Carlucci, Soviets to Discuss Arms Policy

WASHINGTON--Defense Secretary Frank Carlucci was to ask his Soviet counterpart at talks beginning today in Switzerland whether highly publicized changes in Kremlin military doctrine mean reductions in Soviet forces.

Carlucci, meeting today through Thursday with Soviet Defense Minister Dmitri Yazov, will also discuss arms control, human rights, the proposed Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan and such dangerous military situations as a collision between U.S. and Soviet warships in the Black Sea last month, a senior Pentagon official told reporters yesterday.

Carlucci has said he doesn't want the meeting to pre-empt talks on reducing nuclear and conventional forces, but he does want to ask Yazov about the emerging Soviet doctrine of "reasonable sufficiency."

"We would like to get an idea of where they are going," said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

"We will be asking them if this [new doctrine] is...truly a change in their policy and not just a public recitation," said the official. "What changes in Soviet equipment will we see? Will there be a shift in force structure?"

"Over the years, we have seen quite a disparity [between] their nuclear doctrine and what force structure they have actually acquired," said the official.

As early as 1977, then-Soviet leader Leonid I. Breznev proclaimed that nuclear war was a no-win situation. But the Soviets continued to bolster their nuclear arsenal, adding mobile long-range missiles that U.S. officials say could dodge a U.S. strike. Such a capability, they say, appears contrary to the doctrine of Mutual Assured Destruction.

As far as the new doctrine of reasonable sufficiency is concerned, said the Pentagon official, "we don't see any physical indication" of change. "That's why we want to ask them where to look."

At the top of the American agenda, said the official, will be so-called "dangerous incidents," such as the bumping incident in the Black Sea on Feb. 12, as well as the slaying of a U.S. Army officer in East Germany in 1987 and the wounding of another last September.

Soviet spokesman Gennadi Gerasimov blamed the collision on two U.S. warships that passed within 12 miles of the Soviet coast in what American officials called an assertion of the right of innocent passage from one body of international water to another.

Unlike the United States, which claims a three-mile territorial limit, the Soviet Union claims that its territory extends 12 miles beyond its shores. U.S. officials recognize that limit but insist on the right of "innocent passage," in this case from one side of the Crimson Peninsula to the other.

Administration spokesmen said that two Soviet vessels rammed the American ships.

Whatever the Soviet objections to the presence of U.S. ships in their waters, the Pentagon official said yesterday, "ramming ships...is hardly a proportionate and proper action...People could get killed."

The Soviets have never apologized for fatally shooting U.S. Army Maj. Arthur D. Nicholson in East Germany on March 24, 1985, although they did apologize for wounding Army Master Sgt. Charles L. Barry, shot in the arm by a Soviet soldier on Sept. 16, 1987.

Carlucci hopes his meeting with Yazov will lead to guidelines to prevent such dangerous incidents.

The secretary was scheduled to depart from Andrews Air Force Base near Washington Monday evening, arrive in the Swiss capital of Bern today, dine with Yazov tonight, meet him twice tomorrow and once Thursday before returning to Washington later that day.