THE MIDDLE EAST WAR, BREZHNEV'S POSITION, AND DETENTE.

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP85T00875R001100160076-6
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 10
• Document Creation Date: December 20, 2016
• Document Release Date: April 4, 2006
• Sequence Number: 76
• Publication Date: October 19, 1973
• Content Type: IM

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19 October .1.9 73
No. 2455/73
MEMORANDUM
SUBJECT: The Middle East War, Brezhnev's Position,
and Detente.
The outbreak of war in the Middle East poses
problems to the USSR so serious and immediate that
the Soviet leaders probably are taking their current
decisions in a fully collective fashion. Brezhnev
has not been known to harbor policy views on the
region different from those of his present colleagues,
and his propensity to locate and lead a consensus can
be expected to come into play in a crisis of this
kind. It is nevertheless of interest to consider
the state of the Soviet leadership on the eve of
the ?,var, particularly since the crisis bears heavily
on the durability of Soviet-US detente on which
Brezhnev has exercised a highly personal leadership.
This-memorandum analyzes how Brezhnev has been
faring in recent weeks on the issue of detente,
with attention to evidence on the reservations which
this policy has inspired in domestic politics. It
also considers, in a discussion on p. 8 the impli
cations for Soviet detente policy of various out-
comes of the war.
It was probably inevitable that Brezhnev should
have begun at about this time to encounter rene-.i~-rl.
difficulties in managing detente. Expectations of
economic benefits to the USSR from detente await
satisfaction. Thorny specific issues are succeed-
ing the initial creation of a general political
framework, and these issues require that a wider
collection of Soviet interest groups be educated
and involved in detente. His policy departs from
tradition in many areas--rapprochement with West
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Germany, an end to autarky, development of rela-
tions of trust with the main capitalist enemy, ex-
tensive negotiations on arms contro'., acceptance
of broader international contacts, to mention,a
few. It thus undoubtedly arouses different kinds
of misgivings and requiresreassurances to a number
of anxious or suspicious elements in the Soviet body
politic. The fearful will be quick to point to risks
and costs, and the skeptical to the absence of early
benefits. It can also be supposed, in the light of
Soviet political history, that some of his colleagues
will be jealous of his personal preeminence and rer.dy
to improve their position at his expense if policy
vulnerabilities develop.
Throughout the summer and early fall, a number
of indications have accumulated which point to such
difficulties in the aftermath of Brezhnev's triumphs
earlier this year. These indications include some
unevenness in Soviet media treatment of detente and
discipline themes, rumors and speculations among
Moscow diplomats and journalists and foreign Commu-
nist parties, and some floating of trial balloons,
followed by trimming, in recent Brezhnev speeches.
The evidence is clearest on the issue which cuts
closest to home--internal discipline--but it extends
to other areas as well.
Detente and Internal Discipline
Brezhnev has hoped to balance a detente foreign
policy with strict internal ideological vigilance
fitted with a safety-valve of selective, controlled
emigration. This policy has not been successful.
The wrap-up of a long campaign to close down the
dissidents' principal, 's'amizdat channel, The Chronicle
of Current Events, has been blighted by the intran-
sigence of Sakharov and Solzhenitsyn, whose stature
and impact at home and abroad is considerable.
Western nations have been encouraged to barter strong
CSCE action on freer movement of people and ideas as
the price for their ratification of principles of
non-use of force and inviolability of frontiers that
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are the Soviets' Priority CSCE goals. Thus CSCE, a
carefully nurtured Soviet detente initiative intended
to reap an easy and dramatic success, drags on in
controversy and may yet backfire. The US Congress
is tying MFN trade status for the USSR to relaxation
of Soviet emigration policy. Soviet officials have
complained that the USSR has already made generous
concessions on emigration, but that each new gesture
of good will only breeds stiffer demands.
The anxieties of Soviet officials concerned
about internal discipline are bound to increase as
they see signs that the USSR is being maneuvered
toward further compromises. Brezhnev himself un-
doubtedly fed these anxieties in a speech in Alma
Ata on 15 August. He touted an exchange of values
and information in relaxed conditions of interna??
tion contact as a good way to sell Soviet socialism.
This kind of rationale probably lay behind the ces-
sation of jamming of VOA, BBC and Deutsche Welle
broadcasts. If this move were intended to produce
reciprocal Western restraints, in terms of the
leashing of Radio Liberty, it failed. As matters
now stand, the USSR has made a concession without
what many would consider adequate compensation, and
Brezhnev is potentially vulnerable.
At a party symposium in June, the ideological
secretary in the Moscow party apparatus headed by
Brezhnev's Politburo colleague Grishin is reported
in a samizdat account to have warned that the most
dangerous extremist reaction to detente is "oppor-
tunist illusions." The secretary, V. N. Yagodkin,
described these extremists as maintaining that. So-
viet ideology is so strong it need not fear criticism.
Yagodkin, a notable ideological hardliner, is not
likely to have spoken at an official symposium on
the eve of the US summit in defiance of his boss,
Grishin. if correctly reported, Yagodkin's June
descripti.c:~: of "opportunist illusions" comes close
to fitting.Brezhnev's optimistic "victory through
contacts" stance at Alma Ata in August. Whatever
combination of conviction and foreign effect
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Brezhnev may have intended at Alma Ata, his formu-
lation received such sparse initial replay in Soviet
media as to suggest that it was greeted with con-
siderable reserve in influential party circles.
Brezhnev took a more qualified stand on freer
movement in his next speech, in Sofia on the eve of
resumption of CSCE talks, He made clear that detente
largely stops at the USSR's borders. He scornfully
dismissed the Western idea that because the USSR is
interested in political and economic cooperation it
can be pressured into concessions.
Pravda on 7 October began laying the groundwork
for possible defeat of MPN legislation with a state-
ment that denial of MFN is "by itself, in no way
capable of undermining Soviet-US trade." This tack
signalled Soviet unwillingness to compromise further
on trade-emigration issues, and minimized the im-
portance of MPN per se. By the end of September
there were signs that Brezhnev was getting the prop-
aganda apparatus to include some flavor of Alma Ata
in its traditional exhortations of vigilance. At the
same time, the central press began to express cautious
optimism that socialist education can be made capable
of immunizing the population against subversive West-
ern infleunces,
Other Detente Complaints
While the tugging and hauling is most visible
on the issue of discipline, other matters have evi-
dently come into contention.
--Private statements by Soviet officials, plus
questions by Soviet citizens at public lectures, re-
flect a widespread concern over the wisdom of inviting
Western firms to share in the exploitation and use of
Soviet natural resoux'es. The issue of "foreign
concessions" has been a touchy one in Soviet history,
and currently there is a clear concern that the West
may deplete resources, particularly energy, which the
USSR will need for itself.
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--The military remains worried about arms con-
trol agreements. Although the Ministry of Defense
has a major voice in these negotiations and is evi-
dently satisfied with the agreements to date, this
concern persists. It was evident in a Red'Star
commentary of 15 September on Brezhnev's speech at
Alma Ata on 15 August; military correspondent N.
Shumikhin bobtailed Brezhnev's statement on the need
"to supplement political detente with military detente,
end the arms race, and then take practical steps to
reduce armaments," closing the quotations at the phase
"military detente."
--The Chinese problem, in Soviet eyes, has gotten
worse, and Peking's attacks on superpower collusion and
Soviet abandonment of both socialist and third-world
causes have mounted. 25X1
reznnev has come
n er criticism from his colleagues on this score as
well. While he cannot in justice be blamed for the
impasse with the Chinese, it is not an implausible
speculation that Brezhnev has become vulnerable to
charges of neglecting Soviet leadership of the in-
ternational socialist movement by an undue concern
and preoccupation with building detente with the
West.
--It is likely that recent Soviet dealings with
West Germany have taken some of the bloom off that
rose. The Soviets seem to consider Bonn responsible
for much of the Western pressure on freer movement
at CSCE, and Brezhnev is reportedly annoyed with the
slow progress on economic arrangements. Recent West
German pressures on interpretation of the Berlin
Agreements stir ti's fears of Soviet detente skeptics
that Western partners may not be willing or able to
honor their treaties.
Brezhnev's most recent speech, in Tashkent on
24 September, contained an unusually defensive state-
ment on detente. In introducing the foreign policy
section, he referred to unnamed critics who dismiss
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detente's achievements as half measures. "The prin-
ciple of all or nothing is quite inapposite in in-
ternational politics," he asserted. "Whoever sits
idly by, negle:ting albeit a small but real step
ahead, impairs the cause of peace." In Soviet po-
litical parlance, this Is a remarkably clear acknowl-
edgement of domestic criticism, undisguised by being
put into the mouths of foreign enemies. It is strong
evidence that I3rezhnev has to contend with the charge
that detente, with is undoubted risks, has failed to
produce countervailing gains for the USSR.
A Cult of Personality?
The fanfare surrounding Brezhnev's receipt of
the Lenin Peace Prize, announced on 1 May and awarded
with considerable ceremony on 11 July, is another
potential danger to him. Since the spring, his po-
litical clients' speeches have carried flattery to-
ward personality cult proportions. Emphasis on his
personal role in foreign policy achievements has
worked in the same direction. Well publicized volumes
on his trips to Bonn and Washington have been pub-
lished, in addition to collections of his speeches
and articles. His US trip received, heavy and per-
sonalized TV coverage in the USSR. Brezhnev's four
speeches since July have been carried live on do-
mestic TV, and he has clearly enjoyed playing to his
audiences. In the last of these, in Tashkent, he
also indulged in Khrushchevian use of the first per-
son singular, digressions and one-upping local party
leaders.
Stalin's and Khrushchev's excesses are still
very much a part of the mental baggage of the present
Soviet leadership, and collective sensitivities in-
crease in direct relationship to gains in the party
chief's political power and personal immodesty.
Brezhnev, having made another advance in consolidating
his power at the last Central Committee Plenum in
April, may subsequently have been slightly over-
confident. Two days after his return from the US
and France, on 29 June, Pravda chose to review some
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party documents published months before and make a
rare reference to the work of the party and Central
Committee in liquidating the consequences of Stalin's
cult of personality and in adhering strictly to
Leninist norms of party life. The same'Pravda re-
view included an equally unusual reference to the
statement: in the resolution of the 23rd Party Con-
gress in 1966 that a "scientific approach, collec-
tiveness and business-like efficiency... must continue
to form the basis of all its [party]'activity."
Brezhnev's Considerable Assets
Brezhnev, however, has formidable assets to use
against any incipient challenges to his leadership
and detente policies. Perhaps the most important of
these remains his demonstrated sensitivity to the
permissible limits, at any given time, of political
muscle or policy innovation. He has continued
throughout the summer and fall to show that he knows
when and how much to trim.
By any political patronage standard, Brezhnev's
position has grown very strong indeed. In the critical
matter of the harvest, potentially a fatal vulnerability
for any Soviet leader, this year's good results promise
to work to his advantage. Also, if the party ideo-
logues are dragging their feet over detente, significant
parts of the foreign affairs establishment are de-
veloping vested interest in protecting and deepening
detente. The attitudes, statements, and activities
of numerous MFA and Western-oriented institute offi-
cials amply attest to their involvement in detente
equities. Tndeed, one probable reason for recent
high-level personnel movements in the Soviet foreign
affairs establishment is an attempt to ease the
transition of a basically conservative party and
government apparatus into the challenges and com-
plications of a detente era through a leavening of
the Moscow bureaucracy by MFA officials with exten-
sive overseas experience.
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'Bre'zhney and the' Mid'dl'e' East
in the first week of October, the USSR's reaction
to Middle East events was cautious. Its way of ini-
tially handling the crisis probably did not worsen
Brezhnev's position and may have improved it somewhat
in the short term. In the past he had avoided prom-
inent personal association with the subject and had
let his colleagues monopolize official visits to the
area. -While the fighting goes on, he and other Soviet
leaders have repeated their intention to adhere to
detente with the US and have eschewed the kind of pro-
paganda attacks on Washington characteristic of past
crises. But at the same time, Soviet political and
material support of the Arabs has given proof--to
Chinese critics and other possible doubters--that
eagerness for detente is not so great as to lead the
USSR to sacrifice its position in the Middle East.
This stance, and the early successes of the USSR's
clients, probably worked to Brezhnev's advantage.
So far so good. But the increasing level of So-
viet resupply, other activities in support of the Arabs,
and the delay'in Soviet peace initiatives have raised
questions about Soviet adherence to agreements with
the US. And the Arab-Israeli war poses further dangers
to detente under several possible outcomes.
Implications
A separate paper argues that the Soviets will see
their interests in the Middle East best served by an
early settlement which gives advantage to the Arab
side. Brezhnev's stake in detente reinforces his in-
terest in the early-settlement part of this formula,
but probably will not lead him to differ strongly with
his colleagues on Soviet tactics in the cr~'.sis. Both
his own judgment of Soviet interests in the region and
his unwillingness to make himself vulnerable on the is-
sue will work in this direction.
If and when a ceasefire is achieved, however,. he
will have a particular concern to protect and revive
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the detente line. His possibilities in this regard
will, of course, be determined by the outcome of the
conflict. A major Israeli victory would, in Soviet
eyes, so compr..jmise the line of cooperative relations
with the US that any resumption of detente initiatives
would have to be slowly and carefully managed; Brezhnev
could ill afford to show undue haste or eagerness. A
major Arab victory would have a similar effect, but on
the US side, Brezhnev could be expected, however, to
carry out a holding operation, keeping detente on view
as a stated Soviet objective and hoping; with.the pas--
sage of time, for further opportunities to develop it.
A relatively even-handed outcome, on the other
hand, would probably encourage Brezhnev to reaffirm
Soviet detente policy. He would be inclined to pre-
sent this outcome as 'a validation of detente, and so
long as the settlement held, this would be a powerful
domestic argument. He could persuasively claim that,
because of the work accomplished in two summits, the
USSR had been able both to stand up effectively for
its friends and to enlist Washington in a successful
effort to re-establish peace.'
The success of this effort would depend heavily
on US views--in an outside the Administration--of the
crisis, its resolution, and the Soviet role in it.
There is a good chance that Brezhnev, recognizing the
crucial nature of these US interpretations, would move
quickly to secure some new manifestation of the vitality
of US-Soviet detente. This,cduld be largely declara-
tory or cosmetic, but Brezhnev might feel that, in view
of the state of US feelings, some tangible Soviet step
of importance to the US was both necessary and justi-
fied to re-establish the momentum of the process. It
is impossible to predict what?step he might propose,
but in the circumstances .outlined, he probably would
have the domestic political strength to make a move of
some significance.
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