Correspondents' Correspondence
Correspondents' Correspondence BRIEF TAKEOUTS OF MORE THAN PERSONAL INTEREST FROM LETTERS AND OTHER COMMUNICATIONS RECEIVED BY THE EDITORS. Brezhnev Tidying Up Moscow—The process initiated last...
...car use will in fact be increased by the Carter program...
...He has been complaining that not having a Soviet leader who can meet Western heads of government on an equal footing is a serious protocol problem for the Soviet Union...
...That is, if they actually materialize...
...The experts believe, found the OTA, that world demand for oil will continue growing, oilproducing nations will eventually restrict shipments, and there will be sharp price increases...
...As he tidies up his lifetime record in what almost appears a conscious effort to assure his occupying the place after Lenin in the Soviet pantheon, foreign policy seems to be the area where he is eager to make a lasting mark during his remaining years in office...
...Article 117 creates the office of the First Deputy Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet...
...But what he would most like to achieve is progress on the bellweath-er issue of strategic nuclear arms limitations...
...it should grit its teeth and impose whatever sacrifices are necessary...
...More likely, though, Brezhnev wants to devote himself to the role of Soviet statesman, while his hand-picked protege directs the day-today business of the Party...
...Finally, the CBO cuts in half Carter's assessment of gasoline savings...
...For one thing, it says, the number of industrial plants that will convert to coal has been grossly overestimated...
...And the machinery for it is perhaps the one truly significant feature of what will henceforth surely be known as the Brezhnev Constitution...
...For according to CBO projections, says Rivlin...
...Brezhnev Tidying Up Moscow—The process initiated last May 24 with the sudden ouster of Soviet President Nikolai V. Pod-gorny (see "Exit Podgorny," NL, June 6), and continued with the release of the new Soviet constitution less than two weeks later, is expected to reach its culmination with the elevation of the office of the Presidency when the Supreme Soviet convenes on June 16...
...Freedom of speech, assembly, press, etc...
...It is, however, exactly what the two reports suggest.So observers here are watching with interest to see how Congressmen will use the expertise of their new special staffs to wrest the reins of leadership from President Carter on the energy issue.—GEORGE E. HERMAN...
...While he has appeared baffled by the Carter Administration this far, his own military-industrial establishment may be as much of a problem as what the Politburo considers an American ploy to induce the USSR to give up its most lethal long range missile...
...If the Democrats are frightened by the OTA report, circulated to all members of Congress by Thomas Ludlow Ashley (D.-Ohio), chairman of the House Ad Hoc Energy Committee, they will not be quickly comforted by its comments on the White House program for dealing with the crisis...
...In keeping with Soviet tradition, it is less the supreme law of the land than a codification of the current Kremlin world view...
...This information is causing discomfort among Representatives and Senators, especially the Democrats...
...Still, there is no denying that Brezhnev gives the impression of being locked into the salt guidelines formulated at Vladivostok in 1974, uncharacteristically unable to formulate a fresh response that would again put Moscow on the disarmament offensive...
...Indeed, arms control appears to have become his forte, and—whether he is wearing two hats or one—could yet be the point where his aspirations to statesmanship and his perception of the interests of the Soviet Union happily coincide.—Mark Hopkins Grim Energy News WASHINGTON—Returning from its long Memorial Day recess, Congress was greeted by some grim tidings...
...The rest of the document contains no real surprises...
...At the same time, a close reading of Brezhnev's recent speeches leaves no question that he hopes for international agreements, especially with the U.S., to slow the arms race...
...CBO Director Alice Rivlin points out that energy accounts for only 5 per cent of our gross national product, and automobile driving is responsible for merely 30 per cent of that—so the worries on the Hill are out of proportion to the minor economic impact the cutbacks will have anyway...
...There has been a lot of talk about sacrifice and calling the population to arms in this moral equivalent of war, she notes, but they are not really evident in the plan...
...Perhaps more significantly, they further maintained that the bleak situation casts grave doubt on the efficacy of President Jimmy Carter's highly-publicized energy package...
...With this vice president handling the ceremonial and routine Party duties, Brezhnev would be able to serve as President without being overburdened by relatively minor administrative details...
...It matters little that Brezhnev has always been treated exactly as if he were a chief of state, even in trips to the West, and has had no difficulty signing treaties: The protocol explanation provides an acceptable rationale for presenting him with the second office of President...
...A subsequent surge of tension between producing and consuming countries is predicted, with depression, revolution and world war mentioned as eventual possibilities...
...The new constitution represents, if anything, a move away from the protection of human rights, indicating just how concerned the Kremlin is with the problem of internal dissent...
...In harmony with the Brezhnev regime's established analysis, too, it judges the world power balance to have shifted decisively in favor of the Communists...
...A similar situation exists in Yugoslavia, where Marshal Josip Broz Tito, now 85, has delegated most administrative tasks to Party Executive Secretary Stane Dolanc, reserving for himself the major policy initiatives and negotiations, especially in the area of foreign affairs...
...What is worse, the implication is clear: Congress should itself come up with tougher measures...
...They forecast that 1985 figures may fall short of Carter's projections by some two million barrels of oil, two million tons of coal and a considerable amount of nuclear energy...
...Two of its own special staffs declared the energy problem to be worse than we have been led to believe...
...Hurt the public for its own good is not the sort of advice our elected representatives like to hear...
...The Brezhnev Constitution states definitely that civil liberties, now theoretically assured, cannot be used against that society: They are granted only "in conformity with the interests of the working people and in the interests of strength...
...Finally, and also in step with recent ideological pronouncements, the Soviet Socialist system emerges as a successful experiment in assuring efficient mass security, prosperity and liberty...
...To a Brezhnev who relentlessly pursues his place in Soviet—and probably world—history, this arrangement must be quite appealing...
...The second study, published by the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), dissents from the Administration's comparatively rosy view on the future as well...
...In his visit to France (where he journeyed when he last left the Soviet bloc, in 1974) later this month, perhaps as President, Brezhnev no doubt hopes to refurbish the Soviet detente image and regenerate his own languishing "peace policy...
...Thus while our standard of living may start climbing at a slower clip, it will by no means fall...
...For another, a large percentage of private home owners are unlikely to install insulation, whatever the incentive...
...The specialists who were consulted thought the President's estimates of the decline in consumption that would be brought about by his proposals far too optimistic...
...The Kremlin's policy of the last few years (basically, following the parallel paths of East-West detente and superpower status) has not enjoyed conspicuous success—not with China, not with the United States, not in the Middle East, and not in Western Europe...
...This speculation has been bolstered by the recent articles of Victor Louis, a Soviet journalist privy to inside information who writes for Western news organizations...
...But current Moscow reports suggest that—like Czechoslovakia's Gustav Husak and Rumania's Ni-colae Ceausescu—Soviet Communist party chief Leonid I. Brezhnev is about to become the chief of state as well...
...The staff's members, who are not politicians, are puzzled as to why higher gasoline taxes and proposed reductions in fuel purchases are among Congress' biggest concerns...
...Until now the position (actually the chairmanship of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet) has been a largely ceremonial one...
...One of the two staffs, the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA), recently held a series of private panel meetings with specialists on the subject...
...As such, it declares that the capitalist encirclement has collapsed, and that the Communist movement has arisen as the determining global force...
...were guaranteed in the Stalin Constitution of 1936 as the means to an end—the creation of a Socialist society...
...Their own experts, whom thev employed to make the legislative branch a little more equal to the Administration in expertise and the tools of planning, are telling the Congressmen that their leader in the White House has not produced a tough enough response to the nation's energy ills...
...In all probability, the constitution will represent Brezhnev's final major domestic contribution...
...Under the President's plan, the CBO contends, energy savings will still miss their mark by around 20 per cent...
Vol. 60 • June 1977 • No. 13
