TEST-BAN TALKS IN MOSCOW AGREED

Press, Volume CII, Issue 30155, 12 June 1963, Page 15

TEST-BAN TALKS IN MOSCOW AGREED

Voluntary Moratorium On U.S. Tests In Air

(N.Z. Press Association—Copyright)

NEW YORK, June 11.

President Kennedy’s announcement of new nuclear test-ban talks with Britain and the Soviet Union and a voluntary United States moratorium on atmospheric testing met a mixed reception from politicians and the press. Mr Kennedy made his announcement yesterday at Washington University 7. The “New York Times” today said the “big new fact” about the announcement of the Moscow three-Power talks was that the Soviet Prime Minister (Mr Khrushchev) had agreed to hold them.

The newspaper sai tant plea in the speei request that the Unit our attitude towards t The' newspaper said that the need for better American - Soviet relations had concerned the President for some time. He had long planned to make a public appeal on the subject and the agreement by Moscow for resumed nuclear test ban talks had provided him with the opportunity. “No magic wand was waved yesterday,” the “New York Times” warned in an editorial. “This is not world peace. It is a glimmer of hope, a gleam of light on everybody's horizon—except perhaps for the Communist Chinese, who do not appear to be looking these days for the light of" peace ”

It said that the President's plea for new understanding came at a vital time when' the East-West talks were approaching and shortly before the Soviet and Chinese leaders were due to meet in

id that the most imporch was the President’s ted States “re-examine he Soviet Union.” an effort to patch up rifts in the Communist camp. The Washington "Post” said today that the United States as well as the Soviet Union would have to make concessions if President Kennedy’s latest “end the cold war” appeal was to succeed It was vital for the Administration to show a strong American desire for peaceful means of solving international problems in spite of the “meagre responses” of the Communists to earlier appeals. "There was not a belligerent word in the speech . . the “Post” said It welcomed the President's decision to open high-level talks in Moscow on a nuclear test-pan treaty and said the announcement that the United States did not propose to conduct atmospheric tests as long as other states did not do so was a substantial contribution to his conciliatory mood “It is important for the

American people to realise that if this strategy of peace is to be successful, it will have to be followed by other concessions on the part of the United States as well as on the part of the Soviet Union,” it said. The New York "Herald Tribune” said the outlook for a nuclear lest ban treaty remains dark. “At this point the United States and Britain would settle even for an un-

policed agreement with the Russians outlawing the tests in the atmosphere, underwater and in outer space, but permitting underground tests to continue," it said. Dean Favours Talks

The former chief United States nuclear test-ban negotiator. Mr Arthur Dean, said he was “100 per cent.” in favour of the planned Moscow test-ban talks but declined to offer a prediction on their outcome, the Associated Press reported. “I am 100 per cent. in sympathy with the President’s move for such talks with British. American and Soviet negotiators, but I would not want to term the talks a giant step forward," he said. “When you are dealing with the Soviets you never really know if you are inching forward or inching backward.” Last December, Mr Dean resigned from the chairmanship of the-United States test ban committee and the leadership of the United States delegation to the 18nation disarmament conference to resume private law practice.

Congressional Democratic leaders endorsed President Kennedy's announcement, while Republican critics assailed it as a “soft line” "and “dreadful mistake,” United Press International reported

The Senate Democratic leader, Senator Mike Mansfield. said the moves constituted a “step in the right direction,” made at the right time. The Senate Republican leader, Senator Everett Dirksen, questioned the wis-

dom of the moratorium and the scheduled talks.

A leading Right-wing Republican, Senator Barry Goldwater, attacked the decisions as a “dreadful mistake” and told the Senate he thought Mr Kennedy was wrong.

Senator Thomas J. Dodd, a Democrat and co-author of a Senate resolution against nuclear tests in the atmosphere, hailed the President’s action as "a good thing.” The Democrat chairman of the Senate Disarmament Sub - committee, Senator Hubert Humphrey, said: “This is the President’s most important statement on world peace since his historic ‘peace race’ address to the United Nations” in September, 1961.

A Republican member of the Joint Congressional Atomic Energy Committee, Mr Craig Hosmer, a Republican spokesman on nuclear test ban policy, said the announcements revealed a “soft policy.” “Going hat in hand to Moscow to beg for a test ban treaty will prove fruitless,” Mr Hosmer said. “The entire history of negotiation with the Communists shows that nothing is accomplished by soft positions.”

A report of President Kennedy's speech appears on page 17.