Letter from Washington

Cap Weinberger wanted to go to the Summit, but Ronald Reagan didn’t invite him. “My bags were packed,” Cap told a prominent Washington activist, “and I waited for the call, but it didn’t come.” That’s why Cap wrote The Letter, in which he urged the President to refrain from promising continued compliance with SALT II—a melancholy commentary on the low-entré status to which the Defense Secretary has sunk, thanks to Bud McFarlane, George Shultz, Mike Deaver, and Nancy Reagan’s success at screening Reagan from hard-line advice. “The Summit was orchestrated to make Reagan think that his highest second-term achievement will be the Nobel Peace Prize,” notes one conservative congressman sardonically.

Mr. Reagan’s inner circle of White House advisors aren’t enamored of Cap, either, partly because he can usually make an end-run around them, going directly to the President, and partly because he has such an uncompromising manner. “I admire Cap philosophically,” says a Reaganite senator, “but he’s too rigid. I don’t like to deal with him. Yet I realize that his insights on national security are important.”

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Cap Weinberger wanted to go to the Summit, but Ronald Reagan didn’t invite him. “My bags were packed,” Cap told a prominent Washington activist, “and I waited for the call, but it didn’t come.” That’s why Cap wrote The Letter, in which he urged the President to refrain from promising continued compliance with SALT II—a melancholy commentary on the low-entré status to which the Defense Secretary has sunk, thanks to Bud McFarlane, George Shultz, Mike Deaver, and Nancy Reagan’s success at screening Reagan from hard-line advice. “The Summit was orchestrated to make Reagan think that his highest second-term achievement will be the Nobel Peace Prize,” notes one conservative congressman sardonically.

Mr. Reagan’s inner circle of White House advisors aren’t enamored of Cap, either, partly because he can usually make an end-run around them, going directly to the President, and partly because he has such an uncompromising manner. “I admire Cap philosophically,” says a Reaganite senator, “but he’s too rigid. I don’t like to deal with him. Yet I realize that his insights on national security are important.”