OPINION
Friday, December 9, 1983
Page 4
The Michigan Daily
The political impact of the Euro:
By Christopher Bertram
last of a series
Today, the question is no longer whether new
American medium-range missiles will be
stationed in Europe, but how many. If there is
njo agreement in Geneva - and now that the
Soviets have walked out of those talks it ap-
piears certain that there will be no agreement
± the whole NATO program of 108 Pershing II
a'nd 464 cruise missiles will be implemented. If
there is, by some outside chance, agreement,
Euromissile
Dbate
then at least part of it will go forward. And on
the Eastern side, there will be significantly
nmore nuclear weapons which threaten Europe
than were deployed in December; 1979, when
NATO first announced that it would arm unless
arms control should make that unnecessary.,
So what is new? That, after all, has been the
pattern of the nuclear arms competition since
it began 35 years ago. One side's arms are the
oher side's fears and it will do something
lout them. And when both get together to try
to control competition, they usually end up not
by stopping the arms race but by putting a
rlather high ceiling on it.
AND YET, the medium-range missile
decision will be remembered as much more
than merely another episode in the nuclear
arms race. Even before the first U.S. missiles
arrived at their European locations, they have
already had a profound and lasting effect on
nuclear weapons issues in Europe, on U.S.-
European relations, and on Soviet perspectives
on the West.
First, nuclear issues in Europe will never be
the same again. For the NATO decision has
been surrounded by an unprecedentedly deep
and divisive political controversy. At times it
even looks as if governments would not be
able to stick by their 1979 decision, as the public
debate generated first fears and then mounting
internal oppositions - particularly in West
Germany, Britain, and the Benelux countries
- against deployment. The controversy was
heated up as much by Soviet threats and
promises as by the martial rhetoric of the
Reagan administration. It has led, for the first
time in 20 years, to deep doubts among a large
minority of the population about the reliability
of nuclear deterrence for the security of
Europe.
The polarization and bitterness of the debate
has already left wounds and scars in the
European body politic which will remain for a
very long time. They will deepen further as a
result of the violent demonstrations which have
and will continue to accompany the
deployment. Whether they can ever bethealed
is uncertain. But it is already certain that no
West European government will want to un-
dergo a similar experience in the forseeable
future. With the medium-range missile
program, therefore, nuclear weapons moder-
nization at the European end of the Alliance
will be foreclosed for some time, even if the
Soviet Union persists in its habit of ac-
of states during the four years between
December 1979 and December 1983 is not one
that many American presidents will want to
have to shoulder again. Instead, the trend
toward unilateral military decisions which is
already visible will be further reinforced.
In Europe, too, a process of distancing the old
continent from the policies of the new world is
underway. Now it is not only the nuclear issue
which is at stake in the European debate, but
matters of conventional military defense as
well. Proposals abound for reforming NATO
strategy, depending less on nuclear weapons
(which is indeed sensible) but also depending
less on the kind of integrated military
cooperation which has been the condition for
the Alliance's success.
These ideas are unlikely to become accepted
policy under the predominantly conservative
governments in power in Western Europe
today. But they are an indication that not only
the nuclear aspect of Western security has
been affected by the missile controversy, but
its conventional and political foundations as
well.
THIRD, Soviet policies toward the West are
likely to ,take the strains in U.S.-European
relations into account as a permanent feature.
In the past, the Soviet Union was often tempted
to play Europe off against America. But this
was an opportunistic rather than a strategic
choice. Moscow clearly gave a priority to its
dealings with Washington.
In the current missile issue, the Soviets have
overplayed their hand. They had hoped to force
the Alliance apart by putting pressure on the
non-nuclear member states to refuse
missiles!
deployment, and on the nuclear states - Fran-
ce and Britain - by calling in any limitatiotcef
medium-range missiles.
The Soviets have failed in this effect. Onci
again, on this specific issue, they have united
the West by their heavy-handed pressure. One
more time, they have proved inept in applying
the weight of their power with the skill that
European sensitivities demand.
But if they have lost out on this specific issue,
they have nevertheless been able to enhance
the strains within West European societies that
the missile decision has generated. They have
witnessed the attractions for Europeans of a
"European way" to security. And they are
likely to try to appeal to this sentiment more ef-
fectively, particularly if Ronald Reagan should
win a second term as President of the United
States.
So even if the missile issue itself comes to a
conclusion within the next few months, the
political dynamics it has generated or at least
strengthened are here to stay. These amount to
a challenge to the future cohesion and sense of
purpose of the Western Alliance. It will require
statesmen of firmness, wisdom, and
imagination on both sides of the Atlantic if this
challenge is to be met.
Bertram is political editor of Die Zit,
the leading West German newsmagazine.
He was director of the International In-
stitute for Strategic Studies in London for
many years.
What will be the political consequences of the
protests and deployments?
cumulating more and more nuclear forces.
SECOND, European-American relations
have suffered a setback in mutual confidence.
Not only the current U.S. administration will be
reluctant to try again to engage in a joint
nuclear weapons decision with the allies over-
seas. The burden of carrying along a coalition
die fRdbt any
Edited and managed by students at The University of Michigan
Stewart
/.
Vol. XCIV-No. 77
420 Maynard St.
Ann Arbor, MI 48109
Editorials represent a majority opinion of the Daily's Editorial Board
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vill be that year. It will be the truth. "I have the most evil memories
Orwell made the in- of Spain," he wrote, "but I have very
ol of a totalitarian world few bad memories of Spaniards."
lual thought isyerboten. Much of Nineteen Eighty-Four is
the year of Big Brother. foreshadowed in Homage to Catalonia
and Animal Farm, all three of which
hty-Four. convey Orwell's belief that the misuse
ciety that Orwell and abuse of language was the most
where the world was dangerous threat to freedom and liber-
three superpower nations ty. That is the message in Big
war with each other by Brother's slogans: "war is peace;"
- has yet to become a "freedom is slavery;" and "ignorance
everyone, although the is strength."
ns. Though in much of the Most of us know that war is not
ion to the dictum of those peace, freedom is not slavery, and
punished, that opposition ignorance is not strength. People in the
hose fortunate enough not United States still have the right to
totalitarian rule of the think whatever thoughts they want.
eft still enjoy much of the America can be assured that that right
and liberties Orwell still exists by a 1984 calendar
developed by two Michigan Star.;
h feared and despised graduates. The calendar offers up a
ns; he prized the in- day by day listing of freedom-
ove all else. Perhaps restraining events (such as Richard
Catalonia,his account of Nixon's move to install a tape recorder
ces during the Spanish in the Oval Office). Paradoxically, the
est showed this. He saw existence of such a poster calendar
des in the fighting lied to refutes the calendar's ultimate con-
eating heroes and battles clusion that we are very close to what
was no fighting and often Orwell feared most.
or events as if they never 1984 is just a few days away from
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LETTERS TO THE.DAILY:
The un-class of
To the Daily:
I write about class. Not man-
ners, not "good behaviour," but.
class. Where has it gone on cam-
pus?
Chanting bullshit at football
games was witty the first time it
was done, still funny the second,
soon thereafter it became or-
uestion in
To the Daily:
"Question Authority" reads a
lapel button. "Let's look at the
record," said New York Gover-
nor Al Smith back in the '20s.
These admonitions should be
well heeded in light of the mis-
statements of fact and unfounded
rhetoric which characterize the
present administration in
Washington.
President Reagan, at every op-
portunity, contends that the
United States is ready and willing
to negotiate arms control, but
the Soviet Union is not "serious"
about disarmament and is to
blame for the failure to reach an
agreement.
A check on the vote of both
countries on disarmament
resolutions considered by the
General Assembly of the United
Nations early this year shows the
nresrident's assertion to he false
dinary and crass. Now, six years
later and still thriving on Satur-
day afternoons on national TV,
the practice renders the Univer-
sity student body rather juvenile,
to use a kind word.
Toilet paper all over the foot-
ball field, and on the participants,
is bush. Taking over a portion of
g Reagan
the people and the Congress. We
must refuse to be manipulated.
We must demand the facts and
face the reality of the facts before
rushing to judgment.
Edith C. Hefley
November 28
BLOOM COUNTY
rniversity
the field and a goal post while the
game -is still in progress is not
funny, is not becoming of the
tradition of our school.
Forcing Alexander Haig off
podium is not acceptable conduct
at a center of learning, no matter
what "intellectual" imperative is
cited by the protestors. Alleged
intellectualism is easily used as
an exuse for loutishness.
What has traditionally
distinguished the University, the
Midwestern Harvard, from its
less celebrated brethren has been
not only its academic excellence,
but the civility of its student
body. Civility, i.e. class, is hard
to define. It is more easily
students
recognized by its absence.
Student body: you have not been
very classy lately.
I would urge the majority of
responsible students to squelch
the adolescents when they at-
tempt to initiate their boorish
behavior. Call it peer group
pressure. You will all soon be
part of a tradition. Do you want it
to be a tradition that chants
bullshit every time a call goes
against the home team? That is
not saying much for your univer-
sity when it is viewed in other
parts of the country.
David J. Cooper,
November 29
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