European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - June 5, 1988, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Page id the stars and stripes . Rosenthal Reagan shows poor grasp of sofa far an Reafy it was a strange performance presi Dent Reagan put on in Moscow and a sadly flawed one. There were times when he seemed to be doing everything right. He spoke wit deep feeling to Moscow students about the principles and foundations of Ameri can society. The words were his speech writers but the emotion was his. He tried to make a Central Issue out of human rights specifically the right of political prisoners to leave their cells Andice right of soviet citizens to leave their country if the whole nation still seems a cell to them. The Brilliant Mikhail Gorbachev deliberately showed a Little irritation. And some american Kremlin Logiste immediately began to Witter with an Absurdity because Reagan talked about human Nihls which Gorbachev is supposed to be encouraging in the soviet Union somehow the soviet Leader would find it More difficult to put them through. But the totality of the Reagan performance could Only startle and Dis appoint Many americans those who understand that Gorbachev is bringing important changes to the soviet Union but who also believe that it is a Seno smoral and political error for the United states 10 commit itself now to a Man who still is the dictator of the most pow Erful totalitarian nation in the world. And that is what Reagan did. In four Days he managed to speak More glowingly and optimistically about Gorbachev than he has in four years about George Bush. Meanwhile Gorbachev was Busy making sure that most of the rest of Rea Gan s remarks never appeared in the so Viet press or to. The president along the Way announced that the soviet Union was no longer an evil Empire. Perhaps not. But absolution is not Reagan s to give nor is the time quite now with soviet troops still in Afghanistan All of Eastern Europe still under soviet political occupation and millions of soviet citizens unable to leave their own country. Reagan did not have to insult his hosts to their face but he could have gotten out of it by telling the truth that the verdict was open and thai Only people like the poles afghans and soviet citizens who wanted to leave could give it one Day. The strangest episode came when Rea was asked by a student about his interest in refuseniks and dissidents. With great Jovia Lity Reagan said one of the most inane and insensitive things any president has Ever uttered. It was All the fault of the soviet bureaucracy he said. Why we have the same Type of thing in inc . Every once in a while somebody has to shake the bureaucracy by the neck and say Stop what Are you doing so he was bringing some lists of the oppressed to Moscow to Gorba Chev obviously so that he could just go shake up those Pesky bureaucrats. This total distortion of reality was so stunning that twice american correspondents publicly offered him a Chance to get out of it. Twice Reagan declined clearly not knowing what they were talk ing about or what he was talking about for that matter. Does he really believe that 70 years of soviet refusal to allow its citizens to leave the country at will is based on the laziness of Grumpy bureaucrats perhaps Gorbachev will change All that and free soviet citizens from police stale Laws. But to say Only bureaucrats land in the Way that insults and dam Ages those soviet citizens who arc fight ing for a truly new Day. They face Strug Gles to achieve it quite Likely struggles even against Gorbachev and his concept of permitted  Moscow Reagan showed warmth and a sense of humanity. He also showed How shallow Are the Waters in which his intellect now sails. He personalizes history dangerously. He talked As if in were just Gorbachev who is bringing change not the desperate need to save the col lapsing soviet  tendency to banal Anc Edolis Dis torts any unpleasant reality he wishes to ignore. And he seems to have lost the philosophical consistency that a Leader needs not to resist change but to understand How and Why changes take place and  there is talk of a fifth Gorbachev Reagan Summit.  Bush or Michael Dukakis will have to live with the results of inc next Summit. The new president should sit across from Gorbachev and carry on from what Reagan had achieved be fore nil first trip to Moscow. A you believe in signs William f. Buckley there s lots of work left to do in the evil empire9 at 27, he was an agricultural economist with mos cow s Institute of economics and a University lecturer. But Josef Stalin looked kindly on him during the great Puree and instead of shooting or culling him sent him As chief of the . Division of the people s commiss Aii Al of foreign affairs. From there he went As Counselor at the soviet embassy in Washington becoming ambassador in 194. In 1946 he went to the United nations Security Council and established the soviet tradition of vetoing any moves designed to promote peace with free Dom. In 1946 he became Deputy foreign minister. And Stalin s approval of him made him a candidate for the Central committee of the communist party. He became first Deputy foreign minister in 1949 and foreign min ister in 1957. He was directly involved in the diplomatic and military action against the students in Budapest serving under Nikita Khrushchev. Under Leonid Brezhnev he presided Over the great purge of the Prague Spring in Czechoslovakia in 1968. Andrei Andreyevich Gromyko is now the president of the soviet Union and the first person to Greet presi Dent Ronald Reagan As he descended from air Force one at Vnuk ovo Airport last sunday. The itinerary of or. Reagan might have been conceived by the Brothers Grimm no fairy Lale could have made the trip More regally satisfying. The Nch decor was Courtesy of dead czars the last one executed by someone in Honor of whom a russian City is named. There was that one terribly sour note sounded Day after Day. Every time or. Reagan looked especially pleased especially satisfied especially carried away by the  of it All you would hear a voice Nota russian s voice but a Good twangy american voice and always that voice would ask the same question is this what you called inc evil Empire or. Presi Dent what was that about the evil Empire or. Presi Dent Tell us about the evil Empire or. President finally worn Down by this hectoring Over his Melo dramatic excess of years gone by or. Reagan said "1 was talking about another  we sinners believe because we were taught to believe and do give internal assent to the mandate to forgive 70 limes seven times. But or. Reagan is engaged now not i forgiveness but in what George Orwell called vaporization. Big brother decides to change a historical or a pre sent fact and evidence inconveniencing to the new thesis is simply made to disappear run the the fingers lightly Over the Globe pausing to Stop at outposts of the soviet Empire in Nicaragua using soviet arms they Are promoting War and aggression and drafting 17-year-Olds while suffering a 60 percent Cut in their Standard of living. In Bulgaria the dictator Todor Zhivko reign. Sev eral years ago he sent a secret agent to inject Poison into the veins of a bulgarian refugee poet As he was pro menacing Over Waterloo Bridge in London. In Poland Gen. Wojciech Jaruzelski proconsul for Gorbachev Hacks Down those who fight for a free labor Union movement. In Ethiopia starvation is imminent for 2 million people at the hands of a soviet backed dictator. In Southeast Asia dire poverty and huge supplies of weapons keep the North vietnamese in charge of the human misery brought on by soviet backed aggression. Or. Reagan does Well to encourage changes m the soviet system. Something wildly e wiling is indeed going on in the soviet system. Bui to Greet it As if it were no longer evil is on the order of changing our entire position toward Adolf Hitler on receiving the news thai he has abolished one a termination Camp. The soviet Union has � very Long Way to go before it brings reasonable fic Dorai to those who live under it but we sow Only confusion when we retract the statement that it i evil to support the it nematic suppression of human rights  your Empire reaches. Gorbachev May be the spokesman for what is being attempted within the soviet Empire but Gromyko continues a president of what continues to be an evil Empire