Ex-defence chief predicts slow break-up of N.A.T.O.

Press, 25 November 1981, Page 8

Ex-defence chief predicts slow break-up of N.A.T.O.

NZPA-Reuter A former Unites States Defence Secretary, James Schlesinger, yesterday predicted increasing problems for the United States because of the decline of its military power and its heavy reliance on nuclear weapons. “The notion that we were going to match the Soviet Union, however illusionary it was at the outset, has now been overtaken by events,” he said. He foresaw a slow disintegration of the North At-

lantic „ Treaty Organisation and reported a spreading distrust of the strength of American will and of American wisdom. Europeans no longer believed in the United States as their, “all-powered protector.” Mr Schlesinger predicted that West European protests against nuclear weapons would be repeated in the United States five or six months from now. “The problem is that as the possibility of nuclear war became clearer in Europe, and deterrence was not something that one could use

as an incantation and, once having used the phrase, cease worrying about military problems, began to frighten the Europeans and much of this quite unjustly has been blamed on the United States. “We must accept the fact that now that these alarms have ben raised that ... deterrence may frighten those whom we seek to protect more than it deters those whom we wish to deter.” The American position had also worsened in the Middle East, he said. He called the

Reagan Administration’s bid to forge an anti-Soviet consensus in the area “foredoomed to failure” because it did not deal with the issue of the Palestinian Arabs. The United States could not sustain a balance of power with the Soviets unless it got greater commitments by its allies. He laid emphasis on the importance of strengthening the nonnuclear forces of the West, pointing to the many trained reservists in West Germany. But the money had to be spent to supply equipment for them.