Regional Outlook : Drinking a Toast to Europe's Future : The centerpiece of the party will be the signing of a pact reducing conventional forces. Will such treaties be passe in the new Europe's future?

By ROBERT C. TOTH

Nov. 13, 1990 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

WASHINGTON —

It will be a coming-out party for the New Europe, and the guests are to leave most of their weapons at the door.

Amid the splendor of a 34-nation summit meeting in Paris next week, members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and Warsaw Pact countries are to sign a historic treaty reducing the number of conventional forces--tanks, artillery, and aircraft--that both sides have stationed in Europe.

The landmark accord formally recognizes the end of the Cold War-era threat posed by the military forces of the former Soviet Bloc, which has disintegrated in the wake of the recent changes in Soviet foreign policy.

But the agreement comes amid political crosscurrents that raise serious questions about whether arms negotiations such as these have much of a future.

Actual events--such as the moves by the newly emerging East European democracies to expel remaining Soviet forces from their countries--have been outpacing the negotiations. And with the Cold War over, there is less anxiety about war and, to some extent, less sense of urgency about traditional arms control efforts.

The treaty limiting Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE) provides for the Soviet Union and its former East European allies to slash their European arsenals by 40%--and for NATO to cut its European forces by 3%--to comply with new equal arms ceilings on both sides of the now-fallen Iron Curtain.

According to the agreement, most of the surplus equipment must be destroyed, and each side will be authorized to conduct on-site inspections to verify that the other is complying with the terms of the treaty.

And together with the Strategic Arms Reduction Talks (START) agreement expected early next year, the CFE pact represents a milestone from which to view both the record of arms control negotiations to date and their prospects reaching into the 21st Century.

The Background

Arms control has been central to U.S.-Soviet relations for more than a generation, and invariably has been controversial.

The first U.S.-Soviet arms control treaty, in 1963, banned nuclear tests in the atmosphere, space and oceans. It succeeded in limiting radioactive contamination of the environment and demonstrated that the superpowers could begin to slow the arms race, if not stop it altogether.

A decade later, in 1972, the first Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty, known as SALT I, established ceilings on long-range nuclear missiles and bombers. But the limits that it set were higher than either side’s actual arsenal, thereby legalizing a further arms buildup.

A second strategic treaty in 1979, SALT II, called for minor reductions by the Soviet Union. But it contained a major loophole: Although the pact limited the number of missiles each side could have, it did not restrict the number of warheads each missile could carry.

As a result, by taking advantage of new multiple-warhead technology, the superpowers were able during the 1980s to quadruple the number of strategic warheads they had targeted on one another atop essentially the same number of missiles.

By contrast, the START accord now nearing completion is to be the first strategic arms treaty to actually reduce the total number of weapons that the two sides have amassed--by 30% overall, with a 50% cut in the most threatening ballistic missile warheads.

Negotiations to cut conventional weapons arsenals in Europe also have a checkered history. Talks between NATO and the Warsaw Pact nations achieved virtually nothing in 15 years before they were superseded by the CFE negotiations in 1988.

Even the new CFE treaty, which provides for the largest negotiated arms reductions in world history, has drawn its share of criticism. Skeptics say it has taken far too long and in itself moved only marginally toward making the world a safer place.

In some cases, the negotiations have been overtaken by events. Last February, for example, negotiators set manpower limits of 195,000 each for U.S. and Soviet troops in the central zone of Europe.

But by July, those ceilings were obsolete. The new East European governments and the reunited Germany are forcing all Soviet forces out of the region by 1994. As a result, the manpower limits were dropped out of the treaty; only weapons will be affected by the pact.

Arms talks can also delay cuts that a country wants to make on its own.

Soviet officials say part of the reason that Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev announced unilateral cuts of half a million troops in 1988 was that he feared that leaving such reductions to negotiations would actually delay their implementation.

Similarly, U.S. officials speculate that if the United States had tried to negotiate the withdrawal of thousands of short-range nuclear warheads from Europe a decade ago rather than unilaterally bringing them home as it has, the weapons might still be there.

The Debate

How much can the world expect from arms control negotiations? Are they worth the effort?

After studying the impact of arms-control talks over the past three decades, Harvard University professors Albert Carnesale and Richard Haass conclude that “what emerges above all is the modesty of what arms control has wrought.

“If the history reveals anything, it is that arms control has proven neither as promising as some had hoped (in saving money and reducing tensions) nor as dangerous as others had feared (in lulling the Western public into accepting Soviet superiority),” they write.

Kenneth L. Adelman, a former director of the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, gives an even harsher verdict.

The big change in global security has come “not from arms negotiations, but from changes in the Soviet Union--as we saw in the summer of 1989 when the Soviet threat ended,” Adelman argues. “It had nothing to do with arms control.”

Supporters counter that Adelman expects too much of arms control.

Jack Mendelsohn of the private Arms Control Assn. admits that the process has its shortcomings, but he notes that unilateral cuts do not provide for verification, for ensuring against reintroduction of forces, or for monitoring destruction of the weapons.

Moreover, proponents argue that arms-control agreements too often are judged on their technical merits rather than their political significance in bridge-building between the superpowers.

For example, the U.S.-Soviet INF treaty of 1987--to eliminate medium-range nuclear missiles--was insignificant militarily. The Soviets reduced their arsenal by 1,667 warheads, or only about 5% of their stockpile. The United States cut was 429 warheads, less than 2%.

“But the political significance of the INF agreement--the improvement in the U.S.-Soviet relationship in the second half of the Ronald Reagan Administration--far outweighed the technical problems related to the details of military doctrine,” foreign policy specialist Joseph S. Nye Jr. wrote in Foreign Affairs magazine.

Finally, the importance of arms-control mechanisms to limit proliferation to Third World nations--and of U.S. and Soviet example-setting to spur the process--will grow rather than diminish as East-West tensions abate.

The Outlook

The consensus is that despite its faults, arms-control efforts will continue--but with a significant shift in their scope and direction.

Last year, experts were forecasting another extended, wide-ranging strategic arms negotiation--to be called START II--that might seek to halve again the number of offensive nuclear warheads.

Instead of the 8,000 to 9,000 warheads that would be permitted under START I, the talks would seek to set a limit of perhaps 4,000 warheads. And the loopholes and defects in the present agreement might be eliminated in the process.

But key Administration officials now believe that the flaws in START I should be attacked first in narrower negotiations, and that the most destabilizing weapons--land-based missiles with multiple warheads, most capable of surprise attack--should get top priority.

U.S. officials also want to focus on making nuclear arsenals more stable--a goal that might be better served by agreement to ban multiple warheads on new missiles than by another drastic reduction in the number of U.S. and Soviet weapons.

Another high U.S. priority will be talks to ensure who has physical control over nuclear weapons in times of crisis. Officials are especially concerned about how well Soviet nuclear weapons can be safeguarded from dissidents and terrorists during times of domestic unrest.

A similar shift on the conventional arms control agenda may occur.

Negotiators already are committed to follow-on talks to deal with the troop-levels issue, which has been excluded from the CFE treaty. But U.S. officials would prefer that any new negotiations emphasize new “confidence-building measures,” such as including more visits by foreign observers to military maneuvers and reducing the size of the maneuvering forces (now 13,000 men) that may be subject to inspection visits.

Washington also is likely to press for an “open skies” agreement that would permit inspection overflights by aircraft that are equipped with the most advanced electronic sensing gear.

Finally, high on the new arms control agenda will be efforts to expand and intensify multinational cooperation to prevent further proliferation of chemical and nuclear weapon technology--and delivery vehicles such as ballistic missiles--by Third World nations.

While Iraq is the main threat today, U.S. officials are only slightly less worried about nuclear war between Pakistan and India, North Korea’s growing potential to build nuclear devices, and Iran’s desire to match whatever Iraq does.

Cutting Back on Conventional Arms

HELICOPTERS

NATO treaty cuts: -11%

Warsaw Pact treaty cuts: -44%

Treaty limits: 2,000

AIRCRAFT

NATO treaty cuts: 0%

Warsaw Pact treaty cuts: -31%

Treaty limits: 7,000

TANKS

NATO treaty cuts: -10%

Warsaw Pact treaty cuts: -46%