Merry Christmas From Moscow : KGB chief would like to purge perestroika

It was the kind of speech that suggested that maybe the clock can not only be stopped, but can be put back to the time of Leonid I. Brezhnev. In remarks to the Soviet Congress of People’s Deputies, the head of the KGB security police attacked the whole point of perestroika and recommended that the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics return to the good old days of rigid centralized control.

” . . . We cannot avoid restoring the lost connections in the country’s economic life, according to the old system,” said Vladimir A. Kryuchkov, chairman of the Committee for State Security.

Kryuchkov’s bitter attack is particularly ominous because it included the paranoid accusation that the Central Intelligence Agency and other foreign intelligence services are seeking to exploit the Soviet domestic crisis. And the speech came in the still-turbulent wake of the dramatic resignation of Eduard A. Shevardnadze as Soviet foreign minister. The internationally respected Gorbachev aide had spoken in his resignation of the approach of dictatorship and the campaign of right-wing elements to discredit and destroy the reform movement. So, taken all together, the political news from Moscow is part of a clear trend--and the drift is definitely toward the right.

The implications for Washington are serious--and complex. As the article on today’s Op-Ed Page by Soviet expert Mark Kramer points out, “Gorbachev’s desire to consolidate power still appears stronger than his commitment to democracy and freedom.” At some point, then, it is just possible that the new Gorbachev will look more and more like the old Brezhnev. Under such circumstances, the Bush Administration would need to review its Soviet policy, which has rightly rendered the highest priority on maximum possible support of the Soviet president.

But if Gorbachev heads rightward in an alliance with the KGB, which likes to do business the old-fashioned way, Soviet foreign and domestic policies might change enough to imperil detente. That might not mean much for Eastern Europe, which is probably too far gone to return to the Soviet orbit; but it could terminate burgeoning U.S.-Soviet cooperation in the Third World, in particular.

So just when you thought the Cold War was over, here comes this unreconstructed Cold Warrior, Kryuchkov, to remind us that the opera is never over until the fat lady sings. They are still slugging it out in Mother Russia for control of the country’s soul. At risk now is the whole host of extremely positive advances triggered by perestroika and the Reagan-Bush response of trying to work positively with Gorbachev.

It is all so terribly sad, but with the Soviet Union obviously at a crossroads, the Bush Administration needs not only to review U.S. policy and strategy regarding Moscow but also to work more closely than ever with our European allies to try to influence events positively. The momentum from that cooperation will come in handy if the outcome is not to our liking and now-relaxed security and defense measures need to be reconstructed and revived.