East-West: Echoes Across the Gap

With relations on hold, the superpowers hurl weighty words at each other

Words, not deeds, have now become the measure of superpower relations. After each new difficulty, it seems, Washington and Moscow have tried to match charge with countercharge. As the distance separating the U.S. and the Soviet Union has grown wider, those words have begun to echo loudly across the gap. The world last week still heard the shrill reverberations from President Reagan's unfortunate joke about bombing Russia. As the Soviets took full advantage of the incident with denunciations and pious indignation,...