Republics’ A-Arms Stir New U.S. Assertiveness : Soviet Union: Washington is prepared to withhold recognition and aid, officials say.

The United States is becoming increasingly assertive in an effort to prevent independent-minded republics on the periphery of the former Soviet Union from gaining control of nuclear weapons within their borders, according to Bush Administration officials.

The Administration, using as leverage a 1968 non-proliferation treaty, is prepared to withhold political recognition and economic help from the outlying republics if they attempt to assert sole authority over nuclear weapons on their soil, these officials said.

Three key republics--the Ukraine, Kazakhstan and Belarus (formerly Byelorussia)--would rank after the United States and the Soviet Union as the most powerful nuclear states in the world if they kept weapons now deployed on their territory. That scenario is causing increasing anxiety in the West as officials in the republics issue mixed signals about their intentions.

“The bottom line is we don’t want one nuclear state to dissolve into . . . three or four nuclear states, and we’re prepared to use political and economic pressures on the independent republics not to seek the authority to release (fire) these weapons,” said one U.S. official.

Once allergic to everything nuclear because of the Chernobyl disaster and the release of radioactive debris from bomb testing, these republics initially declared that they did not want authority over the weapons on their soil. But recently some of their officials have spoken about “our” nuclear arms and openly pondered their use as bargaining chips.

Ukrainian opposition figures have gone further than any other officials in these republics, calling for retention of nuclear weapons to “deter” the Russian Federation and “the center,” the term used to describe what remains of the former Soviet central government. A new Ukrainian law prohibits weapons from being transferred out of the republic without its approval, U.S. officials said.

As a measure of this concern, preparatory talks opening this week in Moscow on “new security issues” that have emerged with the end of the Cold War will focus on the subject of nuclear weapons control.

At a time when the international political importance of nuclear weapons is receding with the collapse of communism, the West now faces the danger of these weapons playing into rivalries between former Soviet republics.

Few experts fear the actual use of such weapons, but they foresee other troublesome scenarios: Ukrainians, for example, might want to trade nuclear arms for Russian guarantees on their borders; Kazakhstan could seek economic benefits from the “center” if it gives up its arms.

The picture is complicated by the fact that many of the republics see the “center” as being synonymous with the Russian Federation. Returning weapons to the center, in this view, would mean sending them back to the Russia that has oppressed them for centuries.

Adding to their suspicion is the fact that the central government, at least in its public statements, has vowed to cooperate closely with Russia on nuclear matters.

Washington insists that in trying to prevent the republics from establishing sole authority over the use of nuclear weapons, it is not attempting to interfere in the security relationships that are evolving in the former Soviet Union.

The non-Russian republics could help decide the number of nuclear weapons and their disposition and even exercise veto power over their use, much like North Atlantic Treaty Organization nations where U.S. warheads are based, U.S. officials assert.

Washington is using as leverage the 1968 Non-Proliferation Treaty, whose original signers--the Soviet Union, Britain and the United States--pledged not to transfer nuclear weapons, “or control over such weapons, directly or indirectly,” to nations lacking such weapons. About 140 nations have subsequently signed the accord.

Political and military authorities in Moscow strongly approve of the Administration position, U.S. officials said. Their support is based not only on the desire to retain authority for themselves but also on the danger posed by the presence of nuclear weapons on the periphery as historic ethnic and national rivalries are revived.

President Bush’s recent proposal to eliminate or store all ground-based and sea-based tactical nuclear weapons and Gorbachev’s quick affirmative response are expected to eliminate thousands of shells and short-range missile warheads from the outer republics.

U.S. officials were told that Gorbachev’s reply was approved by heads of those republics. So even though these arms have yet to be physically transported out of the republics, the problem they once posed seems on the way to solution.

But strategic, or long-range, weapons remain a significant concern, in part because they still pose a threat to the United States.

Although the Soviets matched Bush’s token reduction of 450 intercontinental missiles by taking off alert 503 ICBMs, “it looks like less than a third, at best, of the strategic weapons in the outlying republics are being stood down,” according to Jack Mendelsohn, deputy director of the non-government Arms Control Assn.