SOVIET DISSIDENTS & BALANCE OF POWER

...Disarmament, though less often in the foreground, actually provides the ultimate framework for all considerations of detente...

...The world still is under the threat of nuclear destruction simply because •the bombs are still there and because the 28 years since Hiroshima have not demonstrated any noticeable improvement in mankind or its leaders...

...It is one of the peculiar ingredients of scientific tragedy that the most gifted men are led first to the discoveries that alter the world and only then to higher moral consciousness and revolt by the political abuse of their work...

...If a stable Soviet Union is desired, then it makes sense not to aggravate its contradictions, that is, to exert only face-saving pressure in the area of human rights...

...The range of hopes expressed so far has been quite large and varied from the simple, essential effort to shield Solzhenitsyn and Sakharov to the suggestion in a letter to the New York Times that one or two East European nations be freed from Soviet control as a sign of goodwill (this latter I expect was offered in the spirit of Jonathan Swift...

...In fact, Sakharov's criticism of detente stems from his realization that anything like disarmament is really no more than wishful thinking, so that for the United States to strenghten the Soviet Union is only to make matters generally worse...

...unfettered access to information is essential in the field of computer technology because of its astonishing tempo of evolution...

...Still, even if one swallows such a line, one is forced to ask whether the Soviets acted in a detentish way in the MidEast crisis...

...At this point it is no longer possible to speak of Nixon and better worlds in the same breath, unless we strictly limit that latter conception to the balancing of power...

...A desire to import the products of science torn out of the framework of free inquiry that made them possible is nothing new in Russian history...

...Thus, while we were outraged spectators of the invasions of Hungary and Czechoslovakia and of previous attacks on dissidents within the Soviet Union, we may now feel to some degree part of the game...

...Nevertheless, •the attention paid to Sakharov and Solzhenitsyn has the effect of obscuring the fate of many others, less well-known but no less valiant...

...In any case, the Russians have always taken pains to separate them, to import the know-how and the hardware but leave the science behind...

...As far back as 1966, its intentions toward nonconformist intellectuals were made clear with the trial of Sinyaysky and Daniel...

...This possibility, however, should not blind us to the fact that the campaign may never seriously have been intended to silence Solzhenitsyn and Sakharov— or, more precisely, such a step could have been taken only if the initial moves had met with apathy and indifference abroad...

...It should be remembered that all the changes for which the dissidents are agitating are already "guaranteed" them by the Soviet Constitution, and that their chief strategy has been to press the authorities to conform to Soviet law and to expose them when they do not...

...I noted earlier that the detente has created a certain Soviet-American continuity, which has altered our way of thinking about the problem of not interfering in the domestic affairs of another nation...

...From the point of view of Russian rulers, the West has long appeared as a market for useful technology and a breeding place of dangerously libertarian ideas...

...This stipulation has the advantage of being fairly clear-cut in application, though not in wording...

...I think Senator Jackson has chosen wisely in having his amendment insist on the right of Soviet Jews to emigrate freely...

...But one wonders what would happen if significant numbers of Latvians, Ukranians, and Uzbeks, taking their cue from the Jews, decide to demand the same right for themselves...

...It is probably too much to expect that they be remembered by the men in power now making deals and rearranging maps...

...Amalrik's sentence was doubled, Medvedev's passport revoked while he was in England, Solzhenitsyn received death threats, Sakharov was attacked by the press...

...Krasin and Yakir were held for a year (three months longer than legal), and recanted in a closed trial that brought back memories of the '30s...

...In any case, the courageous Russian dissidents now face tremendous difficulties...

...But a painful contradiction arises here, for the joining of the United States and the Soviet Union in a series of cooperative ventures is itself the most likely cause for the recent wave of repression...

...Finally, one must seriously ask if the U.S...

...Meanwhile it is, of course, an error to think that the wrongs of Russian history can be corrected in the U.S...

...The recent campaign against the dissident intelligentsia has the purpose of depriving Soviet society of any free-thinking individuals who could interpret the new state of affairs and the arrival of thousands of American specialists in any way differing from the official line...

...The government's campaign could have had other aims as well—to smoke out sympathizers and to weaken those who feared to speak by making them endure the humiliation of silence...

...The semipartnership with the Soviet Union creates a certain continuity in Soviet-American relations and seems to allow for possibilities of dialogue and influence (not just at the top), possibilities that did not previously exist when there were two separate and hostile monoliths...

...The storm of protest that ensued was weathered by the regime without too much trouble, but at that time nothing but prestige was hanging in the balance...

...Now it appears that the Politburo, possibly under the influence of Andropov who is the head of the KGB and a full Politburo member, may have gone too far and caused a strong counterproductive response from American scientists, senators, and intellectuals...

...Peter the Great brought in large numbers of West European specialists to teach the Russians the latest innovations in welfare, navigation, construction, etc.—that is, to modernize and strengthen the state...

...But surely it is a moral obligation for the kinds of people likely to read this note that they remember not only Sakharov and Solzhenitsyn but also the other Russian dissidents, less well-known but not less significant, who speak for freedom...

...The Russians now are interested in computer technology for a number of reasons...

...It would be equally inconvenient for the Soviet authorities to have men like Amalrik explaining the Soviet system to these specialists...

...Do the two go together...

...It is for reasons such as these that it is more convenient for a dictatorial state to import rather than develop technological systems...

...Since, at best, only minimal concessions can be wrung from the Soviet leaders, it remains to ask what one can reasonably expect to get accomCOMMENTS AND OPINIONS 17 plished here and, if a bare minimum cannot be achieved, whether detente is a serious blunder...

...The word "transformation" here is used cynically to suggest that opponents of detente are impractical idealists who want nothing less than a miracle...

...The official line from Nixon and Kissinger presents us with the choice of laying a strong foundation for a better future or of losing that chance by insisting on too much...

...In that case detente means that the Soviet Union and the United States engage in trade and that they carefully choose and limit areas of potential conflict...

...These new rules go by the name of detente but how much they are changing, how much only obscuring the nature of the game, of course remains to be seen...

...Amalrik, in his book, Will ,the Soviet Union Survive until 1984?, stated his belief in the shakiness of such a hope long before detente...

...It is to Sakharov's credit that he has not only resisted the pressures of his government but the more subtle pressure to let the prospects of disarmament or arms reduction obliterate the need for social reform...

...administration is still capable of continuing with the ongoing processes of detente or whether its domestic problems make it particularly unsuited for international grand gestures...

...Medvedev, in his forthcoming book, 16 Ten Years since Ivan Denisovich, states that the chief aim of the long campaign against Solzhenitsyn is the destruction of the men around him, his spiritual comrades-in-arms, so that finally Solzhenitsyn would be isolated...

...Some hint of the official view was contained in Kissinger's reply to McGovern: We cannot be indifferent to the denial of human liberty, but we cannot, at the same time, so insist on transformation in the domestic structure of the Soviet system as to give up the general evolution that we are hopefully now beginning...

...Americans apparently also believe that the gradual improvement in the standard of living, as well as the spread of Western culture and ways of life, will gradually transform Soviet society—that the foreign tourists, jazz records, and miniskirts will help to create a "human socialism...

...A FASCINATING BOOK could be written about the relation of science and the state in Russia, a relation every bit as complex and telling as that between literature and the state...

...Other factors— the legacy of Lysenko, the use of drugs and mental institutions as a means of punishing dissent, the emphasis on the military exploitation of scientific innovation—may be swelling the ranks of sympathizers and making new Sakharovs...

...Israel at least wants the Soviet Jews...

...The Soviet Union also is backward in this area because it has hampered the free flow of information that includes the exchange of scientists, journals, and ideas...

...then they suddenly surfaced at a news conference, which reminded us that these are the '70s and the game is being played by new rules...

...Peace, or as Solzhenitsyn calls it "freedom from violence," does not depend directly on the presence or absence of nuclear weapons, as the two prenuclear world wars and the host of postnuclear conflicts clearly indicate...

...They were slow to develop it because of ideological resistance to cybernetics in the years 1954-58...

...It also implies that a strong and stable Soviet Union is in the best interests of the United States and relative world harmony...

...Catherine the Great had fancies of importing the Enlightenment, but only until she saw its end product in the French Revolution...

...It is curious to reflect how this sinister fact has been buried under layers of new problems, a process aided no doubt by the desire to forget the unthinkable...

...Those criticizing the detente may suddenly find themselves in a position not unlike that of thedissidents, with the pressure of two states leaning on them, and branded as people who refuse to cooperate in the creation of a better or at least more peaceful world...

...For many reasons, courageous and dissident thinkers are not usually recruited from the ranks of the latter group though there is always ample room for surprise...

...That hurdle behind them, Soviet scientists and economists are convinced that computer planning will function best in their planned economy and will be of particular benefit to them in helping allocate resources...

...The campaign against the Russian dissidents, COMMENTS AND OPINIONS 15 which certainly originated at the very top, is nothing new for the Brezhnev-Kosygin regime...

...Behind the talk of detente there is a tacit hope in some circles that computer technology applied to the domestic Soviet economy will cause it to function better and thus will produce a burgeoning middle class, comfort, leisure, rising expectations—i.e., the perfect base for a gradual loosening-up...

...But there is a converse to this and an unpleasant one...

...This is, of course, a sensitive point for any Soviet regime that does not boldly proclaim its true totalitarian nature but instead pretends to govern the most democratic society on the planet...

...Congress...

...18 COMMENTS AND OPINIONS...

...The body of scientists working at a given moment is normally composed of a small number of creative spirits and a much larger group of the less original who follow in the wake of scientific breakthroughs, supporting them with applied experiments and finding their practical application...

...It is possible that we will indeed have a "socialism" with bare knees someday, but not likely one with a human face...