79-12-A2
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Thank You, Chairman Brezhnev[edit]
Transcript[edit]In the summer issue of Strategic Review, the quarterly publication of the respected United States Strategic institute, Walter Hahn suggests that Soviet chief Leonid Brezhnev has profoundly affected the debate over SALT II here in the United States. He did so when he stood before President Carter and assembled diplomats at the Vienna summit in June and declared that Senate amendments to the treaty would have--"grave and even dangerous consequences for our relations and for the situation of the world as a whole." This statement, along with additional warnings delivered by Soviet foreign affairs minister Andrei Gromyko, awakened many Senators and other thoughtful participants in the SALT dialogues to the fact that the Soviet leadership feels confident enough to dictate the way we should go about formulating foreign policy. Hahn explains--"That incident in Vienna put a certain floodlight on the whole dramatic production called SALT. The numbers, in the sophisticated and deadly game of modern strategy, weaponry and survival, are terribly important. But the real issue lies beneath and beyond those numbers." In Hahn's view, the real issue--and the ultimate benefit of the SALT II debate-- is that it is providing a forum for America to finally come to grips with its "Vietnam hangover." Among supporters and opponents of the treaty alike, SALT II is triggering a time of reflection about the role of the United States in a troubled world since our exit from Vietnam. Thus, Senate opponents (and those who are undecided) are not responding so much to the technical "war of numbers." As Hahn puts it--"they are responding more meaningfully to a pronounced popular uneasiness ... about what SALT II symbolizes and presages for America's role and fate in a world in which the shadow of the adversary's power is growing ever more conspicuous." By the same token, a liberal senator such as George McGovern who, political logic suggests, should be one of SALT's strongest supporters, is examining the treaty in the wider context of his overall foreign policy beliefs. He may yet vote against SALT II. Most notably, the imminent signing of SALT II in Vienna prompted Senator Henry Jackson, a loyal Democrat, to break dramatically with a President and foreign policy team of his own party. In a speech delivered in June, Senator Jackson used the occasion of SALT II to weave together the events, policies, actions and reactions of American foreign policy since "détente" began in 1972. The pattern which emerges Jackson claims, is a policy of "appeasement" towards the Soviet Union. So Hahn believes that a word of thanks to Chairman Brezhnev is in order. Whether the SALT II treaty passes or fails, his dictum to the United States Senate--delivered with the arrogant confidence of one who anticipates nothing but blind obedience-- helped expand what might have been a debate over numbers into a comprehensive nationwide re-evaluation of America's role in world events in the 1980's. This is Ronald Reagan. Thanks for listening. |
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