SALT on Whose Tail?

I repeat: The nature of the regime is the heart of the matter. And this is precisely the factor which, in their discussions of the SALT accords, the President, Henry Kissinger and all the other official spokesmen have resolutely ignored. What sort of regime is it, then? Let me try a story (a true story) as one way of answering.

A few months ago a first-rate journalist named David Bonavia, who had for several years been the London Times’ representative in Moscow, was expelled by the Soviet government. On June 21 the well-known Soviet historian, Pyotr Yakir, who had been associated with the “dissidents,” was arrested by the KGB, and has since been held incommunicado. Not long before Bonavia’s expulsion Yakir had come to his apartment in Moscow and asked him to record a statement on tape.

JB

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James Burnham

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I repeat: The nature of the regime is the heart of the matter. And this is precisely the factor which, in their discussions of the SALT accords, the President, Henry Kissinger and all the other official spokesmen have resolutely ignored. What sort of regime is it, then? Let me try a story (a true story) as one way of answering.

A few months ago a first-rate journalist named David Bonavia, who had for several years been the London Times’ representative in Moscow, was expelled by the Soviet government. On June 21 the well-known Soviet historian, Pyotr Yakir, who had been associated with the “dissidents,” was arrested by the KGB, and has since been held incommunicado. Not long before Bonavia’s expulsion Yakir had come to his apartment in Moscow and asked him to record a statement on tape.