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WORLD

Uncertainty
and hope

By FRED WEIR

Mos Tribune Moscow Correspondent
F Cow — The demon winter has locked its icy
P Upon this city, turning all life into a desperate

Stru,
Mo

as th

blo € hardy young portrait artists who, stamping and
Wing on their hands, continue to ply their trade on

at Square.

It is not easy to read the heavily-muffled faces

Bele with the weather. Blasting down the broad
ume boulevards, it rudely thrusts fingers of frost
ine os and sweaters and flings handfuls of snow

the faces of shoppers on Kalinin Prospect as well

Young Soviets at a rock concert in Moscow: People’s lives

wreathed in their own misty breath, but this particular —
winter is heavy with uncertainty and hope. Most of
the people going about their daily routines — to work
or school — are facing the most critical changes of
their lifetimes as the USSR poises for an all-or-
nothing leap into the future. At this stage there

{ Unhappy with the

op OScow — One fundamental
Servation I have made in the
SR is that, whatever distortions

OViet people have never developed
Hae deep feelings of anti-American-

M. This is in sharp contrast to
, €rican political culture, in which

Motion-charged enemy images are
Potent and seemingly necessary
Symbols.

Soviets are taught from a very
Young age to identify with working
People everywhere, and to draw a

Istinction between governments —
Which may be bad — and peoples.
d Ost of them genuinely believe,

€€p in their hearts, that peace,
ftiendship and cooperation between
Nations is the natural destiny of

mankind. Time and time again I
neve Seen the instantly warm, curi-
-Ous and friendly reaction that most

OVviets have for Americans.

Nae the two sides now grope to-
: ie da new dialogue, the inequalities
3 erent in this situation come out in

Me strange ways. Soviets, who

ave always been shown only the
Smiling face of the U.S. propaganda
Machine — the Voice of America,

Or instance — with its aura of con-
\ SUmer paradise, are seldom able to

the cold war may have created, the —

discern the razor-sharp ideological
knives behind it. In consequence,
they are generally unprepared to
play hardball, American-style, and
still communicate constructively.

One illustration of this occurred
recently when Ronald Reagan Jr.
the president’s son, came to the
Soviet Union to do a television
documentary for the American
Broadcasting Corporation. Now, al-
though I haven’t seen it myself, lam
told that the series ABC produced is
on the whole a positive improvement
over previous examples of the “life
in the USSR”’ genre. If that’s true,
they certainly deserve to be
congratulated.

Buy young Ronnie also displayed
the arrogant, self-righteous and in-
tolerant side of American journal-
ism. At one point, he demanded an
interview with an Afghan war vete-
ran. His Soviet hosts arranged this,
and brought a young, wheelchair-
bound former Soviet army helicop-
ter pilot to meet Reagan at the offices
of Ogonyok magazine in Moscow.

Reagan arrived an hour late for the
interview, and began aggressively
questioning the young vet, on-
camera. Had he taken part in, or
witnessed any Soviet atrocities

™~

answers

against Afghan civilians? The young
man answered no, but he had seen
barbarities committed by the Afghan
rebels, and offered some descrip-
tions of these.

Asked how he had received his
injuries, the veteran replied that he’d
been in a helicopter that was shot-
down by an American-made “*Sting-

_er’’ missile.

At the point, Reagan jumped up,
ordered the cameras switched off,
declared ‘‘this is all propaganda. No
one will believe this,’’ and stormed
out of the building.

Of the Soviet press, only
Ogonyok, in whose offices this in-
cident occurred, wrote a tiny
information item about it. Even so,
many Soviets felt that it was rude
and tasteless to have printed such
unfriendly things about the Ameri-
can president’s son at such an im-
portant moment in Soviet-American
relations.

Weare only left to ask, what might
be the reaction of the U.S. press and
public in the almost inconceivable
event of a Soviet journalist throwing
a similar tantrum while interviewing
an American, any American?

ll be irrevokably transformed .

= FW. ]

‘is an Alice-in-Wonderland quality about it for many:

Soviets are being asked to believe six impossible
things before breakfast.

On January 1, the new *‘Law on State Enterprise”’
will come into effect, and the decades-old structures
of the command economy will begin to disappear. The
whole of Soviet society is about to go into a slow
somersault; power, initiative and ideas will flow in
entirely new directions, and peoples’ lives will be
irrevocably transformed.

But last week attention was riveted on an even
more immediate miracle. Watching their leader,
Mikhail Gorbachev, outline the prospects for a broad
strategic accommodation with the United States to
NBC’s Tom Brokaw on their evening news program,
(Vremia), Soviets digested the hopeful possibility that
the long, numbing season of cold war may be finally
drawing to a close.

Few nations on this earth have suffered so terribly
from war; none yearn so intensely for peace as the
Soviet people do. It is not so well understood around
the world that the burden of the arms race has fallen
with disproportionate severity upon the Soviet Union
over the past four decades, exacting a heavy price in
economic, social and even political development.
Soviets understand more clearly than any of us the
inverse relationship between military budgets and the
quality of life.

One significant indicator of how far the changes
have already proceeded in the Soviet Union is that we
need no longer speculate or generalize about the
Soviet peoples’ feelings in these matters. The science
of sociology has come out of the closet with a
vengeance, and Soviet pollsters are busy measuring
attitudes to just about everything.

On November 20, a survey commissioned by the
Institute for Sociological Studies probed a
representative sample of Muscovites on their
opinions about the upcoming summit. Eighty per cent
reported that they were ‘‘greatly interested’ in what
would develop at the meeting. Only five percent said
they had ‘‘no interest’’ in it.

Of those evincing deep interest, 53 per cent said
they hoped for big results from the summit, 40 per
cent expected only ‘‘medium-level’’ results

>

Canadian publishers launch Gorbachev book

chet TAWA — Mikhail Gorba-
-V Snew book, Perestroika: New
W Inking for Our Country and the
Orld, was launched in Canada at
ame tom here given by Soviet
assador Alexei Rodionov.
Na brief ceremony at the Soviet
assy Dec. 2, copies in both
. sh and French were formally
3 Sented to the ambassador by
Presentatives of its two distribu-

a in Canada: Robert Reed of
.  pzHenry and Whiteside for the
thc Nglish edition, and Manon Raci-

St of Flammarion for the French.
€ed called the book ‘‘a unique
heap unity” for Canadians to
Still: from a world leader ““while
an a Office... Canadians can get
ing =e what the USSR is think-
n Stree 9 Cne straight from the
“tt Sets forth clearly, he said,
see Soviet approach to crucial
Toes international relations,
a, Uding East-West relations,
_ US control and disarmament.”’

|

)
)

The merit of Perestroika, said
Ambassador Rodionov “‘is that it
provides a lucid explanation of
and a telling insight into the pro-
found changes and broad
democratization now occurring in
all areas of public life in the
USSR.’’ He hoped the book
‘“‘would help Canadians better
understand the complex pro-
cesses going on in the USSR and
the world.”

The Russian word perestroika,
he continued, means [re-
construction, and its worth can be
seen by the positive, concrete re-
sults that are emerging. “‘One
very important aspect of pere-
stroika highlighted by this book,
Rodionov continued, ‘‘is the
mass activization of the human
factor in Soviet life .. . it also em-
phasizes that the realization of
our plans will only occur in condi-
tions of world peace.”

Recalling that the book makes
its appearance just before Mikhail

Gorbachev and Ronald Reagan
meet, Ambassador Rodionov said
he hoped that the sentiments in it
will be demonstrated at the sum-
mit, ‘‘“where we expect to see the
first agreement to eliminate a
whole class of nuclear weapons.”

Former Canadian agriculture
minister Eugene Whelan, who
accompanied Gorbachev on his
10-day 1983 tour of Canada, said
the book confirms the Soviet
leader’s overriding aim: to make
the world a better place to live in.
‘“‘What Mikhail Gorbachev is
doing now’’, Whelan said, “‘is
what we talked about in 1983; his
main desire is to create a better
place for his people in the Soviet
Union, and a better world, a
world of peaceful coexistence, for
everyone.

“T still believe what I told a
briefing at External Affairs after
his 1983 visit’’, Whelan added.
‘Tf I were running for re-election,
I told them then, I wouldn't want

to have Gorbachev as my
opponent.”

Liberal caucus leader Marcel
Prudhomme told the reception
that he ‘‘hoped every member of
the federal parliament would read
this important book ... As well as
being responsible for their own
constituency affairs, they are also
responsible for peace, a peace
based on mutual respect and co-
operation. This is what Gor-
bachev sets forward.”

The Liberal MP said that so far
peace has been based on ‘‘arms
and nuclear terror. The time has
come for us to do better.”’

Because we want to build
understanding and trust between
our two countries, Prudhomme
continued, “‘this is why we in
Canada welcome glasnost. But
the real impact of Perestroika,
provided that Canadians read it, is
that it will help, as Mikhail Gor-
bachev hopes, to make the world
a safer place.” — M.S.

PACIFIC TRIBUNE, DECEMBER 16, 1987 e 23

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