SOVIET UNION EASTERN EUROPE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP79T00865A000300310001-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 15
• Document Creation Date: December 20, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 17, 2006
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: February 13, 1975
• Content Type: NOTES

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Soviet Union
Eastern Europe
State Department review completed
February 13, 1975
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SOVIET UNION - EASTERN EUROPE
February 13, 1975
Soviet Spokesmen Again
Endorse Detente . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Leading Artist-Activist
To Emigrate . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Czechoslovakia and Romania Are
Tightening Their Foreign Trade System . . . . 5
Hungarian Party Congress . . . . . . . . . . . 7
New Post for Anatoliy Gromyko . . . . . . . . . 9
Belgrade Heats Up
Anti-Bulgarian Propaganda . . . . . . . . . . 10
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Soviet Spokesmen Again Endorse Detente
Several recent statements by influential Soviet
spokesmen are among the strongest endorsements of
US-Soviet detente since the November summit.
President Podgorny, in an.article appearing in
Izvestia on February 12, said that the USSR wants
to improve still further its relations with the US
and other Western nations. He stated that Moscow
is willing to take practical new steps to advance
military detente, as well as economic and political
cooperation.
On February 11, N. V. Mostovets, a key Central
Committee official who deals with US-Soviet relations,
spoke privately to an embassy officer in highly op-
timistic terms. He said the Soviet people were vir-
tually unanimous in supporting better relations with
the US and emphasized the urgent need to build on an
already good beginning.
Mostovets, fresh from a trip to the US, professed
to be encouraged by the vast improvement in US public
attitudes toward the USSR since his visit in 1963.
He noted that congressional action on "discriminatory"
trade legislation had provoked widespread criticism
in the US as well as abroad, and foresaw that as a
consequence Congress would eventually, in some un-
specified fashion, amend the trade act.
Mostovets predictably stressed that Brezhnev's
foreign policies had been collectively formulated at
the 24th Party Congress and continued to enjoy the
support of all the top leadership. He described
Brezhnev's recent absence from public view as a "nec-
essary rest," and predicted that Brezhnev would head
the Soviet delegation to a very successful summit
this summer.
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Mostovets said the avoidance of war is the main
task of our time, a theme which has appeared with
regularity in recent Soviet commentary on detente.
Amid recent bilateral friction over trade and emi-
gration policy and persistent mutual suspicions re-
garding motives in the Middle East, Soviet commen-
tators have increasingly cited efforts at strategic
arms limitation as the mainstay of detente.
Two major articles on SALT in this month's
journals of the USA Institute and the Institute for
World Economy and International Relations make the
same point. The authors, Trofimenko and Milsteyn--
leading strategic analysts in the USA Institute,
heap praise on the Vladivostok accords and are op-
timistic about the prospects for SALT II. The two
men credit the growing strength of the socialist
states with forcing the US to negotiate with the
Soviets on the basis of equality, but both antici-
pate progress in other areas of US-Soviet relations
as a result of success in arms limitation. F
February 13, 1975
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Leading Artist-Activist To Emigrate
Moscow's circle of unconventional artists is
about to lose through emigration one of its most
colorful, albeit not unqualifiedly admired, activ-
ists. Aleksandr Glezer, a Jew prominent in or-
ganizing and supporting the dissident artists'
efforts to chisel out a place for themselves in
the official Soviet art world, has finally received
permission to emigrate to Israel and plans to leave
the USSR on February 16.
Glezer's application for emigration is long
standing, but lately he has made no secret of his
confidence that by sufficiently irritating the
authorities they would want to get rid of him by
granting it. Meanwhile, he has been buying up un-
conventional art at low prices, using an unspeci-
fied "channel" to ship it out of the country, and
saying that he intends to establish a Soviet modern
art museum in London. None of this has endeared
him to his colleagues, who came to feel that he
was using them for his own purposes
Glezer has no intention, of course, of going
to Israel nor, it now appears, of settling in
London. He told the US embassy on Wednesday that
once he leaves the country he will apply for entry
to the US because he feels New York will be more
"receptive" than London to the establishment of a
gallery of modern Soviet art. If Glezer succeeds,
his gallery should be well-stocked from the start.
He said that he has been given permission to take
80 paintings with him, and that he had previously
sent almost 600 works out of the USSR by various
means.
Glezer's departure and subsequent activities
abroad could affect the morale of his Moscow col-
leagues, who are once again seeking to organize an
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officially sanctioned exhibit of -thew work
This turn of events may fuel
their suspicions that .the regime is not really un-
happy with Glezer's activities, which can again be
used to "prove" that status-seeking and monetary
gain play a greater role in the activities of diss'.:-
dent artists than does selfless devotion to the
cause of artistic freedom.
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Czechoslovakia and Romania Are Tightening
Their Foreign Trade Systems
Czechoslovakia and Romania are further tight-
ening their foreign trade systems in an attempt to
stem the tide of rising hard currency deficits by
increasing control over imports from the West.
Last month Prague introduced a customs tariff
to improve control over the semi-autonomous foreign,
trade organizations. The number of enterprises
with authority to conduct foreign trade has been
reduced, and further cuts are probably in store.
Prague has also ordered that hard currency
loaned to enterprises for the import of Western
machinery must be repaid in hard currency. This
would direct Czechoslovakia's imports toward in-
dustries with the greatest hard currency export
potential. The highest tariff rates and apparently
the most stringent loan policies will be imposed
on imports from West Germany. Prague believes that
Bonn already has too much commercial influence in
Czechoslovakia and that foreign trade officials
fall for the West German sales pitch without
shopping around.
In Romania, centralization of foreign trade
has been the pattern for about 18 months. Enter-
prises engaged in foreign trade have gradually
been subjected to stricter regulations, and foreign
trade organizations have been reduced from about
100 to 45. A customs tariff was implemented in
January 1974. Romanian officials are now trying
to persuade GATT members--including the US--that
the tariff will not restrict imports, but will
simply give Bucharest more control over foreign
trade enterprises.
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Despite these changes, both countries will
probably run large deficits again this year.
Czechoslovakia is a large importer of raw materials.,
and Romania's appetite for Western technology is
unabated.
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Hungarian Party Congress
Several changes in the top leadership will be
made at the Hungarian party Congress to be held
March 17-22, according to a well-placed Hungarian
journalist, but party leader Kadar definitely will
stay on.
Ferenc Varnai, a political editor of the party
daily, told a US diplomat that the personnel changes
have already been decided, but he did not divulge
any names. There has been much speculation that
Politburo members Gyorgy Aczel, Rezso Nyers, and
Lajos Feher will be removed from the leadership.
All three are advocates of Kadar's reforms and
suffered setbacks in the retrenchment at the party
plenum last March.
Varnai, whose politics appear to be on the
conservative side of the Hungarian spectrum, said
the congress will not decree any radical policy
shifts, but will continue some of the retrenchment
that has been under way for some time. He antici-
pated increases in the ideological content of media
and cultural activity and strengthening of the cen-
tral economic mechanism to "rectify" some of the
"distortions and abuses" of decentralization under
the economic reform. He said that industrial workers
will receive even more preferential economic treat-
ment so as to bring their incomes more in line with
those of farmers and the small private sector, which
have done well under the economic reform.
Kadar's position seems firm, and speculation
about his "retirement" has vanished since his tri-
umphal visit to the USSR last fall. At the same
time, the Hungarian leader appears intent on satis-
fying certain critics who think that economic and
cultural liberalism has gone too far. It seems
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doubtful, however, that Kadar wants-or will allow-?-
a prolonged period of retrenchment that would mean
a qualitative shift from the liberal policies that
have marked his regime.
Possible popular re-action to policy or per-
sonnel changes is a restraining factor that can be
used to argue for a go-slow policy. The regime is
clearly aware of public attitudes, and is going to
great lengths to reassure the populace. A recent
commentary in the party daily tried to convince
readers that increased ideological struggle is an
"inevitable" part of detente, but that this does
not mean an end to cooperation among all segments
of society (the "national alliance" policy). In
practice this has resulted in a gentle-handed
treatment of intellectuals, wide-spread use of non-
party technocrats, and favorable treatment for
agriculture.
February 13, 1975
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New Post for Anatoliy Gromyko
Anatoliy Gromyko, 42-year-old son of the Soviet
foreign minister, has arrived in East Berlin, where
he will serve as one of two deputies to Ambassador
Mikhail Yefremov. A long-time specialist in US
affairs, Gromyko had been the junior deputy chief
of mission in Washington for little more than a
year when he was reassigned in November 1974.
In East Berlin, as in Washington, it appears
that a special position at the embassy was created
for the younger Gromyko. During a reception in
West Berlin last month, Ivan Romanovskiy, a first
secretary at Gromyko's new post, weakly explained
to a US official that the embassy had always had
two.minister counselor slots, but only the senior
one had previously been filled. In a bantering
tone, Romanovskiy remarked that the arrival of
such a well-qualified US expert demonstrated the
importance that the Soviet Union attaches to its
relations with the United States in Berlin. When
asked whether Gromyko would be concerned with West
Berlin in his new assignment, however, Romanovskiy
implied that he would not.
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Belgrade Heats Up Anti-Bulgarian Propaganda
Belgrade has escalated its month-old press
campaign against Bulgarian treatment of the Mace-
donian question, and allegations that Sofia has
designs on Yugoslav territory are beginning to
appear.
Belgrade's authoritative Borba recently de-
nounced a recent speech by the daughter of Bul-
garian party boss Zhivkov, which, Borba claimed,
called the people of Bulgarian Macedonia "an in-
separable part of the Bulgarian people." Re-
gional dailies in Macedonia, Slovenia, and Croatia
quickly weighed in with more elaborate versions,
including the allegation that Sofia is whipping up
irredentist feeling in Bulgaria.
Milika Sundic, Radio Zagreb's well-informed
commentator, last week speculated that the Soviets
might be pushing "increased anti-Yugoslav propaganda"
in Bulgaria to press Belgrade on other issues. Sun-
dic's assertion may be intended to draw the Soviets
into the dispute. Belgrade has long wanted Moscow
to nudge Sofia into making concessions on the Mace-,
donian minority question.
The Bulgarians have been surprisingly quiet
about the polemic from Belgrade. The Bulgarian
party daily did cover the Zhivkova speech on Feb-
ruary 1 but there has been no campaign on the issue.
With Yugoslav charges escalating at their current
rate, however, Sofia will be hard pressed to keep
its own nationalists in check much longer.
February 13, 1975
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