Bargain Baseness

Rising in the midst of the warmest period in American-Soviet relations since the war, the icy implications of the Spitzbergen controversy tend to drive home some basic truths about the state of the peace. If optimists are deluded into believing that all is to be sweetness and light between Washington and the Kremlin they must rub their eyes hard in view of this recent Soviet demand. The logic behind the Russian demand seems to hint that something more than psychology, something more than sympathy, something more than mere patience must be part of the State Department outlook toward the Soviets.

Spitzbergen and Bear Islands, north of Norway, were deeded to that country by treaty in 1919, with the stipulation that the islands were to be demilitarized permanently. In the convention that signed the treaty were representatives of Japan, as well as 29 other nations. The Soviets currently feel that the signatures of the Japanese representatives invalidate the entire proceedings, thus paving the way for new disposition of claims for the island. Among these claims is the oft-repeated desire of the Russian government to share in the "defense" of the Spitzbergen Islands.

Remorse over the unilateral quality of American policy in the Pacific must not be allowed to cloud the full dangers of this claim. On the surface, the existence of this Russian base within 15 hours flying time of the American industrial heart is inimitable to American security. Soviet apologists will have difficulty finding justification in American demands anywhere. But the full measure of the gravity of this claim lies in the frame of mind that gives the Soviets license to crease treaty obligations at will, or under the flimsiest moral case since the phony Polish invasion of Germany in 1939. Under the Russian logic, the Treaty of Montreux and other of the accords reached following the last war, would be scratched from the books. And the fate of the Dardanelles and the Dodecanese Islands would be transferred from the conference tables of the original signatories to bi-lateral agreements between the Greeks and the Russians, or the Turks and the Russians. If the presence of Japan at Montreux relegates this treaty to the scrap-heap, Europe can look to a new wave of forced agreements between unequal bargaining units that would spell death to the U.N. system and smack too strongly of the pilgrimages of European statesmen to Berchtesgaden.

Perhaps the Russians do not expect a revision of the status of Spitzbergen? Perhaps this new threat is to set the world twitching while other problems are influenced by pressures developed in this new threat? If this is the Russian tack, and many feel it is, the answer is much the same. For bargain-basement diplomacy signifies a mistrust of motive, an unwillingness to place confidence in a structure of good will and fill in the details according to principles agreed upon during the war.

If the Russians mean to use the old-fashioned "grab" as a technique, then the United States must substitute wariness for any form of apriori sympathy. If the Soviets mean what they say about Spitzbergen, the only alternative for this country is staunch opposition. If the move is the demand for thirty where but fifteen is expected, America is left with the same lone path. The tragedy lies in the elimination of the other alternative--sympathy with Russian means based on confidence in Russian aims.