Soviet Right Saw the Nation in Full Retreat

President Mikhail S. Gorbachev made a fatal mistake that no American President since World War II could have survived: He surrendered the issues of patriotism and national security to his opponents.

The opposition has made its case against Gorbachev’s policies, and the cumulative effect is chilling.

They oppose “unilateral concessions” in arms control, by which they have seemed to question the treaties on both conventional and nuclear weapons, and the detente process in general.

They also question the unilateral withdrawal of Soviet forces from their Warsaw Pact positions. The more shrill expressions of this view have asked “who lost Eastern Europe” in a manner that should frighten any American who remembers the “who lost China” era in American politics. While there is not much that even the most strident Moscow jingoists can do to regain their “empire” in the short run, this theme promises long-term difficulties for Europe.

The Bush Administration has paid too little attention to this growing opposition during the past year, at least in public. Now it has an obligation to the American people to be candid about just what is at stake in the Moscow power struggle.