MOSCOW'S NUCLEAR CYNICISM

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000503830003-3
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 12, 2012
• Sequence Number: 3
• Publication Date: May 1, 1986
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/12 : CIA-RDP90-00965R000503830003-3
2
ARTICLE APPbWW
ON PAGE 4A d"7
NEW YORK TIMES
1 May 1986
FOREIGN AFFAIRS I Flora Lewis
Moscow's Nuclear .Cynicism
PARIS
M oscow has still released only a
minimum of information
about the nuclear disaster in
Chernobyl. Even the meager an-
nouncement was obviously provoked
only when Sweden discovered the fall-
out and protested the Soviet failure to
warn that radioactivity was coming
Its way.
So far, the Russians have not told
their own people about requesting
help from Sweden and West Germa-
ny. No pictures have been published.
Obviously there are a lot of rumors in
the country and evident official con-
cern that popular reaction will endan-
ger the ambitious nuclear energy pro-
gram.
But the Moscow radio, broadcast.
ing in English, went rather far in pro-
testing that more Americans demon-
strated after the Three Mile Island
accident, in which no one was injured,
than after recent Nevada weapons
tests. Trying to divert attention with
such propaganda is the ultimate in
cynicism.
So much for the pledge from Gen-
eral Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev to
be more open with his people and in-
form them about things that go
wrong. No wonder it was found neces.
sary to have Oleg Tumanov hold a
press conference denouncing the U.S.
usSian- language station Radio Lib-
erty as a front and claim some
American correspon en in Moscow
are its agents.
Mr. Tumanov had become the sta-
tion's acting editor-in-chief after de-
fecting to the West 20 years ago. Two
months ago he flisappeared from his
base in Munich,and he was very skit-
tish about explaining how he got back
to Moscow When he surfaced there
Internal news
blackout on
Chernobyl
Naturally Radio Liberty broadcasts
the news that Western correspondents
send from Moscow. That is its pur-
pose: to let Soviet citizens know what
the rest of us hear about what goes on
in their country and the world at large.
Doubtless a lot of them are tuning in
these days to find out a bit more about
Chernobyl and its consequences.
The full impact and the number of
people dead or doomed may never be
known. It is obviously more impor-
tant to the Soviet leadership to hide as
much as possible from its own people
than to give them and neighboring
countries adequate reports on the ex-
tent and nature of the risk.
There has to be sympathy for the
Russians. A terrible thing has hap-
pened and it is a reminder for the nu.
clear age that there are no barriers
and border guards in the atmosphere.
It is also a reminder, so. soon after
America's space-shuttle disaster,
that no country and no system is im-
mune to dreadful accident. We do
share the hazards of the times.
But there is also going to be a lot of
political fallout in Western Europe,
particularly on the left because anti-
nuclear protesters and militant envi-
ronmentalists tend to lean leftward.
There are strong anti-nuclear move-
ments in West Germany and in
Sweden, where a Government fell
over the. issue a few years ago.
Finland has not joined the other
Scandinavian countries in protest at
the lack of warning, not because the
Finns don't mind but because Finlan-
dization means having to take great
care not to irritate the Russians. Peo-
ple there must be feeling double in-
jury.
West Germany's Foreign Minister,
Hans-Dietrich Genscher, has called
on the Russians to shut down all nu-
clear reactors of the same type as the
one that evidently melted in Cherno-
byl until the cause of the accident and
needed design changes can be
learned. No doubt Moscow won't do
it, however; about two-thirds of the
Soviet plants are of this type.
Anger in Western Europe at the
lack of information and apparent in.
difference to safety standards has
provoked some of the harshest and
most fundamental criticism of the
Soviet Union for many years here.
French and West German papers
see the disaster as the result'of the
secretive, authoritarian system of
making decisions without involving
the people whose lives it rules, and
failing to allow open debate on nu-
clear issues. They point out that it
was the militaristic urge to disregard
civilian needs that led to negligence
in setting nuclear standards.
"This is just as much our problem
as the radioactive cloud over
Sweden," commented the Sud-
deutsche Zeitung. "We're all, in the
same boat and Moscow must ac-
count for this." This is true around
the world. The Russians keep point-
ing out that we have to. live with
them. They also have to live with us.
Their people should be told, via
Radio Liberty and all possible ways,
that Chernobyl is another reason we
don't like it. ^
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/12 : CIA-RDP90-00965R000503830003-3