U.S. EXPELLING 55 SOVIET DIPLOMATS AS CLASH ESCALATES

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00806R000201100015-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 3
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 6, 2010
• Sequence Number: 15
• Publication Date: October 22, 1986
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

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-" A. "?'EARED
IRA I!
WASHINGTON POST
22 October 1986
U.S. Expelling 55
Soviet Diplomats
As Clash Escalates
By John M. Goshko
Wa,hHigton Post Stall Writer
The Reagan administration, dra-
matically raising the stakes in its
clash with Moscow over diplomatic
expulsions, yesterday ordered 55
Soviet diplomats-the largest num-
ber ever expelled from the United
States-to leave the country by
Nov. 1.
Five of the Soviets were declared
persona non grata in direct re-
sponse to the expulsion Sunday of
five American diplomats from the
Soviet Union. In addition, the Unit-
ed States ordered 50 more Soviets
out of the United States to reduce
the personnel at the Soviet Embas-
sy here and the Soviet consulate in
San Francisco to the same number
of Americans stationed at the U.S.
Embassy in Moscow and consulate
in Leningrad.
Expulsion of the 55 marked the
third roundin an escalating contest
that began wi a U.S. campaign to
cut back the size of the Soviets'
U.N. Mission on the grounds th-aFTI
is a haven for s ies. sin the dip,
lomatic expression for espionage,
State Department seokesmap
Cmales E.Rec man said the 55
were engaged "in activities incom-
patible - wi
tus."
However, while Redman said the
Soviets had been warned that the
United States would take such ac-
tion if Moscow retaliated for the
expulsion of 25 members of its U.N.
Mission, administration officials
said the State Department had
wanted a less dramatic response
than the one taken yesterday to
minimize chances of undermining
superpower relations.
lh a brief initial reaction, the So-
viet news agency Tass condemned
the latest expulsions as "another
step aimed at worsening Soviet-
American relations." Earlier yester-
day, before the U.S. action was an-
STAT
STAT
nounced, Soviet Foreign Ministry The administration took the po-
spokesman Gennadi Gerasimov said sition in public remarks that its
in Moscow "that if the United move should not affect the larger
States insists on a continuation of U.S.-Soviet relationship. Reagan, in
the game according to the tit-for-tat welcoming Kohl yesterday, said
principle, all this may go on to in there was "ample reason for opti-
finity." . mism" that Washington and Mos-
President- Reagan, at a White cow will reach a nuclear arms re-
House dinner last night honoring duction agreement.
West German Chancellor Helmut The U.S. action came 10 days
Kohl, said of the ousted Soviet en_ after the collapse of the Iceland
voys, "We feel that they were con- summit between Reagan and Soviet
iiected with intelligence operations, leader Mikhail Gorbachev set back
the KGB and so forth. Besides, they hopes of improving U.S.-Soviet re-
had more than we did and we just lations. It thus raised immediate
leveled it off." questions about whether the Sovi-
Administration sources said the ets will feel compelled to respond in
expulsion decision was a victory for ways that could further worsen su-
CIA Director William J. Casey and perpower relations and make it
Attorney General Edwin Meese III. more difficult to negotiate arms
Both had urged the White House on control agreements '
Monday to make a strong response In the aftermath of the Iceland
to the Soviet expulsion of five meeting, Gorbachev had. appeared
A
mericans.
The intelligence and law-enforce-
ment communities earlier this year
began a concerted effort to curb
Soviet espionage activities in the
United States. This effort resulted,
in part, in the arrest of Soviet spy
Gennadi Zakharov in New York last
August, which triggered the Soviet
detention of American reporter
Nicholas Daniloff.
The intelligence and law-enforce-
ment agencies wanted to try
Zakharov to make a point to the
Soviets and to the American people
about curbing espionage, the
sources said, but the administration
decided to allow Zakharov to plead
no contest to espionage charges as
part of a swap for Daniloff. Yester.
day's announcement, one official
es
re for
said, came about because the White the United States to refrain from
House promised Meese and Casey the kind of action that would re-
"the next time this happened, we'd quire a further Soviet response.
do it right." Redman said yesterday that de-
A Justice Department official said spite the latest expulsions the Unit-
Meese was a "strong advocate of ed States "remains committed to
the steps that were finally taken." pursuing the dialogue from the
This official said the State Depart- Reykjavik meeting in all areas of
ment was "foot-dragging" but "it got our relationship."
turned around in the meeting at the But, he added, "at the same time,
White House." as you can see by this action, we
At He White House meeting will certainly do everything we can
Monday, Reagan met with Secre- to prevent this country from being
tary of State George P. Shultz, Vice used as a haven for espionage."
President Bush, Meese, Casey, and
White House chief of staff Donald
T. Regan.
to be making a number of concilia-
tory gestures toward Washington.
He signaled possible greater flex-
ibility on arms control talks and per-
mitted the departure from the So-
viet Union of a prominent Jewish
dissident and a Jewish woman seek-
ing to donate bone marrow to a crit-
ically ill brother in Israel.
Even the order Sunday expelling
the five Americans was regarded in
diplomatic circles as a minimal re-
sponse since Moscow had an-
nounced publicly that it would re-
taliate if the United States went
through with the expulsion of the
25 Soviets at the United Nations.
Gerasimov, who concluded his re-
marks by saying "it is best to draw a
line under this affair," appeared to
be signaling Moscow's d
i
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 Sanitized Copy Approved for Release
_Y`?-~++J, UC 3alu, Cne u.s, ac-.
lion will shrink the previous author.
ization that permitted the Soviets to
keep 320 diplomats in this country,
exclusive of their U.N. missions, to
a new lower total of 251-the same
number that the United States has
in the Soviet Union. The Soviets
now will be allowed a staff of 225 at
their embassy here and 26 at their
San Francisco consulate.
Although the United States spe-
cifically told the Soviets which dip-
lomats must leave, Redman publicly
identified only the five who were
declared persona non grata in re-
sponse to the expulsion of the five
Americans. He gave their names as
Vasily Fedotov, Oleg Kikhachev and
Aleksandr Metelkin, all counselors
at the embassy here; Nikolay
Kokovin, an attache at the embassy,
and Lev Zaytsev, a consul in San
Francisco.
A White House official said that
last month, when the United States
and the Soviet Union were arguing
about the expulsion of the 25 So-
viets at the United Nations, the So-
viets were told explicitly that Wash-
ington considered the Soviet pres-
ence at the United Nations as sep-
arate from diplomats directly ac-
credited to the governments. As a
result, the official said, the Soviets
were warned that if they retaliated
against American diplomats in Mos-
cow, the administration would apply
the parity principle called for in leg-
islation passed by Congress last
year.
Redman also said that "the So-
viets were aware at the time of that
action at the U.N., that if they took
action in retaliation that we would
then be moving to establish parity
at the levels I have described." But,
while he repeated several times
that the Soviets had been warned,
he refused to say directly whether
the United States had intended to
invoke a policy of full parity or a
partial movement in that direction.
Other State Department officials,
while affirming their understanding
that the Soviets had been given a
specific warning about the conse-
gdences of expelling any Ameri-
cans, said that the department had
advocated less stringent retaliatory
measures.
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They said that while the depart.
ment supports the idea of parity in
the U.S. and Soviet diplomatic rep-
resentation, senior State Depart-
ment officials believed that this goal
should have been implemented in a
phased manner in the interest of
ending the round of expulsions be-
fore it got out of control.
In addition, these officials said,
the department is in the process of
trying to improve security at the
embassy in Moscow by replacing
Soviet employes who perform cler-
ical and maintenance work with
nondiplomat Americans. The offi-
cials said the department expected
it would take about 1'/x years to
implement that policy in a signifi-
cant way and is fearful that the
round of expulsions will cause major
setbacks in the program.
A White House official, familiar
with the Monday meeting where
the expulsion order was decided on,
said it was "decided that the only
way to do business was to follow
through ... to be true to our
word." A State Department official
added that "some tradeoffs were
made that enabled us to join in the
decision," but he declined to say
what the tradeoffs were.
Staff writers David Hoffman,
Howard Kurtz and Donnie
Radcliffe contributed to this report.
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THE EXPULSION GAME
Expulsions by the United States and the Soviet Union of each
other's citizens in the last five years, 'and the allegations on which
they were based, according to "Facts on File":
^ Feb. 4, 1982: The United States expels Maj. Gen. Vasily Chitov,
senior military officer at the Soviet Embassy here, for "activities
inconsistent with diplomatic status.".
^ Aug. 2, 1982: The Soviet Union announces the expulsion of
Newsweek correspondent Andrew Nagorski for "impermissible jour-
nalistic methods." The United States retaliates Aug. 5, saying it will
not allow Washington-based Izvestia correspondent Melor Sturua to
return here.
^ March 10, 1983: The Soviets order Richard Osborne, first sec-
retary in the U.S. Embassy's economic section, expelled for espi-
onage.
^ April 21, 1983: The United States expels Aleksandr Mikheyev
and Oleg Konstantinov, members of the Soviet U.N. Mission, and
Lt. Col. Yevgeny Barmyantsev, a military intelligence officer, for
espionage activities.
^ June 4, 1983: The Soviet Union announces the expulsion of
Louis Thomas, an electronics expert in the U.S. Embassy's security
division, for espionage activities.
^ August 1983: Soviet assistant attache Anatoly Skripko is ex-
pelled Aug.. 17 for purchasing classified documents. Assistant air
attache Yuri Leonov is expelled Aug. 19 for possessing classified
documents.
^ Sept. 12, 1983: The Soviets expel Lon David Augustenborg, a
U.S. vice consul in Leningrad, and his wife, Denise, for receiving
secret Soviet documents.
^ May 16, 1984: Robert Cullen, Moscow bureau chief of News.
week, leaves the Soviet Union after apparently being ordered out of
the country by officials of the Foreign Ministry.
^ March 7, 1986: The United States orders the Soviet Union to
reduce staff members of the Soviet, Ukrainian and Byelorussian
missions to the United Nations to a total of 170 by April 1, 1988.
^ March 14, 1986: The Soviets expel Michael Sellers, second
secretary in the political section of the U.S. Embassy in Moscow,
accusing him of spying.
? May 14, 1986: The Soviets announce the expulsion of Erik
Sites, an aide to the U.S. military attache in Moscow, for spying.
^ June 20, 1986: The United States expels Col. Vladimir Ismailov,
a military attache at the Soviet Embassy here, for attempting to
steal U.S. military secrets.
^ Aug. 23, 1986: Gennadi Zakharov, a Soviet employe of the U.N.
Secretariat, is arrested by the FBI while attempting to buy classi-
fied material. After a court hearing he departs for Moscow Sept.
30.
^ Aug. 30, 1986: U.S. News & World Report correspondent Nich-
olas Daniloff is arrested in Moscow for receiving documents con-
taining secret material. He leaves Moscow for West Germany Sept.
29 and returns here the following day.
^ Oct. 19, 1986: The Soviets order the expulsion of five American
diplomats, less than a week after the withdrawal of 25 Soviet U.N.
envoys from the United States in line with a March 7 order.
? Oct. 21, 1986: The United States expels 55 Soviets, the largest
mass expulsion in U.S. history.
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