Trouble at Geneva

After two weeks of disagreement and fruitless debate, the disarmament talks at Geneva have bogged down. The conference cannot be considered a failure, but signs of the political maneuvering which have characterized past conferences are beginning to reappear.

The talks opened on a note of extreme optimism with the Soviets' blanket proposal to end all nuclear testing, immediately and forever. The simplicity and directness of the Russians' approach to the problems of disarmament has definite propaganda value, but, as U.S. diplomats were quick to point out, it ignores all the technicalities of enforcement. The U.S. counter-proposal asked for a suspension of nuclear testing on a year to year basis, with some kind of inspection plan to enforce the test ban. It was on this point that the talks stalled, and the old suspicions appeared on both sides.

Apparently, the Russians have conveniently chosen to ignore the results of last August's Geneva conference which produced East-West agreement on the technicalities of disarmament. At that meeting non-political Soviet experts agreed on the feasability of an inspection system with 180 nuclear-testing stations located throughout the world. But little has been said about that conference, if it has been mentioned at all.

Nevertheless, if any constructive agreement on disarmament is to come out of this present conference, the final plan will have to include provisions for inspection and enforcement of a test ban. Western diplomats must remain firm on this point, whatever its propaganda disadvantages, and wait for the Soviets to compromise their proposal to include more practical considerations.

The call to compromise, however, is not one-sided. So far the United States has offered no explanation for its insistence on a yearly ban rather than a long-term cessation of testing. Some members of the Administration's higher echelons who have never favored a ban on nuclear testing have added to that feeling their political distrust of any agreement whatsoever with the Russians. It would seem that they have been mildly successful in persuading the Administration to move at a halting pace in the negotiations.

If the West can remain united in its insistence on an inspection system, however, it can afford to compromise on its other demands, and accept a test ban for a five or ten year period. The prospect that Russia would agree to the compromise, while not particularly good, cannot be ruled out. After all, it was the Soviet Union which proposed at last year's meeting of the U.N. General Assembly that nuclear tests be stopped for two or three years.

With each side either testing nuclear weapons, or threatening to test them, a conference on disarmament borders on the ridiculous. Neither side is willing to forego the last word, or more important, the last test. In order to achieve constructive results, diplomats on both sides will have to make every possible attempt to remove the political and propaganda considerations from the negotiations.

The meeting at Geneva is no ordinary conference, and if it fails, its failure will be no ordinary one. Lack of agreement on so vital and important a problem as disarmament will leave little hope for the success of future East-West negotiations.