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4) Relations with the Third World. Most European leaders believe that they have a special opportunity to establish preferential relationships with Third World countries. In the flash points of the Middle East, Africa and Central America, they see U.S. approaches as hopelessly tainted by an obsession with Soviet ambitions; some hope to win favor in the Third World by an ostentatious dissociation from the U.S. More than a few Americans view such behavior as a free ride paid for by U.S. sacrifices or as a positive incitement to Third World radicalism.
These differences could be healthy if they led to compatible and constructive policies for the 1980s and '90s. So far this has not happened. Mutual recriminations have created opportunities for Soviet political warfare even during this period of stagnation in the Kremlin leadership. The Politburo is obviously convinced that the West has become so paralyzed concerning nuclear weapons that there is no urgency about nuclear arms control; the Soviets can simply wait for a while to harvest the fruits of Western anxieties. By contrast, there may be concern in Moscow that NATO will move to close the gap in conventional forces; hence the willingness to resume the talks, moribund for ten years, about limiting conventional arms. Does this reflect a genuine interest in arms control, or is it a means to thwart the desperately needed Western conventional buildup by creating the same conditions by which public opinion was mobilized on the missile question? And what is one to make of the almost deferential pleas by all major NATO countries for the resumption of a dialogue that the Soviets have interrupted? Or of the upgrading of all major European delegations except the French to the Andropov funeral, compared with the Brezhnev rites 15 months ago—especially as Andropov's rule was marked by the flagrant attempt to influence the German election, the walkout from arms-control talks and the shooting down of the Korean airliner, not to speak of Andropov's 15-year stewardship of the KGB?
Will the Soviets see Western pleas for dialogue as a demonstration of good will, or will they learn from the compulsion to demonstrate good intentions after months of harassment that intransigence pays because the West has weak nerves? Will we fail to relax tensions because the Soviets conclude that atmospherics can substitute for dealing with the real causes dividing the world? Europe is not moderating the U.S., and the U.S. is not stiffening Europe's spine, as the folklore on each side would have it. More likely, each is in danger of paralyzing and demoralizing the other. Western disunity is perhaps the principal obstacle to progress in East-West negotiations.
This state of affairs has deeper causes than particular policies on either side. The present NATO structure is simply not working, either in defining the threat or in finding methods to meet it.
Existing arrangements are unbalanced. When one country dominates the alliance on all major issues—when that one country chooses weapons and decides deployments, conducts the arms-control negotiations, sets the tone for East-West diplomacy and creates the framework for relations with the Third World—little incentive remains for a serious joint effort to redefine the requirements of security or