Stalemate Broken on Troop, Arms Cuts, Officials Say : Summit: But no official announcement is made as Bush and Gorbachev wind up three days of meetings. The complex issue of aircraft limits is unresolved.

U.S. and Soviet officials said Saturday that negotiators have broken a deadlock and moved closer to a historic agreement to slash troop levels and conventional weapons in Europe.

There was no official announcement of the development as President Bush and Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev concluded three days of summit meetings with an informal session at the Camp David retreat in Maryland. However, a ranking Soviet official said in an interview, “The stalemate you Americans talked about is over. I don’t think any problems remain.”

U.S. officials were far more cautious in their assessment. “The deal is not done yet,” a senior American official cautioned, but he confirmed that the impasse was broken.

Bush and Gorbachev, preparing to return to Washington after about 10 hours of wide-ranging discussions at the retreat, declared that they had deepened their understanding of each other’s positions on what the Soviet leader had called “the global flash points.”

“We have an awful lot of common ground,” Bush said.

Calling the day “very instructive,” Gorbachev said, “I think there is really ample opportunity for cooperation even though there are real problems that neither the President nor I can turn a blind eye to.”

Questioned by reporters, Bush sharply defended his decision to proceed with a trade agreement with Moscow despite the continuing economic embargo of Lithuania.

“I look at the overall relationship,” Bush said, asserting that the trade accord is “in the interest of the United States.”

“Somebody wants to argue with me, fine, we’ll take him on,” he said.

Bush and Gorbachev did not comment publicly on the conventional arms issue. In Washington, an American official said substantial progress was made toward agreements on limiting numbers of tanks, destruction of weapons that are taken out of service and the issue of verifying destruction of weapons. Unresolved, he said, were limits on aircraft, probably the most complex topic facing the conventional arms talks.

The progress toward a treaty to reduce conventional forces--one of the superpowers’ chief arms control goals this year--comes as another positive note in U.S.-Soviet relations at a summit that both sides already were hailing as a success.

It helped to counterbalance continuing differences over several other major issues, including two of the most vexing of the relationship: whether a unified Germany will be a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, and Soviet handling of the independence movement in the Baltic states.

Bush and Gorbachev again took up Lithuania and Germany during their more than eight hours of discussions Saturday at the presidential retreat, an Administration official said, but only to go over what they will say at a joint press conference at the White House today--the climax of the summit.

Soviet officials have said they expect two more Bush-Gorbachev summits to be held later this year, one to sign a treaty reducing conventional forces, assuming it is completed this year, and another at Moscow to sign a treaty drastically reducing strategic or long-range nuclear weapons (START). The conventional forces pact would be signed, probably in Paris, at a meeting of the heads of all 35 nations of the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe.

On Friday the two leaders signed a framework for a START treaty and indicated that they thought they had narrowed their differences on remaining issues. Although some sources suggested the Moscow summit would be officially announced today, an Administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said such a meeting could not be announced until it is certain that a START treaty will be ready for signing this year.

In the sunshine and relaxed setting of Camp David, the two presidents removed their ties and sat around a large patio table Saturday as they discussed a wide ranging of regional issues, touching on Afghanistan, Cambodia, Cuba, Nicaragua, El Salvador, India and Pakistan, and the Middle East.

It was “not in a sense of dividing up the world,” Bush said. “Maybe that would have happened years ago. In terms of ironing the problems, achieving common ground, as we looked at a lot of regional problems.”

“It’s been a big day,” Gorbachev said.

Bush quipped that he had only one disappointment from their time together--that coming at the camp’s horseshoe pit. The Soviet president, who never played the sport before, “literally, threw a ringer the first time,” Bush gasped. “There’s not much more to say.”

In an earlier briefing for reporters, Marlin Fitzwater, Bush’s press secretary, said the President and the Soviet leader included a thorough discussion of human rights in their Saturday session.

They discussed ways to increase the number of Jews emigrating from the Soviet Union and “talked about direct flights to Israel and the general problems about allowing emigration to be as free and open as possible,” Fitzwater said.

Bush noted that the United States is accepting about 70,000 emigres annually now compared to 14,000 a few years ago, Fitzwater said, adding that “we continue to want to take more.”

During the day, U.S. and Soviet officials also issued a joint statement announcing a new cooperative effort to ferry relief supplies to Ethiopian famine victims. The statement said U.S. food would be hauled to stricken areas on Soviet aircraft “to demonstrate our joint commitment to responding to this tragic humanitarian problem.”

U.S. and Soviet negotiators plan to brief their allies on the results of the talks on Monday. Unlike the superpower negotiations over reduction of long-range nuclear weapons, the Conventional Forces in Europe conference is a multinational affair including the 16 members of NATO and the seven members of the Warsaw Pact.

A senior U.S. official said American and Soviet negotiators reached tentative agreements defining classes of tanks and armored vehicles and establishing limitations on them. But he said nothing can be considered final until the other NATO nations give their approval.

“Most of those are likely to be acceptable to the allies, but there are at least one or two that will require some careful study and may or may not work,” the official said. “On some of these issues, ceilings and weights, allied equipment is affected more than American equipment.”

The Soviet official said that difficulties may develop between Washington and its allies.

“We don’t have that problem any more,” he added in a somewhat rueful reference to the disintegration of the Warsaw Pact--which has left Moscow virtually without allies.

Bush and Gorbachev signed a joint statement Friday fixing a goal of completion of a conventional arms pact by the end of this year.

Although it has often been overlooked by a world public preoccupied with the destructive power of nuclear weapons, the sophistication and destructive power of non-nuclear arms in Europe has mushroomed during the years of the Cold War. Western leaders see the Vienna talks as an opportunity to roll back Soviet power in Europe and end the hair-trigger confrontation that has lasted for more than a generation.

“A war in Europe would mean total, irreversible catastrophe,” Valentin M. Falin, head of the international department of the Soviet Communist Party, said Saturday.

Times staff writer James Gerstenzang contributed to this story.

NUCLEAR ARMS CONTROL AGREEMENTS

1959

Antarctic Treaty

Parties: U.S., Soviet Union, 21 other nations. Purpose: Prohibits establishment of bases for nuclear weapons, introduction or testing of nuclear weapons and disposal of radioactive waste in Antarctica.

1963

Limited Test Ban Treaty

Parties: U.S., Soviet Union, 103 other nations. Purpose: Prohibits nuclear tests in outer space, in the atmosphere and under water.

1967

Outer Space Treaty

Parties: U.S., Soviet Union, 78 other nations. Forbids weapons of mass destruction in outer space; pledges only peaceful use of the moon.

1968

Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty

Parties: U.S., Soviet Union, 125 other nations. Forbids help to non-nuclear states in developing nuclear weapons; bans efforts to develop them; requires disarmament talks.

1971

Seabed Arms Control Agreement

Parties: U.S., Soviet Union, 66 other nations. Prohibits deployment of weapons of mass destruction on the ocean floor.

1971

Agreement on Measures to Reduce Risk of Nuclear War

Parties: U.S., Soviet Union. Outlines procedures to prevent nuclear accidents and avoid misunderstandings during periods of crisis.

1972

Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty

Parties: U.S., Soviet Union. Limits testing and development of missile defenses; permits one ABM site on each side.

1972

Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (SALT I)

Parties: U.S., Soviet Union. Prohibits production of new long-range missiles; limits sea-based launchers and submarines. Expired 1977.

1973

Agreement on Prevention of Nuclear War

Parties: U.S., Soviet Union. Provides that the two countries will refrain from the threat or use of force against each other or their allies and behave in a manner consistent with the ideal of avoiding nuclear war; also provides for crisis consultations.

1974

Threshold Test-Ban Treaty

Parties: U.S., Soviet Union. Limits nuclear tests to 150 kilotons, provides for information exchange on tests. The treaty remains unratified.

1976

Peaceful Nuclear Explosions Treaty

Parties: U.S., Soviet Union. Permits nuclear explosions of more than 150 kilotons for peaceful purposes. The treaty remains unratified, but both sides say they have abided by its provisions.

1979

Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (SALT II)

Parties: U.S., Soviet Union. Sets ceilings for long-range nuclear systems but allows each side to develop one new strategic missile. The treaty remains unratified, but both nations say they have observed its provisions.

1987

Treaty on Intermediate- and Shorter-Range Nuclear Forces

Parties: U.S., Soviet Union. Requires reductions in the number of intermediate-range and short-range nuclear missiles, the first arms control treaty to require the physical destruction of existing weapons.

Late 1990

Strategic Arms Reduction (START) Treaty Expected

Parties: U.S., Soviet Union. Requires reduction of superpowers’ strategic nuclear arsenals by about one-third.

TODAY’S SCHEDULE

9:30 a.m. EDT--The Gorbachevs have coffee at the White House with President and Mrs. Bush.

10-11 a.m. EDT--Presidents Bush and Gorbachev hold a joint press conference at the White House. (Live coverage by ABC, NBC, CBS and CNN.)

11:30 a.m. EDT--Official departure ceremony at the Washington Monument reflecting pool. (Live coverage by CNN.)

Noon EDT--The Gorbachevs leave Washington for Minnesota.

1:25 p.m. CDT--The Gorbachevs arrive at Twin Cities Air Force Reserve Base.

2:10 p.m. CDT--Gov. Rudy Perpich and his wife, Lola, host a luncheon for the Gorbachevs at the governor’s mansion in St. Paul.

3:25 p.m. CDT--The Gorbachevs and the Perpiches tour the Twin Cities.

4:45 p.m. CDT--The Gorbachevs meet with business and agricultural leaders at Radisson Plaza Hotel in Minneapolis.

5:30 p.m. CDT--Mrs. Gorbachev and Mrs. Perpich visit the home of Steve and Karen Watson in Minneapolis.

6:40 p.m. CDT--The Gorbachevs visit the Richard and Cecelia Brand farm in Farmington, Minn.

7:30 p.m. CDT--The Gorbachevs meet with top executives of Control Data Corp.

8:06 p.m. CDT--The Gorbachevs leave Minnesota for San Francisco.

8:45 p.m. PDT--The Gorbachevs arrive in San Francisco.

9:30 p.m. PDT--The Gorbachevs attend tea with Gov. and Mrs. George Deukmejian at the home of the Soviet consul general.

More on the Summit

COMMON ENEMY--The U.S. and Soviet Union become allies in the war on drugs by agreeing, for the first time, to share customs intelligence. A12

STOPPING START--Senate conservatives are mustering their forces to fight ratification of the superpower START treaty. A14

SAFETY ZONE--At Stanford and in San Francisco, the Secret Service, KGB and South Korean agents are erecting a security screen for Gorbachev’s visit. A14

ACTIONS SPEAK LOUDER--The summit raised hopes for an accord on Germany; now the two sides must turn words of cooperation into a workable solution. A15