U.S. and Soviet Defense Chiefs Meet at Pentagon for 1st Time

U.S. and Soviet defense chiefs met in Washington for the first time ever Monday, engaging in a broad discussion of superpower military doctrine and defense spending.

Defense Secretary Dick Cheney and Soviet Defense Minister Dmitri T. Yazov exchanged information on how defense policy is made in their respective countries, military strategy and doctrine and defense budgets and production, according to U.S. officials who attended the sessions at the Pentagon.

But the significance of the talks was not in their content, which was broad but not deep, officials said. The defense chiefs did not negotiate arms control agreements nor advance new positions.

Rather, the talks were part of a continuing series of high-level contacts between U.S. and Soviet defense officials and military officers.

“The goal is to improve understanding by the two sides in the military sphere,” a senior Pentagon official who participated in the talks said afterward. “The hope is that the talks will enhance predictability and stability in the relationship.”

Defense, White House Officials

The talks were attended by Deputy Defense Secretary Donald J. Atwood, Undersecretary of Defense Paul G. Wolfowitz, Assistant Secretary of Defense Steven Hadley and the new chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Colin L. Powell. Other defense, White House and State Department officials sat in.

The Soviet official was accompanied by more than a dozen civilian and military advisers.

Yazov has been defense minister since May, 1987, when he took over in a shake-up brought on by the penetration of Soviet air defenses by West German teen-ager Mathias Rust, who flew a single-engine Cessna into the heart of Red Square.

The Soviet official was met at the Pentagon on Monday morning by Cheney and a military honor guard. The two defense chiefs then met privately for 15 minutes in Cheney’s office before a 90-minute session with their staffs. The talks continued two hours after lunch.

A Pentagon official described the discussions as “businesslike, informed, very candid.” He would provide no further details.

Yazov is to visit the Gettysburg (Pa.) Civil War battlefield this morning and to meet with President Bush at the White House this afternoon. He will deliver speeches in Washington and New York, then visit military bases in California, Arizona and North Carolina before returning to Moscow on Friday.