Foreign Relations of the United States, 1981–1988, Volume V, Soviet Union, March 1985–October 1986

200. Information Memorandum From the Director of the Policy Planning Staff Staff (Rodman) to Secretary of State Shultz¹

Washington, March 1, 1986

SUBJECT

• Gorbachev and the Summit

SUMMARY: The Soviets may already be discounting the possibility of early arms control agreements with us, and therefore are haggling over the summit date in order to place the onus of failure on us. We have little to fear from Soviet resort to this tactic. Gorbachev does not believe that calling off the summit would serve Soviet interests. We therefore should resist pressures to make concessions to the Soviets, and begin to exert counterpressure on them by warning against their reneging on a commitment made at Geneva. END SUMMARY.

Thursday’s New York Times editorial (attached)² is a good example of the kinds of pressures we will come under if the Soviets continue to hint, as Gorbachev did in his speech to the party congress, at a cancellation of the summit if no progress is made on arms control.³ I am convinced that the Soviets are aware of these pressures, and are “playing hard to get” for precisely that reason. But I am also confident that the Soviets are not genuinely contemplating calling off the summit. We therefore are in a good position to resist pressures for new concessions at Geneva.

In 1984, the Soviets learned that cutting off dialogue with the United States did not serve their interests. It is unlikely that Gorbachev, who has called for an “activation” of Soviet foreign policy in all directions, would repeat the mistake of several years ago. Gorbachev wants to foster an image, at home and abroad, that the USSR has recovered its internal and external dynamism—that it is on the move after years of stagnation. It is hardly possible for Gorbachev to pursue an “active” foreign policy without also conducting a dialogue with the United States.

In his remarks to the party congress, Gorbachev did not condition the holding of the summit on U.S. movement on SDI—the main Soviet theme of late and, according to the Soviets, the chief sticking point in the arms control talks. This was no accident. At Geneva, Gorbachev had a chance to see firsthand how committed the President is to SDI, and knows that demanding concessions on SDI as a price for the summit would be tantamount to cancellation. Gorbachev clearly does not want to go that far, and was careful to link the summit to two less salient issues—nuclear testing and INF—on which he hopes there may be more give on the U.S. side. But even on these issues he did not back himself into a corner. He only said that if there is “readiness” on the U.S. side to seek agreement—not agreement itself—the summit dates could be set.

By insinuating that we are not yet ready for serious talks and by suggesting that our current proposals are nothing more than a basis for “idle conversations,” Gorbachev may hope to pressure us to make concessions. However, he is probably realistic enough to know that the threat of a cancelled summit will not be enough to force us to abandon, over the span of a few months, fundamental positions on INF and CTB. He therefore must have other motives for being so difficult about setting a summit date.

In my view, the Soviets are trying to place us in the role of demandeur, not because they believe they can pressure us into arms control agreements on their terms, but precisely because they know the gap between the sides on most arms control issues is too wide to be bridged, and that there most likely will not be arms control agreements. By creating the impression that we are more eager for a summit than the Soviets and by exercising his veto power over the summit dates, Gorbachev is trying to show that he can “win” in hard bargaining with the United States. He has to show his power over us on this issue, because so far he has exercised very little power over us on matters like getting us to drop SDI or securing compensation for British and French systems.

The Times is right—the summit date has indeed become a bone of contention between the two sides. But the implication that it is a rather silly bone standing in the way of progress on “real” issues, namely arms control, seems to me to put the cart before the horse. Given the President’s firmness on arms control issues and the rigid Soviet adherence to “principled” stances, the Soviets probably are already discounting the possibility of arms control agreements between now and the summit—whenever it takes place. They therefore are trying to place the onus for the lack of progress on arms control entirely on us.

While the Soviets may enjoy some success in this effort, they are creating problems for themselves down the road. They will either have to back out of the summit, which is clearly not in their interests, or eventually attend a summit in the absence of major progress on arms control—which they are saying they will not do.

Our problem is rather in the longer run. As I have said to you on other occasions, I see 1986 as the year of our maximum bargaining strength. Next year, if the President loses the Senate, and as Gramm-Rudman bites deeper into our defense budget, we will be in a somewhat weaker position. The Soviets may have decided to eat up time for that very reason.⁴ Indeed, Gorbachev’s proposal of January 15, which tried to undo the gains we had made in the Geneva Joint Statement, may have been designed to throw a monkey wrench into the works to ensure no rapid progress by the time of the next summit.

As you have pointed out, this is not a reason to make hasty concessions either. Rather it is a reason to focus on maintaining Congressional funding for SDI; maintaining allied solidarity; and engaging Gorbachev aggressively in the game of maneuver he is playing. Gorbachev’s two most recent arms control blitzes have really fallen flat. We may well be able to maintain Congressional and allied support over the next three years and thereby preserve the balance of bargaining strength. As our SDI program moves ahead, time is not on the Soviets’ side—if we keep our cool.

The one thing we should not do is make new concessions and thereby appear overly eager for a meeting that Gorbachev needs as much as we do. Rather, we should begin going to our publics more aggressively to reject the Soviets’ crude blackmail tactic and to explain that the Soviets are reneging on their commitment to hold follow-on summits. By meeting this issue head on, we will preempt suggestions, such as those in the Times editorial, that setting a summit date is a petty matter that can easily be resolved. By acting in this way, we will place pressures on the Soviets and hopefully induce them to agree to a summer meeting or at least to set a date for a post-election summit.

1. Source: Department of State, S/P, Memoranda/Correspondence from the Director of the Policy Planning Staff, Lot 89D149, March 1986. Secret; Sensitive; Summit II. Drafted by VanOudenaren on February 28. A stamped notation reading “GPS” appears on the memorandum, indicating Shultz saw it. On a covering note, Shultz instructed: “Dick S—let’s develop careful Q&A on this—see esp p. 3. G.” Dick S. refers to Richard Solomon, who replaced Rodman on March 3.
2. Attached but not printed is a copy of the February 27 New York Times editorial, “Downhill From the Summit.”
3. The 27th Party Congress met in Moscow February 25–March 6. Telegram 3121 from Moscow, February 25, reported on Gorbachev’s speech, which focused on economic issues and reforms. (Department of State, Central Foreign Policy File, Electronic Telegrams, D860142–0129) For the full text of Gorbachev’s speech, see Current Digest of the Soviet Press, vol. XXXVIII, no. 8 (March 26, 1986), pp. 4–40. Excerpts are printed in Documents on Disarmament, 1986, pp. 80–88. In telegram 3404 from Moscow, March 15, Hartman commented: “The Party Congress, always a major festival of political theater, has assumed particular importance this time because it marks the end of the transition from the Andropov-Chernenko interregnum to the Gorbachev era. Gorbachev’s main political report to the Congress provided few new indications of how he intends to make good on his promise to make the system work. Similarly there were no major new directions in foreign affairs, although Gorbachev’s preoccupation with U.S.-Soviet relations was striking. In this connection, his emphasis was predictably on arms control, although the overall U.S. approach to Third World problems also came in for some tough criticism.” (Department of State, Central Foreign Policy File, Electronic Telegrams, D860156–0508)
4. Shultz underlined this sentence and drew a bracket in the right-hand margin to highlight the paragraph.