Gromyko’s influence still strong

Press, 10 July 1985, Page 16

Gromyko’s influence still strong

By

JAMES RESTON

of the “New York Times”

The announcement that Andrei Andreyevich Gromyko had been named President of the U.S.S.R., a few days before his seventy-sixth birthday, came as a surprise to official Washington. He had been around the Soviet Foreign Office for so long that few people around here could imagine his leaving that centre of power for a ceremonial job; and maybe he has not.

Mr Gromyko became a member of the Communist Party in 1931, during the days of Stalin and Hitler. He was his country’s ambassador in Washington (1943-46), Soviet ambassador to the United Nations in New York (1946-48), ambassador to Britain in 1956, and Foreign Minister for the last 28 years. ,

Thus, as Foreign Secretary he served five leaders of his party, survived seven United States presidents and nine United States Secretaries of State, and remains not only as President of the Soviet Union but a senior member of its ruling Politburo. It is conceivable but not likely, that Mr Gromyko has been kicked upstairs where he will greet foreign visitors and no longer influence Soviet foreign policy. No doubt Mikhail Gorbachev will have different priorities and in due course will want to emerge on the world scene as the dominant foreign policy spokesman of his country. He has indicated as much by arranging to meet President Mitterrand of France in Paris in October and the United States President, Mr Reagan, the following month in Geneva. His immediate concern, however is the reform of the Soviet domes-

tic economy. He is no expert on foreign policy himself, and has chosen Eduard Shevardnadze, 57 years old, as Mr Gromyko’s successor at the Foreign Office, a man of his own generation who has even less experience in foreign policy than himself. In this situation, it would be surprising if Mr Gorbachev, after only four months in office, would be able to make any fundamental changes in Soviet foreign policy, even if he wanted to do so, without reference to Mr Gromyko, whose appointees still dominate the Soviet Foreign Office bureaucracy and Soviet embassies abroad.

Accordingly, upstairs or down, Mr Gromyko is likely to be heard in the Politburo with attention and respect for some time to come. The notion of his retiring into the presidency as an amiable greeter of foreign visitors is hard to imagine. In all his years in Washington, New York, and London, he seldom made a personal friend or a joke, and never departed from his arguments about what was right with the Soviet Union and wrong with everybody in the West. Maybe this is why he managed to survive for so long between Stalin and Mr Gorbachev.

He has too many memories, however some of them good and some not so good. He is old enough now to remember the carnage of the Two World Wars. He is one of the few remaining leaders in the world whose career has paralleled the entire atomic age; but he has other memories as well. Most of them are about his diplomatic battles with the United States in the past; and if he retains his authority, which seems likely

at least for a while, it’s not going to be easy to open up a serious discussion between the United States and the Soviet Union about the future. For he remembers every chapter, every verse and every quarrel of the past 40 years, all stored away in the attic of an old man’s mind. There is some evidence, not much but some, that Mr Gorbachev and Mr Reagan may want to begin concentrating on the future, rather than listening to some of their advisers who insist on fighting the battles of the past. The two leaders co-operated more than is generally realised in the release of some if not all of the hostages in Lebanon, leaning on Syria and Israel and even getting the help of the religious fanatics in Iran to avoid a military confrontation. It was not a pretty picture. The terrorists got what they wanted: the release of the Shi’ites from Israel and recognition of their grievances. The hostages, not forgetting the seven left behind, were released with a nudge and a wink, which was shameful only if you do not consider the alternative of sending in the Marines. The only thing that can be said about the episode is that it bought time, and the question now is whether Mr Reagan and Mr Gorbachev will use the time to think about the future or concentrate on the advice of others, like Mr Gromyko, who are stuck in the mud of the past. There are the problems of the control of nuclear weapons, trade and finance, and the hunger of the majority of the human race in the Third World, all of which are

likely to influence the security of the United States and the Soviet Union in the last years of the century. Fortunately, they have two things in common: the months of July and August, when the sun shines, even in Moscow.

Nothing has been solved, and everything is still at risk, but between now and the summit meeting at Geneva in November, maybe even Mr Gromyko will begin to think about the future instead of brooding along as usual about the past.