Basic HTML Version
Behind the Call
fora
"NUCI,EAR FREEZE"
inEurope
by
Gene H. Hogberg
The Soviet Union faces a grim paradox: the more its worldwide nuclear advantage
grows, the greater is its future insecurity close to borne in Europe.
O
N M ARCH
16 Soviet
P resident
Leonid
l.
Brez hn ev an–
nounced a unilat –
eral moratorium
on deployment of
inte rme di a t e
r a nge nu c l ear
mi ssi les i n t he
European pa r t of
the Soviet Union.
The 75-year-old
Soviet leader fur–
ther pledged that
sorne missiles now
in place woul d be
removed later th is
year . And that
sorne older s ingle–
warhead SS-4 and SS-5 missiles
would not be replaced with the
newer, more powerful , trip le–
warheaded SS-20s.
T he Soviet Un ion is already
believed to possess 300 SS-20s, two
thi rds of which are targeted upon
key population and strategic cen–
ters in Western Europe.
West e rn Officia ls Discount
Nuclear F reeze
Sorne significant strings were
attached to the Soviet " nuclear
2
SOVIET PRESIOENT Leonid Brezhnev
visited West German Chancelfor Helmut
Schmidt (right) in Bonn last November.
Soviet leadership is intens ifying its oppo·
sition to NATO p lan for new missiles.
free ze " propasa!. Mr. Brezhnev
said that the moratorium would
remai n in effect until an arms
control agreement was reached
with the Un ited States regarding
nuclear weapons based in Eu–
rope- or until the United States
begins " practica] measures to
deploy" new generation Pe rshing
JI
and c ruise mis–
siles in Western
Europe.
T he North At–
lantic T reaty O rga–
nization decided in
1979 to deploy 572
such advanced nu–
clear weapons o n
E uropean soil- tar–
geted o n Soviet
s i tes- by
late
1983.
React ion
throughout the
Western world to
the nuclear morato–
rium offer generally
... was negative. While
~
spokesmen for the
·~
many antin u clear
~
movemen ts
re–
~
spond ed favorably
"' to what they called
a breakthrough in the arms race,
official react ion ranged from cool
to ice cold.
P rime Minister Margaret
T hatcher of Great Britain quickly
dismissed the offer, saying it
"freezes the total superiority of the
Soviet Union in these particular
theater nuclear weapons."
T he West German government
was more guarded in its response.
Nevertheless, a Bonn spokesman
rejected the Soviet contention that
a rough East-West parity of
nuclear weapons existed in Europe
The
PLAIN TRUTH