beat_
Academics react to Soviet’s death
(AP) — President Ronald
Reagan is making a major
diplomatic mistake by sending
Vice President George Bush to
Soviet leader Konstantin
Chernenko’s funeral instead of
personally attending, say two
University scholars.
“If we have any kind of hope
for accommodation and a
loosening of tension, it’s by
making some kind of gesture
toward Gorbachev,” said
Joseph Fiszman, a political
science professor specializing
in socialist governments.
“We should begin to court
him (Gorbachev) through
diplomatic channels,” added
Russian history professor Alan
Kimball. Reagan is the first
president in recent history not
to have routinely sent the Soviet
leadership diplomatic greetings
on major Soviet occasions, such
as the anniversary of the Rus
sian Revolution, he said.
The two said Monday that the
selection of Mikhail Gorbachev
to head the Communist Central
Committee doesn't signal any
major shifts in the Soviet power
structure.
However, Kimball added that
the speed with which Gor
bachev was chosen by the Polit
buro to succeed the late
Konstantin Chernenko was a
significant departure from the
way past general secretaries
have been chosen. The an
nouncement that Gorbachev
would succeed Chernenko came
within five hours of
Chernenko’s death.
“I have a feeling it was
predecided,” said Kimball,
who has a doctorate in Russian
history, and has been studying
Soviet affairs for the past 20
years. If a consensus among the
Politburo was reached before
Chernenko's death, Kimball
said it would represent a con
trast from the way Soviet
leaders have been chosen in the
past.
Gorbachev’s age — at 54, he
is the youngest member of the
Politburo — does not mean he
will approach his new post with
fresh ideas or with an eye
toward changing Soviet policy,
Kimball said.
“Gorvachev represents tradi
tion and that’s why he was
chosen,” he said. ”He’ll be
more like a Brezhnev.”
Unlike Grigory Romanov, the
other Politburo member believ
ed to have been a top contender
for the general secretary post,
Gorbachev represents a more
progressive and worldly view
toward leadership, Kimball
said. Romanov is considered
“the thug” among the top Polit
buro members for his close links
with the Soviet secret police,
the KGB and the Army, the pro
fessor added.
Gorbachev, who recently
completed a well-publicized
visit to England where he met
with Prime Minister Margaret
Thatcher, also has closer links
with the West and may have
more global sophistication than
Romanov, Kimball said.
“I think people will like Gor
bachev,” he said.
Kimball and Fiszman agreed
it will take three to five years
before Gorbachev establishes
his power within the Soviet
government.
The U.S.-Soviet arms talks
should continue largely un
changed by the shift in party
leadership, Fiszman added. The
Soviet leaders will continue to
have a “great fear and inferiori
ty complex over American
technology,” he predicted, and
pursue arms limitations as a
way to direct more attention,
and money, away from ar
maments and into the Soviet
economy.
NOMINATION FORM FOR 1985
FACULTY AWARDS FOR
DISTINGUISHED TEACHING
Nominations are being accepted for 1985 awards to UO faculty members for distinguished teaching. This year there
will be two Ersted awards and three Burlington-Northern awards made at the Spring Commencement exercise. Each
of the Ersted awards will be accompanied by a gift of $1,000 and each of the Burlington-Northern awards will be ac
companied by a gift of $2,000. Nominations may be submitted by students, faculty, staff, and alumni. You may use
the form below or send a letter of nomination to:
Joanne M. Carlson, Associate Provost, 103 Johnson Hall
Please send no later than March 15, 1985
ELIGIBILITY FOR AWARDS
Ersted Awards
Faculty members who are at relatively early stages in their teaching careers.
Burlington-Northern Awards
Faculty members who have held academic rank at the University for at least 7
years.
I nominate___
for one of the 1985 distinguished teaching awards.
The reasons for this nominations are as follows: (attach additional sheet, if necessary)
i
1
Signature of Nominator_
Address_Phone_
Please indicate your status: ( ) Faculty ( ) Student ( ) Staff ( ) Alum
Gorbachev to meet
with world leaders
MOSCOW (AP) — A “young and energetic” Mikhail
Gorbachev, in firm command of the Soviet Union, looked
back to mourn his predecessor Tuesday and ahead to his first
head-to-head summit talks with world powers.
Vice President George Bush, landing in the frigid Soviet
capital for Wednesday’s funeral honoring former President
Konstantin Chernenko, declared that he was bringing a
“message of peace” from President Ronald Reagan.
The United States "has no greater hope and no greater
goal” than improved relations with the Soviet Union, said
Bush.
In Washington, the White House said Reagan would con
sider meeting with the new Kremlin chief sometime in the
future if “it would be beneficial to the cause of world peace.”
Gorbachev's first planned talks, however, were with
France’s President Francois Mitterrand. A presidential
spokesman in Paris said Mitterrand, attending Chernenko's
funeral, would sit down with the new Soviet Communist Par
ty general secretary after the Red Square burial.
Meetings with Bush and others among the world leaders
streaming into Moscow remained uncertain.
Hundreds of thousands lined up in central Moscow
Tuesday to file past the flower-draped bier bearing the body
of Chernenko, who died Sunday at age 73 of lung, heart and
liver ailments.
Gorbachev, a 54-year-old lawyer and agricultural
specialist, was the youngest member of the 10-member ruling
Politburo. He was announced as the new Communist Party
chief within hours of Monday’s announcement of the death of
Chernenko, who had been both president and party leader.
Gorbachev can be expected to eventually take on the less
important presidential title as well.
It was a smooth and rapid transition from a period —
since the November 1982 death of Soviet leader Leonid
Brezhnev — that Western diplomats described as a time of
rule by an aging collective.
“It’s the right thing that they chose Gorbachev,” a young
bearded man told a reporter near a central railway station.
“He’s young and energetic. We are putting all our hopes in
him, as they say.”
House panel votes
for missile funding
WASHINGTON (AP) — A House appropriations subcommittee
:ired the first shot in the congressional battle over the MX missile
ruesday, by voting 7-4 to accept President Ronald Reagan's recom
mendation for spending $1.5 billion to produce another 21 of the
long-range nuclear weapons.
The panel, meeting as the arms control negotiations began in
Geneva, Switzerland, opened what is forecast as a close and bitter
aattle in both the House and Senate later this month.
A subcommittee member, Rep. Joseph McDade, R-Pa., said if
Congress voted to stop MX production now, “It would be
devastating to the purposes of arms control. . .The place to settle
this is at the talks in Geneva and not at the table in this committee
room.”
But Rep. Joseph Addabbo, D-N.Y., the subcommittee chair
man. said there are enough of the 10-warhead missiles already ap
proved by Congress to permit the United States to produce the 100
sought by Reagan — even if the arms negotiations go badly.
An Oregon Democrat, Rep. Les AuCoin of Forest Grove, was
one of four members casting 'no' votes.
The Senate is expected to vote on the missile about March 20,
vith the House following on March 25.
Tuesday’s vote was required under a congressional decision
nade last fall which in effect postponed the MX fight. No matter
row the subcommittee or the full appropriations committees in the
douse and Senate vote, the issue will be battled on the House and
senate floor.