Word: inf
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...issue of such rising prominence?and potentially deadly consequences?hinges on two related enterprises: the North Atlantic Treaty Organization's beleaguered plans to deploy 572 new American missiles in Western Europe, and the superpowers' deadlocked negotiations on Intermediate-range Nuclear Forces (INF). Barring a breakthrough in those talks, which resume this week in Geneva, NATO is committed to begin deploying its missiles by the end of this year. If it fails to meet that deadline, the Western Alliance will have demonstrated to itself and to its adversaries that it is incapable of carrying out the most important collective decision...
...more. The single highest priority of Soviet foreign policy in the months ahead is to stop most if not all of the new American weapons from crossing the Atlantic. Toward that end, the Soviets might, if necessary and if possible, cut a last-minute deal with the U.S. on INF. But they have at least as much hope for success through a campaign of pressure and propaganda directed at the Europeans...
...preparation for the resumption of the INF talks and the Bush mission, Reagan held an hourlong meeting in the Oval Office last Friday with his top political aides, national security advisers and arms-control negotiators. The coming round" of negotiations, said a presidential statement released afterward, "is particularly important because our far-reaching proposals, combined with our defense modernization programs, provide a strong incentive for reaching agreements on lower levels of forces...
Last November the new Soviet party leader, Yuri Andropov, denounced the U.S. proposal for INF as one-sided. "Let no one expect unilateral disarmament from us," he said. "We are not naive people...
Soviet negotiators had also been hinting in Geneva that if the NATO deployments went ahead as planned, they might walk out of not only the INF talks but the Strategic Arms Reduction Talks (START), which are proceeding in parallel. The Soviet proposal in START is for reductions well below the ceilings established by SALT II. But that proposal is contingent on there being no new missiles in NATO. Last fall the Soviets seemed to be backing away from their threat of a walkout, since it conflicted with the image of infinite patience they were trying to convey...