'Wooould you believe...' redux.

READERS OF "The Week" will recall the parallels recently drawn here between the Soviet Union's machinations on the illegal Krasnoyarsk radar and the shameless excuse-making of TV's mock hero, Maxwell Smart. Even the inventive Smart, however, would be hard pressed to top the latest Soviet gambit.

At last recounting, the official line was that the USSR would be willing to "destroy" the ABM-Treatybusting Krasnoyarsk radar if only the United States would agree to adhere for a protracted period to an unduly restrictive interpretation of that accord's limits. Subsequent conversations at the perfunctory five-year review of the treaty held last month in Geneva revealed that the Soviets did not actually"destroy" as the word is regularly used, i.e., to eliminate. What they meant was "destroy" in a way the word is never used, i.e., to modify

The United States' intrepid negotiators icily turned down this latest flim-flam. Nothing would do, they informed the Soviets, but that this massive radar be razed. What is more, the shameless Ambassador Karpov (the Soviet Union's Maxwell Smartsky) was told, there would be no deal on new strategic-armscontrol agreements until that happened. Just to be sure the Soviets got the message, the Senate subsequently voted unanimously to affirm that position.

Scarcely missing a beat, the Soviets rolled out a new offer. Wooould you believe, General Secretary Gorbachev in effect asked, the USSR would like to turn the Krasnoyarsk radar into an international center for the peaceful exploration of space? For sheer chutzpah, it is tough to top this one. Evidently, the Soviets believe that if they can move in the Carl Sagans of the world as camouflage for this illegal Siberian ballistic-missile-detection and -tracking complex, they can not only avoid tearing it down-they can actually make it operational!

Unfortunately, while the United States has thus far resisted this chicanery, it still shows no sign of appreciating the larger problem. Fixated as U.S. diplomats are on "restoring the integrity of the ABM Treaty," they are simply haggling over the circumstances under which the Soviet Union will continue with its preparations to defend itself against ballisticmissile attack-with or without the Krasnoyarsk radar-and under which we will continue not to defend ourselves.

As former Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger recently put it, "We have the opportunity now to shape our strategic destiny. . . . But if we are to succeed, we must have the political courage and the funding to move ahead with plans for deployment [of SDI]. And that means we must no longer let the Soviet agenda succeed. That agenda is for us to continue to be bound by the ABM Treaty, which prevents deployment of SDI, while the Soviets race ahead with their own system. . . . The ABM Treaty provides that we can . . . cancel the treaty on giving six months' notice. We should do this now. "

Sadly, the President will not be presented with such sage counsel from a single individual still serving in his Administration. Instead, his advisors will continue to say: Woould you believe you can have both your beloved SDI program and the ABM Treaty that prohibits it. Not so smart, really.

Winner and Still Champion

Joe Louis had a handler

Who told him how to punch

And when to mention mamma

At ringside or at lunch,

But though these ministrations

Gave Joe a crucial push,

No handler has the moxie 

Of Baker coaching Bush.

W. H. VON DREELE