High-Tech Fallout in Britain

...At least one senior Tory has served notice that he will nominate an alternative leader, as yet unnamed, at next fall's annual Conservative conference...

...Is she too bossy, as is commonly believed, or not bossy enough...

...Who in the government leaked what to the press...

...troops to remain in Europe for about two years after World War II ended, to help tidy things up...

...To an onlooker, it was astounding that a controversy more concerned with proprieties than substance had swelled to outsized proportions...

...shifted from John Foster Dulles' strategy of massive nuclear retaliation to one of flexible response, a shiver of apprehension ran down the spines of some European military strategists...

...As the leader of the Western Alliance it would of course be a participant in the battles, yet it would not feel itself in danger, its commitment would no longer be total...

...forces in Europe— former Senator Mike Mansfield's name continues to cause shudders in European defense ministries—confirmed suspicions that one day the Americans wouldgohomeandtheAllieswouldbe left to their own devices...

...At the Yalta conference in 1945, Franklin D. Roosevelt told Joseph Stalin he expected U.S...

...and that this would trigger a contagious process that might ultimately leave Europe denuded of much of its independent advanced weapons research and production capability...

...When, under John F. Kennedy, the U.S...

...And periodic calls by various influential Americans for a withdrawal or reduction of U.S...

...Although the issue at the heart of the original dispute was comparatively trivial, major political questions soon dominated the Westland affair...

...It flaredupattheturnoftheyear, then blossomed into a headlined hassle between two of Thatcher's most valued ministers, Defense Secretary Michael Heseltine and Minister for Trade and Industry Leon Brittan...

...In relating those fears to the West-land fuss, "devices" is the operational word...

...Fleet Street's references to a British Watergate were somewhat off the mark...

...The ambitious Michael Heseltine may have tried to use the Westland row to cut Margaret Thatcher down to size and succeed her ultimately as Conservative leader and prime minister (a futile effort so far, strongly resented by mostofhis Tory colleagues...

...It is not only the Pentagon that harbors anxieties about the future—exaggerated or otherwise—and believes that a honeymoon with Gorbachev's Russia could very well have less than agreeable long-term consequences...

...THE WESTLAND CONTROVERSY HighTech Fallout in Britain BY NORMAN GELB London We probably have not heard the last of the row within Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's Cabinet over whether a medium-sized British helicopter manufacturer, Westland PLC, should be rescued from bankruptcy by the American Sikorsky Aircraft Company or a consortium of European and British enterprises...

...Western Europe emerged from the fighting in such a state of devastation and disarray, though, that Washington subsequently decided the Continent would not be able to see to its own defenses until around 1952...

...It is interesting to note, in this context, that the London military attache of the People's Republic of China was invited to one of the functions of the European Atlantic Group...

...Much that today seems to have an anti-American flavor in European official circles reflects an anxiousness to make certain that their armed forces will have adequate hightech weapons and other devices with or without the American defense umbrella...

...If, as it appeared, the Soviets with their wartime Army still largely intact were embarked on a campaign of aggressive expansionism, an American defensive shield would be required longer than the proj ected 1952 pull-out deadline, probably much longer...

...But to detect anti-Americanism in his antics is to miss the point...

...In the great Profumo scandal in the early 1960s, the Minister of War had to resign not because he had shared a London call girl with an attache from the Soviet Norman Gelb writes regularly for The Nfw Leader on British affairs...

...that the company's high-tech brains would be lured to the United States...

...He seemed to be promoting an image of America as the domineering big brother, determined to thwart any European competition, no matter how peripheral...

...Embassy, but because he had lied to Parliament about it...

...General Sir Edward Burgess, the British Deputy nato Commander, recently told a London meeting of the European Atlantic Group that breaking the cohesion of the Atlantic Alliance, "particularly the transatlantic link," was still a Soviet goal...

...With its atomic threat withdrawn, America might consider Russian probes purely regional conflicts that were to be won or lost on European soil...

...These were fueled by Heseltine's unrelenting, sometimes desperate public efforts to block the Sikorsky lmk-up, favored by West-land's board of directors for commercial reasons...

...counterpart, Caspar Weinberger, for lucrative British participation in projected Star Wars research programs...

...Ironically, theFrench, whowould prove so difficult an ally in later years, particularly pressed the United States to continue to participate in a joint defensive alliance based upon the American nuclear umbrella...

...The seeds of this worry were planted along time ago...

...In this case a letter from Solicitor General Sir Patrick Mayhew to Heseltine, telling him he had some of his facts wrong in backing the European consortium...

...There is a genuine fear in Britain and elsewhere on this side of the Atlantic that large American companies (General Motors is the current specter) are drying up local jobs by buying out European companies and "rationalizing" them—that is, shifting parts of their operations to the United States and to cheap labor corners of Europe...

...At the moment no one expects Thatcher to be drummed out of her post, but the Iron Lady's armor has been badly dented...

...It is likely that Heseltine, as defense secretary, was angered by not getting firmer guarantees from his U.S...

...But in the Sikorsky bid—finally blocked, incidentally, by Westland's shareholders—the dangers perceived were that Britain's only helicopter manufacturer would be reduced to mere "tin bashing," or assembling parts...

...Governments here have always indicated their views on commercial transactions when they wanted to...

...His worry, and that of numerous others in West European defense ministries, is primarily about high-powered competition from America in high-technology research and development...

...The situation became so clouded with suspicion and innuendo, however, that critics of Thatcher in her own Tory ranks were handed the first real chance they have had to talk seriously about replacing her as Conservative leader...

...The Soviet Berlin blockade in 194849, which spawned the Cold War, necessitated another review of the situation...

...Governments here have always leaked documents...

...That may have been the immediate reason for the strength of his attack on the Sikorsky bailout...

...No illegalities were involved...

...In this case Thatcher, through Brittan, made known her preference for the Sikorsky deal...

...Heseltine issued warnings that if Sikorsky won over the European consortium, "the Americans" would gain control of Britain's helicopter industry...

...True, commercial factors and questions of creating jobs in key industries carry much weight in European capitals as well...

...But it would be a mistake to dismiss the stand of a man who has been so resolute a supporter of the Atlantic Alliance as anti-American...

...They feared this would also mean a different perception in Washington toward possible Soviet military adventures in Europe...

...Could Thatcher control her Cabinet with Heseltine and Brittan vigorously and publicly at odds...

...The fuss seemed excessive, until one recalled how much of a role proprieties play in British public life...

...Was the Prime Minister a party to this impropriety...

...As the Westland imbroglio developed, there were suggestions of anti-Americanism on the part of those who urged the European option...

...Why were civil servants involved in the affair ordered not to appear before parliamentary committees (which are getting to behave more like congressional committees all the time...

...Eventually, this reasoning went, though Soviet objectives would remain unchanged, American interest in European defense would undoubtedly fizzle out...

...Before January was out both men had resigned, and the Prime Minister faced her most threatening challenge to date...

...detente that he apparently intends to press more strenuously than his predecessors did, and with American defense outlay coming under intensified budgetary constraints, many European military strategists envision a time when they may have to see to their own devices far more diligently than at any period since World War II...

...With Party chief Mikhail S. Gorbachev launching a new era of Soviet-U.S...