Rougemont, Switzerland, March 10— An American historian, married to a Swiss and doing research on the military arrangements that made possible the Helvetian Confederation, has learned that the Swiss military have come to doubt that the United States will continue to provide an effective deterrent against Soviet expansionism. Their thinking is based not only on the old question: Would the United States risk nuclear war for Danzig? It is based also on a profound conviction —such as it is said Charles de Gaulle entertained—about America’s capacity to cope with internal disorders.
The latter has an obvious bearing on the former. It requires a nation either thoroughly united or thoroughly subservient to play convincingly at nuclear poker. The Swiss high command (or so the story goes) believes that things are getting worse, not better. And that it is altogether conceivable that in the next few years the Soviet Union will do an Operation Czechoslovakia against West Germany, confident of reaching the Rhine within two or three days.
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