Brezhnev's death will have no drastic effect The Michigan Daily-Friday, November 12, 1982-Pag (Continued from Page 1) we'd be in a holding pattern," said Rusk, who was President Johnson's secretary of state when Brezhnev came to power in the last major transition in the Soviet government. Haig, who resigned from the Reagan administration only six months ago said all the United States can do in the next few days is wait and watch. "We must merely conduct our policies as usual," he said, emphasizing the United States could have no effect on the selec- tion of Brezhnev's successor. THE SOVIET leaders that do emerge are likely to be only transitional figures themselves, according to Brzezinski, though the former President Carter aide added the transition should not deter the United States from initiating new foreign policies. President Reagan should give the new leaders "something constructive to chew on," he said, suggesting new arms control policies. "I believe that in arms control we could make some intermediate proposals designed to break the logjam," Brzezinski said. University political science Prof. J. David Singer agreed, though he wouldn't wait until the new leaders assume power. "The U.S. has to take some initiatives," he said. The hardline stance of the United States has narrowed the field of Brezhnev's suc- cessors, he said. "All of them have to be fairly hawkish" to respond to the rhetoric of the Reagan administration, he added. SINGER explained that a hardline U.S. position only begets the same in- transigence in the Soviet Union, and that policy will carry over to future leaders. As in past instances of leadership change, a group will probably emerge to form a collective leadership, Singer said. Raymond Taras, a professor in the University's Center for East European and Russian Studies, agreed. Taras predicted Brezhnev's death would have no immediate effects on U.S.-Soviet relations. He did, however, suggest that the death leaves a "political vacuum" that will be tough to fill. "THERE'S A tendency to adopt a holding pattern and work out a 'modus vivendi' for a short time," he said. Taras said long-term trends in Soviet policy are difficult to predict, but he suggested there may be some "de- Brezhnevizing" of the nation's political structure that might bring younger members into leadership positions and liberalize the economy somewhat, but the changes probably will not be major. "There's also considerable commit- ment to detente among the current leadership," he said. Political Science Prof. Alfred Meyer said the debate over who will succeed Brezhnev is a waste of time. "What we should try to find out are the problems the Soviet Union faces. Within 10 years they (the current leadership, whose average age is 70) all will be gone." Meyer also agreed with Singer that the United States has nothing togain from belligerency."If we make it tough for them, they will only make it tough for ourselves. But they don't want trouble with the U.S.,"he said. PUBLIC SKATING MONDAY Thru FRIDAY 12:00-1:30 P.M. THURSDAY EVENING 8:00-10:00 P.M. SATURDAY AFTERNOONS 12:30-2:15 P.M. (Except Home Football Saturdays) SUNDAY AFTERNOON 12:30-2:15 P.M. U of M Student .................... $1.00 High School Age & Under .......... 1.00 Faculty & Staff...................1.25 Public ........................... $1.50 Skate Rental ...................... .75 ICE RENTAL AND SKATE SHARPENING AVAILABLE YOST ICE ARENA 1016 S. State St. 763-0064 Daily Photo by MARY CASSARD Poet Carolyn Forche speaks on her two-year trip to El Salvador. Forche's week long stay was part of the University's new Writers in Residence Program. El Salvador poems are Forsche's forte By GEORGEA KOVANIS When Carolyn Forche writes, people listen. Especially when her poems focus on El Salvador, where American involvement in a civil war has generated great controversy.- Forche, the first of three authors to participate in the University's new Writers in Residence Program, will end her week-long stay here today. A two-year trip to El Salvador, she stressed during her stay, has changed the major focus of her works from that of growing up in Michigan to the complexities of a Central American revolution. THROUGHOUT her trip to Central America, which ended in 1980, she worked as a freelance journalist and "began what was an education for me in El Salvador." During that time she also discovered that the media were not at all interested in El Salvador. After studying at Justin Morril, an international relations college at Michigan State University and doing research in Ann Arbor on the labor movement, Forche began working for Amnesty International and finally met up with Claribel Alegria, a Salvadoran poet. Forche lived with her in 1977 while translating Alegria's works into English. This was the beginning of what For- che called an education which changed her life. SHE WAS persuaded by Alegria's brother to go to El Salvador in 1978. She accepted the offer and for two years lived in El Salvador with an element of danger that she often finds difficult to talk about. , Forche said that she was "very, seldom in more danger than anyone else." but she added that it was dangerous for anyone to document the progress on human rights. She said she had to come to terms with the fact that she might die there. "I prefer not to say too much about it," she said. However, she does describe what she believes was a close call with a Salvadoran "Death Squad." SHE SAID that in March, 1980, she was walking with a Salvadoran dissident down a street in the coun- try's capital of San Salvador. While walking, the two noticed that gunmen were training machine guns on them. She said that there was no way of knowing whether the gunmen inten- ded to kill her or the dissident. But, she added "it was a fluke that we escaped.". Forche left San Salvador within a week of the incident. "If the 'death squad' wants to kill you and you stay in the country, they kill you," she said. FORCHE SAID she would like the U.S. government to end all military aid to the Salvadoran regime and make a "severe reduction" in economic aid. I p EiI7ILULFLU L2 INDIVIDUAL THEATRES 5th A Ae at lberty 761.0700