In a TIME interview, Haig outlines the goals of U.S. policy
Shortly after concluding 4½ hours of arduous negotiations with Britain's new Foreign Secretary Francis Pym last week, Secretary of State Alexander Haig spent 70 minutes talking with TIME's State Department correspondents Gregory H. Wierzynski and Johanna McGeary. Excerpts from the interview:
Q. What is at stake for the U.S. in the Falkland Islands crisis?
A. There are basic issues of international law and their relationship with the fundamental objective of this Administration's foreign policy, and that is to insist that historic change occur through the accepted rules of law. So that's a stake of principle.
Secondly, there are hemispheric interests. We have been working to enhance our relationship with the Organization of American States and its member states, and have had considerable success in getting their support for the policies that we have been pursuing in El Salvador and Nicaragua. That is also at stake.
Then there are the Atlantic-community interests. An American misstep could have lasting consequences. There are also North-South overtones of colonialism and anticolonialism. It would be a tragic outcome if this issue were to deteriorate into that highly charged context.
Finally, of course, there are East-West overtones. It is the proclivity of the Soviet Union to fish in troubled waters, and there is no reason to anticipate it could be any different in this situation.
Q. What kind of policies do you intend to pursue in the Middle East after the transfer of the Sinai is completed?
A. The Camp David process is our framework for peace. We see no other alternative that offers any prospect for a lasting, comprehensive and just settlement of this historic problem.
If the two parties now seek to pull out of the Camp David framework, there will be little hope for progress on those issues which they agreed to defer to let history contribute to a solution. There will be no solution on autonomy. But if they continue to abide by the concept agreed to at Camp David, which establishes a transition period in which confidence building can emerge under a central governing authority, there is no reason that this is undoable.
That doesn't preclude broadening the participation in this process—not at all. Nor does it mean we're contemplating doing that in the near term. First we've got progress to make in the Israeli-Egyptian talks.
Q. What about your concept of a "strategic consensus" in the area?
A. Despite all the bumps and lumps and all the skepticism of the so-called strategic consensus, we have one. This was never an American-made formula but an expression of strategic reality, in the context of direct Soviet threats to the area, Soviet proxy threats or radical threats, as from Iran, to moderate Arab regimes.