Behind the Headlines U.S. Trade and Soviet Emigration

A showdown is rapidly shaping upon whether Soviet-American trade will include Soviet adherence to freedom of emigration. In a three-faceted battle, Soviet propagandists are lobbying on Capitol Hill and offering inducements across the country to U.S. business and industrial leaders.

The Nixon Administration seeking ratification of the U.S.-Soviet bilateral trade agreement, is encouraging Soviet propagandists but may be seeking a compromise Moscow where U.S. Secretary of the Treasury George P. Shultz, head of the Administration’s economic affairs, is visiting for three days this week.

The third element is Congress. There the leaders for legislation linking free emigration with the East-West Trade Act are insisting that the Soviet government live up to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

The issue is this: Majorities in both Houses of Congress want both elimination of the Soviet education tax and Soviet guarantees of continuing free emigration before granting the Soviet Union most favored nation treatment. The Soviet government holds emigration to be its business only. The Administration would like a compromise which would have the Soviets eliminate or reduce the education head tax but not necessarily with guarantees.

QUIET DIPLOMACY: A DISASTER FOR SOVIET JEWS

“Talk of compromise is only designed to promote compromise,” the Jewish Telegraphic Agency was told by an aide to Sen. Henry M. Jackson (D.Wash.), chief sponsor of the Senate legislation. Jackson, he said, is “reaffirming his determination to stand on principle–it’s an American issue not a Jewish issue.”

Rep. Charles A. Vanik (D.Ohio), who with Rep. Wilbur Mills (D. Ark.) introduced the legislation in the House, observed that “the last two periods of quiet diplomacy have meant disaster for Soviet Jewry.” He was referring to the President’s summit conference in Moscow last May and the visit to the Kremlin last Aug. by his foreign affairs advisor Dr. Henry A. Kissinger. “If that’s how quiet diplomacy works,” Vanik declared, “who needs it?”

The question is, he added, “what guarantee is there it will be successful and continuing?” “Quiet diplomacy” is the phrase used by President Nixon last Oct. In New York to Jewish supporters of his re-election campaign as the way to meet the emigration issue. It was after he had made this statement that the Soviet government published its education tax law.

The President’s position was reaffirmed only yesterday by Secretary of State William P. Rogers in a nationwide television broadcast. Appearing on CBS “Face the Nation,” Rogers said that the Soviet Union regards the exit fees as an internal matter “and we have to deal with the situation as it exists.”

Nevertheless, the Administration plainly urges business to fight the J-M-V amendment. William Casey, Undersecretary of State for Economic Affairs and Peter W. Flanigan a top Presidential aide, both publicly aroused fears of a U.S. trade setback if Congress adopted the legislation.

Soviet lobbying reached a sort of climax today when Soviet officials met with some major opponents of the Jackson-Mills-Vanik proposal for lunch at the Capitol Hill Club. The Russians asked for the meeting and E.D. Kenna, president of the National Association of Manufacturers, issued invitations by telegram to key Congressmen. Only opponents of the J-M-V amendment reportedly accepted. A curious element in this gathering is that some of the Administration’s bitterest opponents on virtually every issue for years favor the Nixon-Rogers approach on this particular issue.

IS DETENTE A ONE-WAY STREET?

After the NAM-sponsored trade conference two weeks ago in Washington which was attended by 60 Soviet officials, Soviet specialists fanned out coast to coast. Rubbing shoulders with American capitalists they hinted at big profits ahead for Americans if the trade agreement signed in Oct. is legislated and blaming Jews for delaying a U.S. trade boom.

Few if any of the J-M-V amendment backers oppose U.S.-Soviet detente. On the contrary, many have led in the fight for increased East-West trade and better relations in general. But the Soviet propagandists made it appear that those who want to relax emigration restrictions are enemies both of detente and even agreements against nuclear war. The extreme was reached by G.A Arbatov, director of the U.S. Institute in Moscow, who threatened that anti-Semitism would arise in the U.S. and the-Soviet Union if trade between the two countries were not “normalized.”

Thus the question is posed: Is detente a one way street that only America must follow?