CHANGING THE GUARD

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP92B00478R000800130022-6
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: C
• Document Page Count: 4
• Document Creation Date: December 23, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 16, 2014
• Sequence Number: 22
• Publication Date: April 8, 1985
• Content Type: MEMO

25X1
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?
cAE Wsk..7 _
NrWSWEEK
25 March, 1985
CHANGING
THE GUAR
' After years of halting rule by feeble old
men. the Soviet Union suddenly has a lead-
er who looks like he belongs at the helm.
Mikhail Gorbachev, 54, is smart, touch
and relatively young?a good match for
Ronald Reagan. Until now, the Kremlin
has had no one who could match Reagan in
public. Gorbachev is the Politburo's an-
swer to the Great Communicator. He is as
hard as his predecessors, but unlike them,
he is smooth, charming and healthy
enough to do his job. The superpower com-
petition is a brand-new game?and Mos-
cow's man has a 20-year edge in age.
The first moves of both players were
reassuring. Reagan responded to Konstan-
tin Chernenko's death and Gorbachev's
ascent with a polite three-page letter invit-
ing the new Soviet leader to a summit in
Washington "at your earliest conven-
ience." Receiving the letter from Vice
President George Bush, Gorbachev didn't
accept the invitation, but in the course of a
long and businesslike discussion, he didn't
reject it, either. And his government did
! not allow the change of leadership to delay,
for even one day, the resumption of nucle-
ar-arms talks with the 'United States. They
began in Geneva right on schedule.
Gorbazhey created the impression of a
young man in a hum,. Less than four hours
after Chernenko's death was reported on
Soviet television, the usual mournful music
was interrupted by the announcement that
Gorbachev had been elected general secre-
tary of the Soviet Communist Party, the
. country's most powerful position. The next
day, poor Chernenko, 73, didn't even rate a
front-page portrait in Pravda; his succes-
sor's picture pushed his own onto page two.
Gorbachev's selection by the ruling Polit-
buro apparently had been arranged well in
1 advance. Once the transition was official,
Gorbachev quickly took charge, delivering
an ambitious policy address that promised
to get his lethargic country moving again.
With an eye on his own
place in history, Reagan is
beginning to think that he I
can and must deal with So-
viet leaders. "He doesn't .
like them, and he doesn't
trust them," says a top
counselor. "But over the
last four years, he's come to
understand that it's impor-
tant to have some sort of
relationship with them."
Now Reagan cannot count
on having things his own
way on the propaganda lev-
el. With some trepidation,
American analysts suspect
that Gorbachev soon will
launch a "peace offensive"
aimed at driving a wedge
between the United States
and its West European al-
lies. Already Reagan seems
to be conscious of the gen-
eration gap that exists be-
tween Gorbachev and himself. "It isn't
true," he joked in one gathering, "that I
don't trust anyone under 70."
The rise of Mikhail Gorbachev is more
than a change in personal style, but its
principal impact will be felt inside the Sovi-
et Union, rather than overseas. Gorbachev
represents a new generation of Soviet lead-
ers in all fields, from government to the
arts (page 34). But political power was not
seized by the young last week; it was con-
ferred by the old?and for good reason.
The Soviet Union faces an array of eco-
nomic and social problems, from declining
oil production to a drop in male life expect-
ancy. Now, after years of stagnation, the
survivors of the establishment created by
Leonid Brezhnev have handed some of
their power to a man they can trust: an
apparatchik like themselves. Gorbachev's
mandate is not to liberalize Soviet commu-
nism, but to make the old system perform
better?and to squeeze harder work out of
its people. "The Soviets are not looking for
a Kennedy-style democrat," says Krem-
linologist Dimitri Simes. "They are look-
inc for a ruthless, decisive leader."
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?
1
_
Patron= They seem to have foirrid-th-elf;
m-ah-TAeret study prepared for Reagan
by the CIA describes Gorbachev as a ca--
,reerist who earned his job the old-lash-'
rioned war: by paying court to powerful'
'men. His first important patron was hard-
; line ideologist Mikhail Suslov; then came ....
Yuri Andropov, the KGB chief turned
"reformer"; finally, Gorbachev made his
peace with An d ropov's former rival;Ch-ei:
nenko, and became his heir apparent:In-a'
sense, Gorbachev is a Teflon commissar;
failure doesn't seem to stick to him: During
I
his tenure as the head of Soviet agriculture;
harvests were so disastrous that the gov- !
ernment mimed issuing crop stilittic-trr
Even so, Gorbachev's career prospered.
"He's the most intelligent and the best-
trained leader the Soviet Union has had
I since Lenin," says Berkeley economist
John M. Letiche, an authority on the
Kremlin. Gorbachev also has an intelli-
gent and elegant wife named Raisa. He is
first and foremost a child of the party,
which he joined at the relatively tender age
of 21, just as Joseph Stalin was launching
his last purge. "He is a serious and cultivat-
ed man with a great deal of style," says
Peter Temple-Morris, Gorbachev's offi-
cial host during his visit to Britain last
. December. "Nevertheless, he is as tough as
------- -- ------- old boots?that's impor-
tant to remember."
i Tne transition from
Chernenko's leadership
i to Gorbachev's may ac-
tually have taken place
long ago?whenever the
younger man began to
sit in for his boss at
the Thursday meetings
of the ruling Politburo.
, Chernenko appeared on
television for the last
time in a brief, carefully
staged event on Feb. 28.
It seemed clear that he
was succumbing to em-
physema. According to
the Soviet government,
he died at 7:20 p.m. on
Sunday, March 10. The
process of burying one leader and elevat-
ing another went on with practiced
smoothness. The next day Gorbachev ad-
dressed the party's Central Committee,
endorsing the reforms begun by Andropov
and promising to work toward "speeding
up the country's social and economic
development."
ernenko's funeral had the air of a play
that had been staged once too often by a
cast that was no longer interested. "Hur-
ry up. comrades,- a policeman barked
through a megaphone as buses unloaded
the ordinary citizens who had been chosen
to pack Red Square. Giggling and chatting,
they trotted into position facing Lenin's
Mausoleum. The open casket was brought
1 into the square by soldiers. and Gorbachev
delivered a perfunctory eulogy. He aligned
himself with Andropov's legacy, empha-
sizing initiative and discipline. Only
at the last moment, when Chernenko's
widow, Anna. stroked her husband's hair
and tearfully kissed him goodbye, was
\
there any display of uncalculated sadness.
Soon Gorbachev was working his way
through the foreign dignitaries, courting
the West Europeans, upbraiding the lead-
ers of Japan and Pakistan, with whom his
country has longstanding differences, and
quietly mending fences with the Chinese.
Ronald Reagan had decided not to attend
the funeral almost as soon as he heard of
Chernenko's death, before dawn on Mon-
day. Later he explained that "there's an
awful lot on my plate right now [and] I
didn't see that anything could be
achieved." Bush represented the president
and was pleased by his own meeting with
Gorbachev. "We're not euphoric," he said.
"But the climate is such that we feel this is a
good time to move forward." After his own
return to Washington, Secretary of State
George Shultz described Gorbachev as "a
very capable, energetic person who ...
seems to be well informed, well prepared.
Whether it turns out that we can do busi-
ness," Shultz added, "is another matter."
_ _.
RUSSELL WATSON with ROBERT B.
CULLEN in Moscow. JOHN wALCOTT.
MARGARET GARRARD WARNER and
RICH THOMAS in WashinFlon. ANNE
UNDER WOOD in New York and bureau repons
* * * * * la li- ?
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STAT
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hi.?,, his ?
had ?korked for se,cral cm, ;o1-
11achey's first job was di iv mg a tiactoi In.
1950 he made a significant leap lou ward
by gaining entrance to Moscow state tint.
?eisilY Admission IN 11,11111.11I(INI II:11.1110
Nkiii. (unless a student IN C l:11-
culled. he needs family influence It enter.
The farm boy apparently got his boost
from a good work record and from local
party officials who had been impressed hy
the ambitious youth
(iorbz:chev 1,)ined the (11111111IIIIISI
1'1111Y In 1952. NN hilt: he was soli in school.
1ev yudo?ich. a fellow student w ho knew
-
Gorbaclie. iememheis him .IN
-gray.- Of ;IVCI:IgC. NIUdC111 %N 110 C11.10>ell
Slapping backs :11 much as hitting the
books. "Ile dtdni have a lot of 0111;1,1a'
ideas.- recalls Yukio% ieh. who left the So-
viet Union in 1977 and now teaehes at the
U.S. Army Russian Institute in West Ger-
many. "But he made an effort to be every-
body's buddy.- Go:II:tette% soon was de-
voting as much time to party activnies as
to his studies. After graduating with a law
degree in 1955. he decided on a career as a
party professional. Ile returned to Stavro-
pol. where he specialized in running col-
lective farms. In 1970. at age 39. he was
named first secretary of the regional party
organization.
I n 1978 Gorbachev made his second ma-
jor move: he went to Moscow as a
member of the Secretariat of the Central
Committee, a kind of inner cabinet that
runs the Soviet Union from day today. Ile
was apparently being pushed upward by
Sus by, who was something of a mentor to
him. Once in Moscow. Gorbachev report-
edly established an almost filial relation-
ship with an even more influential patron:
Andropov. The then KGB chief is believed
to have been behind the 1980 decision to
make Gorbachev a full member of the Po-
litburo at the remarkably young age of 49.
Between 1978 and 1984 Gorbachev was in
charge of the country's agriculture. 1)e-
spite a string of disastrous Soviet harvests,
which normally would have doomed the
future of the man in charge. (;orhachev?s
career flowered. After ..\ ndropo. became
General Secretary in 1982. it is believed
that he relied on (,orbachev as his closest
lieutenant.
Though Gorbachev was inmored to
be A ndropov's chosen heir. he faded to
make it to the top after the leaders death
iii February 195.1 Yet there was little
doubt who was second-in-command be-
hind Chet nenko. Gorbachev r;III the Sec-
retariat and brought loyalists into key
party jobs. Ills reported chairing of Polit-
buro meetings as early as last summer
would have made hint the de facto leader
of the Soviet Union. fits ascension last
week formally acknowledged what has
long been known in the K rentlin the bo.v
from Stavropol is a practiced pofiti,aan
mnlable skills It is now the v.orld
Win to learn about the substance behind
the style. By James Kelly. Repot ted
by Era. Amlitheatr of /Moscow
I l I l: I: I i a 410
Measure of the Man
STAT
Months ago when Mikhail (nil bache began to move more visibly around the
power circuit of the Soviet Union. U intelligence analysts started to feed
background on him into Ronald Reagan 's morning reading. There was an as-
sumption among the experts that something was bubbling up in the Kremlin's
gerontocracy. whose members were expiring with discouraging regularity. A (ter
67 years there were signs that the old group of Soviet leaders, steeped in the tradi-
tions of the revolution and shaped by the horrors of kVorld War II. was giving
way to a new generatton.
In the President's intelligence report. a thick black notebook with gold letter-
ing that is delivered to the Oval Onice at 9:30 a.m, every working day. single lines
about Gorbachev grew to paragraphs. and head shots became full-length photo-
graphs of a well-tailored, energetic man. Reagan took notice, knowing that
Konstantin Chernenko would be dead sooner than later. Gorbachevis good-hu-
mored outing in Britain last December with his fur-clad. stylish wife provided
plenty of new material. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher stored up a lot of im-
pressions from her 3Y2 hours of meet-
ings with Gorbachev. and she carried
them all across the Atlantic with her a
month ago and constructed for Rea-
gan the first flesh-and-blood portrait
of his new adversary. The thrust of
Thatcher's counsel was that Gorba-
chev. while still a Soviet and a
Communist, was fresh and intelligent.
a potentially major improvement over
being dim and dying. The Prime Min-
ister found something hopeful in the
man's eyes and manner. The 30 or so
people who run this world analyze one
another that way and then make deci
sions of life and death for us. Scary
but true.
When Reagan was handed a non_
at about 10 a.m. Monday saying that Gorbachev had been confirmed as Genera
Secretary, he knew more about this Soviet leader than he had about Andropov or
Chernenko. He had been told that,..,J1t,:,
fa he
pro. em o course is t 'alt ose in ? s o data tell almost nothing?a ut Jorb3chev
as leader of a surly, hostile superpower. How did he rise so fast? Why was he cho
sen'? What makes him special'? There is no sure way to measure a man's soul.
Gorbachev may be an admission of sorts by the Soviets that personality car
be as potent as armies. The superpowers are fighting a war of words, and the So-
viets may have concluded that they too need a great communicator. Whether
Gorbachev can lead is another matter. Personality is an outcropping of charac-
ter, but there is no true test of character at that level until it goes through the fire.
'It's for them to solve their problems.- an aide said Reagan had told his staff
after Gorbachev's elevation. -If the Soviets worry about us being aggressive. we
ought to he able to solve that one. Beyond that, we can only keep trying.- Rel?-
gan's first try was to send George Bush to the Chernenko funeral: then he shaped
the personal letter to Gorbachev that the Vice President would carry. The re-
sponses from Brezhnev. Andropov and Chernenko to such private entreaties had
read like the handiwork of a committee, and not a very skilled committee at that.
Reagan rather thinks he will get a personal. and perhaps mildly revealing. an-
swer this time. Prime Minister Thatcher did in correspondence following Gorba-
chev's visit to Britain.
Meantime. Bush, the professional mourner (six funerals of top foreign lead-
ers). was Reagan's eyes and ears when he gripped Gorbachev's hand in Moscow
last Wednesday afternoon. Funerals are robust ground for political intrigue.
Bush the former CIA head, hardly needed coaching. From the Brezhnev and
Andropov burials he returned with mental notes on eye contact. humor. intellec-
tual agility, confidence, vitality, tailoring. shirt collars, hair color. complexion
and hand size.
The short of it is that wc are starting a new chapter in superpower relations.
and the twists and turns that lie ahead are for the most part utterly unknown.
More than ever the reaction ()lone man to :11101 her will set the mood of this anx-
ious world. That chemistry is not fathomed yet even by the two men themselves.
Still scary, but still true.
A Thatcher welcome in 1984
2'
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