European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - June 1, 1987, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Paga 10 columns the stars and stripes monday june 1,19b7 Russell Baker tale of a Hobo a baseball crowd and Money before King fahd of saudi Arabia visited president Reagan in 19 85, he was contributing a million a month to the Contra cause in Nicaragua. After the visit he generous 1 doubled the contribution $2 million a month. Reagan acknowledges that he and the King Dis cussed the contras but says he did not ask the Sau Dis to increase the payment an act which would probably have been illegal though the White House has recently suggested that the president s foreign policy Powers cannot be restricted by Law. In any Case the tantalizing question remains Why did the King sweeten the pot if the president did t ask him to sure the saudis have Money to Burn but the Rich Are rarely parted from their millions by Dis interested concern Tor inc Public weal. If they were the tax loophole would have been unborn. Of count the president did t have 10 come Rightout and say ill give it to you straight from the shoulder. You d belter Start putting More Money into Nicaragua if you want me to return your phone Call nem time you need some High tech  visualizing this meeting of president and King re minds me of the great Mckinty a 1940 movie satire on american polities in which a Hobo name Mcginty gets elected mayor. On his office Wall hangs is picture of an immense crowd at a baseball game. The precise amount of Cash it will Cost to bribe Mcginty is never discussed with the Moneybags Type who come to him carrying satchels. Instead he changes the subject shifts attention to the picture on he Wall and ask the caller to guess How Many people attended the game the Day that picture was taken. When they Hazard a cheapskate s guess he replies not even close and Stales the enact figure. Presidents Are More dignified than mayors so Reagan May have been More Subtle with the  Point though is that you Don t have to be very Clever to violate the Taw s spirit without violating its letter. This is what Oliver North the Marine corps ubiquitous Light colonel and master of foreign policy revels was up to in the squeeze the Rich scheme described in the congressional hearings. Two of the witnesses told of being introduced to North in curious circumstance. One passionately anti communist was taken tothe Dallas Airport to meet the colonel who then told her a poignant Story of the suffering of the Nicara William f. Buckley Guan contras fighting the communist government. No he did not ask her to donate the Money she subsequently gave to help the contras she said asking her or it would have violated the letter of the Law. Slopping at the Airport to fill a gentle anti communist heart with grief that could later be trans formed into Cash through the services of a non governmental third party this was no breaking the Law or so North was betting. Another Well healed citizen told of being brought to he colonel s White House office and receiving private one to one briefing with All the trimmings official Wall map of Nicaragua information so vital that it was known to few persons outside thai room and must never be divulged to anyone else. No the colonel had not requested Money for the contras that would have been illegal. The witness understanding the Gravity of the crisis in Centra America contributed anyhow listening to these accounts of Boyish plots la out wit the courthouse sen. Warren Rudman dismissed them As the old one two  in effect he suggested the donors had been caught in a transparent con game designed to deceive the courts into think ing that nothing disreputable had been done to the Law. The senator seemed to think that Only a Simpleton would cd pct to find the courts that Gullible. If so was the president any less a Simpleton than North it is easy enough for senators 10 dismiss the ineffable North As a bit of a nil. A lieutenant colonel who Muscles both the Secretary of stale and the Secretary of defense out of control of diplomatic and military policy in Central America and he Middle cast May seem a foolish Antic spirit after his adventure col lapses in ruin and he stands exposed As a boy Defeated by a Man s Job. Yet the presidents position differs Little from North s. Consider a King visits then doubles his outlay and the president Sayi doubled it did he imagine that this is the president being Oliver North. It is North who was being Mcginly. Tow York tymm nose a americans Are thinking Europe should do More concerning the attack on the . Frigate Stark in the persian Gulf afew observations europeans ought to watch very care fully the quiet movement of american opinion which is not yet Resolute but is isolationist bound. This is so not atone because we lost 37 americans but be cause there is a crystallizing consensus that the europeans Are not doing their share of the work in the peacekeeping operation. The immediate question is what were the motives of the Pilot who fired the exocet missiles on the Stark there Aren t that Many possibilities. On the dark Side he might have been Lold to fire Ai an american warship in order to make one of those byzantine Points thai Arete special properties of thai part of the world a second possibility is that he honestly mistook the Stark for a vessel engaged in an iranian Mission. A third i that he went berserk. If the first is the True Story we can understand Iraq s unwillingness to permit the Pilot to be questioned by . Authorities let alone surrender the Pilot for treat ment by . Authorities. The willingness of the iraqi government in principle to compensate the victims families is of course a Good initial sign. But the Public wants More than merely a Cash settlement and Here we run into a situation that abuts on the european problem. The West germans have had Cap Tive one of the hijackers who two years ago was involved in an episode that resulted in the death of an american and what we Are getting from West Germany is the Long stall. First the germans wanted assurances that if released to . Authorities the prisoner would not be executed. We gave those assurances. But the months dragon. Imposed on the entire situation is the Felt impenetrability of the West european position on strategic and tactical , the europeans decline to mobilize sufficiently to offset soviet mobilization then they resist the deployment of intermediate nuclear weapons to offset soviet strategic and tactical preponderance and now they grumble As Well they might Over Ronald Reagan s disastrous decision to re move those nuclear weapons in Clum for the soviet removal of their counterparts never mind the residual soviet preponderance in military might and yet although we know that Chan cellar Helmut Kohl of West Germany is deeply Upsel Over the proposed treaty he has yielded to Domestic political considerations and is grudgingly prepared to go along. Mrs. Thatcher earn in the Middle of a political Campaign play into the hands of the wimp vote which in great Britain dominates the labor party and i heavily influential in the social demo cratic party and France even under the socialists usually the voice of prepared Ness in matters of european defense is publicly silent. It All leaves Many Ameri cans in a to hell with them Frame of mind. Now the loss of life in the persian Gulf is a personal tragedy to the Young Antn involved and to their families. Bui it is not properly viewed As a policy Mak ing event. If a Bridge Falls Down in a storm then All other Bridges like it Are structurally suspect. But if 37 americans Are killed in peacekeeping operation the policy thai caused them to be where they were is no automatically suspect. Their death is a part of the overhead of a policy whose correctness is no More invalidated by the act than the correctness of for fighting i invalidated by the death of a fireman caught in a Blaze. There Are housekeeping question to be answered Why did t the americans kill the iraqi rather than the other Way around but these Aren t the main event. The main event is should the United slates continue to shoulder the principal Burden in the persian Gulf Given that 95 percent of the Oil that  that choke Point go to other countries the diplomatic responsibility four government is to narrow in eyes against the distractions of demagogic comets and try to keep them focused on the National interest. Even if every european from the Berlin Wall to the West coast of Ireland were slacker the United states would still be better off with the status quo than with a Europe dominated by the soviet Union but politic As Michael of Zohott has taught us is not made As the Crow flies. The american people need from Europe a few signs of fraternal affection and self Pride