Gorbachev Seeks Mutual Cutting of European Forces

Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev proposed today that the United States and the Soviet Union each cut back to 195,000 troops in Europe, excluding Soviet territory, Tass press agency reported.

Gorbachev’s proposal, made in talks with Secretary of State James A. Baker III, accepted figures offered by President Bush last month but apparently refused to accept that an extra 30,000 U.S. troops could be stationed outside central Europe.

Bush proposed that each superpower should retain 195,000 men in central Europe but that the United States could keep 30,000 more in Britain, Italy, Greece and Turkey without a matching Soviet deployment.

Bush’s proposal was formally made Thursday at the Vienna talks between NATO and the Warsaw Pact on reducing non-nuclear forces in Europe.

Tass quoted Gorbachev as saying that if the 195,000 figure was unacceptable, the Soviet Union proposed a ceiling of 225,000 troops apiece in Europe, excluding Soviet territory.

Gorbachev’s proposals appeared to indicate that Moscow is not ready to accept that the United States should keep more troops in Western Europe than the Soviet Union has in Eastern Europe.

The Soviet Union has about 575,000 troops in Eastern Europe, and the United States has about 305,000 in Western Europe, according to Western figures.

The Tass report came after Gorbachev and Baker met for nearly four hours on the third day of the secretary’s visit.

Baker saw Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard A. Shevardnadze before and after his meetings with Gorbachev. U.S. officials said their focus was on arms control, which experts from the two sides tried to advance during the day at their own meetings.

Shevardnadze said the “discussion of the disarmament problem is proceeding very well.”

Gorbachev spoke on a wide range of other issues before going into his meeting with Baker today, including his own future as head of the Communist Party now that the Central Committee has decided to revoke the party’s monopoly on power.

Asked how the action would affect him, Gorbachev said, “I would not think anything particular happened to me. What we wanted to achieve at this plenum we did achieve,” he said.

He said the changes began when he attained power five years ago and “once we have solidified this phase we will move further.”

“It certainly would be wrong for the West and everyone to believe we began these changes only in the last few days,” he said. “They have been under way since 1985.”

Gorbachev gave a guarded answer when asked if he would run for president on the Communist Party ticket if the country implements a new, stronger office chosen by a contested election.

“Let’s wait and see,” he told reporters.