 325,000 Soviet troops.

To help verify reductions, NATO proposed that aircraft and helicopters withdrawn from service should be destroyed, as tanks, artillery and troop carriers would be under earlier proposals.

In his remarks, Soviet negotiator Grinevsky complained that British, French and Canadian forces based in West Germany were left out of proposed reductions.

And he specifically criticized the NATO package for omitting the category of light tanks, those under 26 tons. The Soviets believe that all tanks should be included in reductions since, as Grinevsky argued, modern technology could in the future upgrade smaller tanks to the effectiveness of current main battle armor.

The talks, formally known as the Conventional Forces in Europe talks, reconvene in September.

Cruise Missile Plan

In another arms-control development, a senior Soviet military official in Moscow said his nation is willing to give up all cruise missiles deployed at sea with nuclear warheads if the United States does the same, according to the Washington Post.

The remark by Col. Gen. Nikolai F. Chervov, chief of the arms-control directorate in the Soviet military’s general staff, represented a departure from the Soviet position at the superpower arms negotiations in Geneva. That position was that each side could retain up to 400 of the winged, pilotless missiles with nuclear warheads and 600 with conventional warheads.

Washington has long resisted limiting these weapons at all on the grounds that inspectors cannot readily monitor them. The dispute has been a major obstacle to a new treaty reducing strategic arms.