page 4
Wednesday, October 7, 1981
daily nebraskan
Sadat's death threatens peace
JO)
The objective that Anwar Sadat fought for
during his 11 -year Egyptian presidency is pre
cisely what may be the first casualty of his
death - peace.
Few leaders have had such a profound effect
on world peace as Sadat has, and perhaps no
single person was responsible for peace in the
Middle East more than the slain Sadat.
Sadat's death is indeed sad for Egyptians,
but all people who proclaim to be for peace
must realize the magnitude of his passing.
Since expelling some 17,000 Soviet advisers
after taking office, Sadat strove to lead his
country toward a closer relationship with the
United States. His clear rejection of Soviet in
fluence in his country symbolized his deter
mination to make Egypt an underling to no
one.
With his historic trip to Israel in November
1977, Sadat gained the admiration of Israeli
leaders and their people, as well as worldwide
recognition.
But those who were opposed to Sadat's
peace overtures with Israel vowed to kill him
for what they claim was the selling out of the
Palestine Liberation Organization.
With the signing of the Camp David peace
accords in March 1979, Sadat declared the
region was determined to seek peace, further
irritating those opposed to him.
Regardless of what group was responsible for
the assassination, Sadat's death leaves a vacuum
in Egypt that will be impossible to fill.
Whoever follows Sadat, be it Vice President
Housni Mobarak or someone else, the successor
is bound to face the criticism and dissent that
Sadat faced in recent months. It was just this
dissent that brought Sadat to crack down on
his political and religious opponents.
In a "Time" magazine article several years
ago, Sadat told the story of how he almost died
after falling into a rocky river gully as a child.
He was asked what he was thinking about when
the near tragedy occurred.
Sadat replied, "I thought if I had died,
Egypt would have lost Anwar Sadat."
Now, Egypt has lost Anwar Sadat and his
vision for what Egypt should be in the future
could wither away.
The peace process and whether the Middle
East treaty is between two countries or two
men,, lies in the balance.
Cross-town MX bus line to be Russian teaser
While it should not come as much of a surprise to you
that the Reagan administration has come out in favor of
construction of the MX missile, it might come as more of
a surprise to discover how Reagan intends to deploy these
weapons.
When Reagan announced the big defense package last
Friday, he indicated that some of the missiles would go in
previously existing missile silos, and a decision would be
made on where to deploy the other MX missiles later on.
O
dark
Knowing Reagan's tight-fisted financial position on
other issues, however, I suspected from the beginning that
he would not just build a gaggle of missiles without know
ing what he would do with them. I snooped around for a
while, and found an absolutely confidential source who
would fill me in on the rest of the MX package.
I met him at a taco stand on Sunday afternoon. "Psst.
Hey Mac, c'mere a minute," he said. It was our prearrang
ed password.
"You're the guy," I said definitively.
"Right," he said tersely.
"Let's get right down to cases," 1 said. "Has Reagan
got a plan for housing the rest' of the MX missiles?
"Reagan's got a plan for everything," he said.
"Could you be more specific?" I asked.
"Of course," he said. "But let me give you a little back
ground for this. With the Reagan plan, he wanted to
accomplish two things. First, he wanted to deploy the MX
in a way that would be effective, economical enough to
pass through Congress, and politically popular enough to
serve the Republicans for 1984.
"But he also wanted to find a way to punish Nevada
and Utah for their objection to deploying the MX in those
states."
"What did he come up with?" 1 asked.
"It's devilishly clever. He's going to put MX missiles on
school buses in major American cities and shuttle them
between the downtown core and the suburbs."
"What good will that do?" I said.
"Plenty. To begin with, it gives the Defense depart
ment the shell-game missile set-up they wanted. They even
have an option to drive empty buses around town as
decoys to the real MX buses if they want to.
Second, Reagan can contend that everyone has to share
the load equally. Of course, none of these buses will be
driving by the Reagan ranch in California, but nobody
needs to notice that.
The plan also allows Reagan an easy way to scrap the
school busing plan, which is something he wants very
much to do. He can contend that national defense is a
higher priority matter, and commandeer every school bus
in the country for MX use.
"You said that Reagan also wanted to get even with
Utah and Nevada," I said. "How is he going to do that?"
"Easy," said the guy. "He's going to build those holes
in Utah and Nevada anyway."
"What's he going to do with them?"
The man swallowed the last of his taco.
"He's going to prove to the poor who have been axed
out of the Reagan budget that they still have a role in the
Reagan program."
"Could you be more specific?" I said.
"Of course. He is going to roll up all of those people,
take them to Nevada and Utah, and drop them in the
holes. Of course, they'll have to be moved around from
time to time so that no reporters ever catch up to them.
But they will be performing a very valuable government
service, and we will have successfully taken them off of
the welfare rolls. And that's what's going to make
America great again."
Russian Bear scaring alliance apart
Helmut Kohl is a huge slab of a man who looks as if
two or three lesser men might be quarried from him. As
leader of the Christian Democrat coalition, he may be
West German's next prime minister.
From the American point of view, that would be splen
did; Kohl is deeply pro-American. He speaks movingly of
the American-supplied food that saved many Germans
from starvation just after World War II.
Gratitude is a fine sentiment, but it is perishble. Fewer
nb and fewer Germans are old enough to recall the benefits
IH oal sPeaks f More and more Germans, though still a
I QJl4ai minority, express neutralist, pacifist, and even anti-American
views.
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At the moment, Helmut Schmidt's ruling Social Demo
crat coalition includes the loudest anti-American voices,
much to Schmidt's embarrassment. If he claps a firm hand
over the mouth of Egon Bahr, he risks his coalition. If he
doesn't he risks offending moderate voters.
5sp)Q sobran
For an object lesson, Schmidt can look to England's
Labor Party, whose left wing has moved further to the left
even after defeat by Margaret Thatcher. Its leader, Michael
Foot, makes speeches likening Ronald Reagan to Adolf
Hitler, and its moderates, sick of such antics, have broken
off to form the new Social Democratic Party.
If it is heartening that anti-Americanism may backfire,
the more disturbing fact is that it has already gone so far
in most NATO countries. In the long run, the vocal left
will change the tone of the alliance, with an influence out
of proportion to its numbers.
The reason is simple enough: fear. Soviet military su
periority first is assumed. One poll found 50 percent of all
West Germans conceding first place to the Soviets, with
only 10 percent deeming the U.S. more powerful.
There is a fascinating paradox here, in that the Soviet
Union has been so steadily amoral in its use of force and
terror that nobody bothers denouncing it any more. You
may as well denounce a foraging bear, the average Euro
pean feels. The Soviet Union is simply a "reality;" beyond
any human appeal.
The United States, by contrast, is still a part of the
moral community so it becomes the sole object of moral
criticism.
When we take a firm line against the Soviets, it is we,
not they, who are accused of being "provactive," of
baiting the bear. Why blame the Soviets? Bears will be
bears. Their amorality thus becomes a moral advantage.
The current topic of anxiety is the modernization of
our nuclear forces in Europe, especially through the mo
bilization of the neutron "bomb," actually a warhead de
signed for defensive use against an invading army. The real
issue is that the Soviets are angry about our attempts to
restore balance, and the Europeans are, naturally, but un
wisely, afraid.
Yet full discussion of that threat is suppressed. Here we
have another paradox, what Angelo Codevilla calls "the
Damocle's sword syndrome."
It consists of "simultaneous denial of the threat's seri
ousness and of criticism of attempts to are against the
threat, on the ground that the threat is so great and so im
minent that any move could set off disaster."
The real problem is not that Europeans are ceasing to
be grateful for old debts: after all, they have their own in
terests in a changing world. What is a problem is that
many Europeans seem not to regard their own interests
as including their own freedom.
(c) The Los Angelts Times Syndicate