Taking the Initiative from Moscow

...Eastern Europe, meanwhile, was quiet...

...The Euro-communists are turning out to be more of a bane than a blessing, and Poland-whose government is hanging onto power by the force of its arms—is not the only Eastern European country in trouble Indira Gandhi has been ousted in India, the Horn of Africa is fast becoming a nightmare, and the new leaders in Peking have summarily rejected Moscow's bid to close the Smo-Soviet rift On the domestic front, the Soviet economy has declined from sluggish to almost stagnant, in 1977 it will grow by less than 3 per cent Despite massive injections of U S grain, food shortages have triggered demonstrations in Rostov, Riga and even Leningrad More imports will be needed and the hard currency to pay for them will be harder to produce, by 1985, the Soviet Union's own energy needs will force it to buy oil abroad—at prices the short-sighted Russians themselves helped to drive up Western technology and equipment, which the Russians will desperately need in coming years, may also prove more difficult to obtain Several big U S compames who opened offices in Moscow amid much hoopla have become so annoyed by the red tape encountered in dealing with the Russians (not to mention the lack of earnings), they have decided to pack up and save the estimated $500,000 a year it costs to keep a typical American sales operation in the USSR going This would be not merely inconvenient but embarrassing for the Russians, and the Kremlin's unofficial ambassador to the U S business community, Djerman Gvish-lani, who has launched a frantic campaign to convince U S companies with Moscow offices to keep them open—for peace, if not for profits Problems of this magnitude, serious at any time, are at the moment especially distressing to the Soviet Union For the long-awaited succession struggle within the Kremlin has begun, with no end in sight Trouble abroad and at home is the last thing Brezhnev and his aged, weary, distracted Politburo colleagues want as they scrap and plot among themselves either to hold power a few years longer or to decide on successors By contrast, the world view from the White House these days (assuming the President can see beyond the ample shadow of Bert Lance) is far more encouraging than it was a few years ago For one thing, of course, since the Soviet Union is this country's chief adversary, its setbacks become our advantages What is more, though, the economy is recovering after deep recession, spirits are rising following the one-two punch of Vietnam and Watergate, and the country does not have to face a national political campaign for another three years Finally, American business' growing disenchantment with detente is now shared by a majority of voters, thanks largely to the Soviet Union's astonishingly counterproductive responses to recent U S initiatives A glaring example is salt Carter's effort to push far beyond the preliminary agreement reached by Gerald Ford and Brezhnev in Vladivostok may well have violated the ground rules of U S -Soviet diplomacy established during the early '70s Yet the Russians' parry of Carter's thrust—a clumsy, out-of-hand rejection of the U S proposals—convinced many Americans that the Kremlin leadership is unwilling or unable to consider any new ideas that might lead to a reduction of strategic armaments As a partial result, public support for a big defense budget is on the upswing Similarly, the President's extraordinary letter to Nobel laureate Andrei Sakharov no doubt came as a blow to Soviet leaders long accustomed to meddling without hindrance—or concern about reverse action—in U S internal affairs But the Kremlin's response to the letter—an escalation of its crackdown on dissidents, including the bellwether decision to arrest Anatoly Shcharansky on the capital charge of treason—made a shambles of its claims that the human rights violations charged by Alek-sandr Solzhenitsyn and others were exaggerations and distortions A number of Carter s actions suggest that he intends to keep up the pressure on Moscow His decision in June to move forward with development of the Cruise missile, together with his announcement in July that he wants the neutron bomb as an "option," were clear signs that the U S means to take full advantage of its superior military technology A still stronger signal came back in May, when Carter denied Control Data Corporation permission to sell the Soviets a $13-million Cyber 76 computer The Russians wanted the big machine badly, and based on their experiences with the Nixon and Ford Administrations—when they were allowed to buy nearly any American product, including advanced computers and equipment for cosmonauts' space suits—they had expected to get it Carter's most aggressive move, at least from Moscow's point of view, probably was his asking Congress last March to step up the transmitting capacity of US -sponsored radio broadcasts to the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe Congress responded affirmatively this summer, adding 50 per cent to the capability of Radio Free Europe-Radio Liberty, and roughly 25 per cent to that of Voice of America There can be no mistaking the motive behind the budget hike, or the Kremlin's unhappiness with the increased deployment of the most cost-effective U S ideological weapon—the fact that somewhere there is such a thing as freedom All of this does not mean Jimmy Carter wants to revert to the Cold War of the '50s and '60s It simply means that as a result of the changing diplomatic cycle, for the first time in a long while the man in the Kremlin needs the man in the White House more than the other way around That is why Carter, whose experience as a businessman has taught him to take advantage of the good years when they come, is leaning hard on Brezhnev And why Brezhnev, who is nothing if not a realist, has lately discovered "positive" statements in a Carter speech this summer on U S -Soviet relations HERBERT E. MEYER, a new Contributor, is an associate editor of Fortune specializing on Soviet affairs...

...Technologically, ideologically, militarily, and especially politically, Washington is now setting the pace and calling the shots...

...The fuss over Carter's unorthodox handling of the USSR has, however, obscured the most interesting and potentially significant aspect of the U.S.-Soviet rivalry-the current transfer of initiative from Moscow to Washington...

...In China the Soviet Union's mortal enemy, Mao Tse-tung, was finally on the verge of death...

...Jimmy Carter's unsettling style is not the primary cause of this change...

...The Vietnam war is ended, and the Americans have put Watergate behind them...

...they can only make the most of the good years, and minimize the damage in the bad ones...

...The change is due, rather, to the diplomatic cycle- a phenomenon roughly analogous to the business cycle, governing the relative status of nations...

...The latest shift in the U.S.-Soviet cycle is not difficult to discern...

...Heads of state, like board chairmen, have little power to alter it...

...Perspectives TAKING THE INITIATIVE FROM MOSCOW BY HERBERT E MEYER To hear Jimmy Carter's foreign- policy critics tell it, the President has dangerously strained the delicate U.S.-Soviet relationship- which under Nixon-Ford had greatly improved-by pounding the Russians on the ultrasensitive human rights issue, and by launching new strategic arms limitation proposals with the sort of publicity the secretive Kremlin was certain to resent...

...Some detractors, including former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, have bluntly warned the President to back off and keep quiet before the Soviets lose patience with him...

...inflation rates have dropped to considerably below 10 per cent in most countries...

...Never before has a Soviet leader complained publicly about his inability to understand the Americans, as Party chief Leonid I. Brezhnev did a few months ago to, of all people, President Valery Giscard d'Estaing of France...

...The capitalist economies are on the road to recovery as well...

...assiduously courted reporters, as Anatoly Dobrynin is doing at present in an undisguised effort to drive a wedge between the President and the American public...

...After decades of having it their way, of heating things up and cooling them down again at will, the Soviets have suddenly lost control of the superpower competition...

...Never before has a Soviet foreign minister held a televised news conference to justify his government's behavior, as Andrei Gromyko did after the SALT talks crashed in March...

...Others-in Congress and particularly in the press-have worried aloud that Carter really has no coherent strategy September 26, 1977 for dealing with the Russians, that his freewheeling and often pugnacious thrusts merely reflect inexperience laced heavily with naive idealism...

...And never before has a Soviet ambassador to the U.S...

...Vietnam and Watergate were humiliating and debilitating the U.S., double-digit inflation was ravaging the entire capitalist world, and Communists seemed on their way to power in Italy and Portugal...

...At home, the Soviet government had found it could prop up the slow-moving economy by importing vast amounts of Western equipment and food...

...Nor, for that matter, has it occurred because of any specific step the President has or has not taken...

...The view from the Kremlin wall today is a much less cheery one...

...For the first time in many years, the Soviets are on the defensive...

...There was a friendly government in New Delhi, and a promising situation on the Horn of Africa...

...It could even pay, having earned $3.2 billion in 1975 alone by selling oil to the energy hungry West...

...Think of how high the Russians were riding just a while back...