Bolivia: Poker Game

The neatest trick in the Communist propaganda game in Latin America is the Kremlin's constant bluffing as it plays on the countries' deep yearning for development. When the Reds talked vaguely of offering Bolivia an uneconomic but showy smelter to refine its tin ore, the U.S. showed its cards by lending Bolivia $10 million to revamp the nationalized tin mines, which account for 67% of the impoverished nation's export income. Last week the Communists dealt off another, even bigger offer. In La Paz, Nicolai Rodionov, Soviet bureaucrat, announced that Russia would bid not only the smelter but also a $150 million low-interest, long-term loan for Russian technical aid to Bolivia's government-owned petroleum and tin corporations. Russia might also buy, all of Bolivia's high-cost tin ore, currently in slack demand at world market prices.

Economists doubted that the Russians would deliver. With an estimated $225 billion economy, less than half U.S. size, of which more than $40 billion goes for defense, Russia is already straining to meet heavy obligations to Red China, the European satellites and Cuba. The Reds are also committed to build Egypt's $1 billion Aswan High Dam, have considerable financial agreements with Ghana, Guinea, India, Iraq and Indonesia. While new U.S. overseas aid this year has totaled $3.7 billion, the Russians were able to send only an estimated $475 million in loans, grants and usable credit to non-Communist countries—far less than the $1.6 billion they had promised.

Yet merely by making the headline-catching offer, the Kremlin's propagandists made strides in Bolivia. When a group of junketing members of the Soviet Party Congress arrived in La Paz last week, they were greeted by a wildly cheering throng, which clashed with cops when it tried to raise Red flags atop the airport terminal. Later, a TNT bomb was tossed into the courtyard of the U.S. embassy, shattering windows but fortunately injuring no one. It was the third incident against Ambassador Carl Strom in less than two months, and the government of Bolivia's pro-West President Victor Paz Estenssoro was forced to issue its official regrets.

As for the Russian offer of $150 million, the Bolivian government is well aware of the pitfalls, but it must bow to public opinion by sending a delegation to Moscow this week to discuss the Russian terms. The delegates have orders to ask tough questions.