European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - February 8, 1987, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Page 10 the stars and stripes sunday february 8.19b7 columns Jim Fain interests of baby m should be Paramount Solomon finessed the question Back where i belongs when he ordered the baby sawn in half but Kings did t need to worry about appeals courts. Judge Harvey Sorkow of Hackensack n.j., has no such Luiu  must decide soon in he agonizing Case of baby m whether a woman s contract to be n surrogate Mother takes precedence Over her right to change her mind and keep the child. Both the natural to incr Mary Bolh Whitehall an the couple who hired her or. And in. William Stem love the blonde baby girl whom the Sterns Call Melissa and the whiteheads Call Sara. Ail apparently would befit and Loving parents. In. Whitchead lays she agreed to be artificially inseminated and carry the baby for the Sterns out of concern for the plight of childless Couplet. She was to be paid s 10,000 and give up the child for adoption but changed her mind when she saw her baby. Though surrogates have Given birth to 500babies in the United slates Over the last 10 Yean and three have refused to give them up not one slate has enacted legislation covering such contracts. Catholics and some other groups oppose artificial insemination and argue that surrogate mothering should be illegal. Others contend it is a Boon to the childless and should be a contractual right. It s hard to imagine a More excruciating Case Nan baby m Sall the people involved seem honorable Well motivated and totally committed to their views. If Tough cases make Sharp Law this one should serve swell. Bill Stern 40, has a doctorate in biochemistry. His Mother and father hounded by the nazis died Young. All other relatives were killed in the holocaust. He feels a compulsion to continue his bloodlines he tells reporters. His wife Betsy 41, is a paediatrician with a doctor ate in human genetics. She feared pregnancy would aggravate her multiple sclerosis. Mrs. Whitchead is the Mother of two Ryan 12, and tuesday 10, her husband is a sanitation worker. She seems to be a Model Mother and says the Piihl of her childless sister inspired her to become a surrogate Mother for the stems. Should Sorkow Rule the surrogacy contract invalid and be upheld there Mill would be a custody Tigh Between Stem As the father and mrs. While head. And if that seems complicated consider the Prospect of a similar Case Over a test lube baby in which a George f. Will pm much is 1w baby in the window surrogate carried an embryo created in a Laboratory from sperm and egg. That May be next. In fact the whole Pandora s Box of medical ethic seems about to open wide As technology races ahead in Organ transplants artificial prolongation of life Eutha Nasia fetus care a Vitro fertilization and genetic Engi Neering. Should we then dash out and pass Laws to coverall contingencies probably not. Too Little is yet known. There is logic in letting cases fill in the common Law. There will be intense pain along the Way however much As the Sterns and who chads suffer now. And it s hard to see How any contract could permanently bind a woman before the awesome mind altering fact of birth occurs. Whatever evolves the interests of the baby should be Paramount and they Are a murky mystery at Best. No matter who baby m ends up calling Mommy far example she has been grievously Hurt. Unless she is moved thousands of Miles and Given a new identity she will live forever with notoriety she did nothing to cause. Per a provides pearls of Wisdom on nato it is said that diplomacy consists of saying Nice Doggie while reaching for a Rock. Recently in Munich Richard perk assistant Secretary of defense abandoned diplomacy As usually understood and pelted nato s member governments with heavy rocks. For that flagrant Viola Tion of decorum Perle should be sum Marily. Decorated. Perle informed the allies thai their shortcomings include an addiction to mealy mouthed pronouncements symptomatic of political cowardice. He also said they Are guilty of a failure of forthrightness Solo ice Muir rings that pass for Alliance statements Foster ing a climate in which realism is subordinated to Hope and policy is shaped by fear using halting euphemisms re Garding soviet non compliance with agreements cowering behind Bland and oblique formulations so As not to offend the sensitivities of our enemies or he prevailing Wisdom of our editorial writ ers conducting a charade that per mits soviet propaganda to succeed patronizing Western  and issuing misty Blandishments Perle began by illustrating the Al Liance s impulse to paper Over differences avoid controversy placate Public opinion and round All Corners an smooth All Sharp edges As though we were designing a stealth air plane rather than declaring our most fundamental  recently the United states proposed that nato say Gorbachev would forfeit his credibility if having promised otherwise he continued to hold an agreement on intermediate Range missiles hostage to an agreement on strategic defense. Another Natona Tion s representative said you can t say that Perle Why not other fellow it just in t done. You dont say in a nato communique that Gorbachev has  the communique became a flavor less and untruthful pudding. Nato has responded Cra Venly Perle says to the soviet Call for an end to All nuclear testing. Without testing Confidence in the nuclear inventory would de Cline and there would be no More of the modernization thai has reduced the number and yield of weapons in the stockpile. However rather than explain the need for testing nato governments have hidden behind the peripheral Issue of ratification refusing to argue what they privately acknowledge the necessity for and benefits of testing. Or consider says Perle nato s lame response to the soviet Call for a total ban on chemical weapons. The so Viets possess them in Quantity have specialized military academies for the stud of their use Irain for their use and equip their troops to fight in the midst of such weapons. Most nato nations have no such weapons. The United Stales has not produced a new or modernized chemical weapon in 18 years. Production has been delayed As Congress Hopes for an arms control agreement that would obviate nato s need for chemical weapons. But nato s emphasis on verification of a chemical weapons ban is a Dodge. Says Perle the unhappy fact is that Ordinary chemical plants could be converted for the production of lethal agents in a matter of weeks Given Advance planning. Such planning would of course be undetectable. No Natona Tion could make even precautionary production plans after signing a ban on chemical weapons. Yet nato govern ments do not put before their Public the hard facts about chemical weapons or about soviet cheating on agreements nato Speaks of serious concerns but Perle says nowhere have i been Able 10 find a statement deploring the fact that the soviets have been cheating. It is As though the words violation1 and cheating cannot be said in Well mannered company nato governments find it easier to distance themselves from . Responses to soviet cheating such As abandonment of Salt ii limits than to condemn the cheating. Thus nato governments male . Responses seem capricious. Perle s most scathing remarks were re served for the absurd Idle and dangerous talk about a nuclear free world the sort of talk president Rea Gan has engaged in at the Iceland Summit and elsewhere. Perle says the verification of an agreement to abolish All nuclear weapon is not difficult or very difficult it is in  so what Western Leader would turn in his country s last remain ing nuclear weapon on the strength of assurances Mere wards thai the soviets had done the same As Western governments tacitly accept the idea of nuclear free world the weapons on which deterrence must rest Are steadily stigmatized. Nato representatives at the Munich meeting were indignant that Perle had injected a foreign substance truth into the proceedings. The White House rushed to say that Perle was not speaking for the president which fact Perle had emphasized. Perle May soon leave the administration thereby reducing by about 85 percent the administration s Tang an Wisdom regarding arms control. Perle in undisciplined opinionated eloquent principled and disdainful of decorum All the things governments find indigestible and this Republic should consider in dispensable