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PASTOR GENERAL'S REPORT, SEPTEMBER 9, 1983
PAGE 10
The fallacy of the
II
linkage policy" was explained by Josef Joffe in the
September 1, 1983 WALL STREET JOURNAL, one day before the Korean plane was
shot from the sky:
From the late 1960s onward, the West...[ calculated J that money
would buy influence over the East. Together, the nations of the
Western Alliance would enmesh the Soviet Union in trade and tech
nology ties, credit 1ines and arms-control agreements. Having
acquired a stake in cooperation, Moscow would behave according to
Western standards--like any reasonable power that values peace
and prosperity more than aggrandizement. The Kremlin, so the
"linkage theory" went, would not risk the horn of capitalist
plenty for a quick geopolitical grab here or there....
A dozen years later, our hopes have not blossomed into reality.
The Soviets did not live up to our "good conduct code" in Angola,
Ethiopia and Afghanistan. Where they faced concentrated Western
power {as in Europe) they behaved with prudencer where Western
commitments were neither clear nor backed by force, they acted as
great powers always do: with opportunism and risk taking.•.•
Nor could the West do what "linkage" required....
Western...
governments depend on the consent of the governed. Hence firms
and farmers do not yield gladly to control from above, which is
absolutely indispensable for a political trade policy. "Linkage"
requires the freedom to cut links. That freedom is heavily con
strained by vested economic interests, the prospect of lost jobs
and the pains of structural adjustment.
In other words, Western interests {such as American farmers or manufac
turers of gas pipeline laying equipment) have more to lose from a suspen�
sion of links to the Soviets than do the latter.
The Intriguing Long-term Possibility
One thing the crude Soviet act has done:
mute the voices of President
Reagan's critics who claimed that he had embarked on a new "cold war" cru
sade against the Soviets. Also, the wind may have been taken out of the
sails, temporarily at least, of the "peace movement" in Western Europe.
The Soviets had been cleverly using elements within the movement to get the
idea across that the U.S.S.R. was all peace-loving and that America was the
major threat to world peace--especially by pushing ahead on the N�TO plan
to upgrade nuclear missiles in Western Europe.
TIME magazine, in its September 12 cover story, "Atrocity in the Skies,
11
concluded its account as follows:
In the U.S., the Soviets' rash act certainiy strengthens military
hard-liners and gives Reagan an even better chance to win final
congressional approval for deploying the MX missile while limit
ing U.S. concessions in arms-control talks. [ U.S. Senator J Jesse
Helms made the point well in discussing the Soviets with conser
vative colleagues in Seoul last week. Said he: "This is the best
chance we ever had to paint these b..••..• into a corner."
Actually, the painting has already been done.
It is a nasty
self-portrait that shatters the reasonable image that the Soviets