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PASTOR GENERAL'S REPORT, DECEMBER 11, 1981
PAGE 8
Party of West Germany, and at the next German general election in
1984. The Russians know this; it is one reason why they have picked as
their chief negotiator a Germany expert, Yuli A. Kvitsinsky, former
counselor of their embassy in Bonn..•.It will not take much ingenuity
�or Kvitsinsky to soin out his talks with [U.S. negotiator Paul} Nitze
1n �eneva for the next three years to see just what happens polit1cal
!.Y
1n West Germany.
Those 1984 German elections therefore loom as increasingly important. In
the meantime, Moscow will continue playing to West European neutralist and
anti-nuclear forces. In some countries, such as Great Britain, with its
Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND), these forces advocate total unilat
eral nuclear disarmament, with their leaders talking about "taking a chance
on peace" with the Soviets.
I witnessed a spokesman (or spokeswoman, I really could not tell) for the
"ban the bomb" movement explain his (her) position while being interviewed
on British television. It said: "I would prefer being Red to dead." Now,
this was the first time I actually heard anyone personally express this
preference. This spokes(wo)man professed the belief that should the "Red
option" come about, "we would be under Russian domination for only a period
(of tim�), for a generation or two by Russia." How incredibly naive!--but
there's more. He (she, it) said that "being forced to conform to an alien
system is not an end to life."
What a difference between this attitude and the spirit that aroused the
British people in 1940 to stubbornly refuse to bow to an alien slave system
worse than death. "Whosoever seeks to gain his life will lose it•..." What
a contrast also to the "Masada spirit" that animates the Israelis.
"Protestant Angst"
It is also an interesting observation that Protestant Northern Europe has
been the scene of most of the demonstrations against the new NATO weapons.
Even in West Germany, the Protestant rather than the Roman Catholic clergy
has been in the forefront of the mass movement. Commenting on this phenome
non, U.S. Assistant Secretary of Defense Richard N. Perle said:
"The
Protestants are suffering from angst--a gloomy, often neurotic, feeling of
anxiety or depression. I refer to it as Protestant angst because when you
look to Catholic Europe, when you look at Portugal and Spain and
Italy...you find a very different attitude, a much greater awareness of the
danger of military imbalance, a greater willingness to make sacrifices for
defense." The same is true, of course, for Catholic France.
This high Pentagon official also noted that the Protestant clergy have
jumped on the disarmament issue as one way to revive flagging church atten
dance. Added Perle: "I had a Dutch friend tell me that the disarmament
campaign has been good for the membership drive in the church. 'With the
ability to bring people into the churches with seminars on GLCMs [ground
launched Cruise missiles] and Pershing-2s, you can hardly blame the clergy
for holding seminars of GLCMs and Pershing-2s.'"
The "Strong Man of Europe" Points the Finger
While in Egypt Mr. Armstrong expressed the desire to stop in Munich to visit
Franz Josef Strauss, who, of course had been a guest in Mr. Armstrong's home
a little over ten years ago. Mr. Fahey made a quick call to Bonn and our