The Presidency by Hugh Sidey: Using Words as Weapons

Not too long ago, a guest at any Soviet embassy reception was greeted by a phalanx of unsmiling men in gray, square suits looking for all the world like spies, which they were. A couple of years ago, the image changed. There still were some of the gray bricks lurking in the drapes, but there were also a growing number of well-tailored young men wearing granny glasses and smiles. Indeed, Vladimir Mikoyan, second secretary in the press office and grandson of the old Bolshevik Anastas Mikoyan, could pass for a Duke University graduate student.

This sudden concern for appearance was accompanied by a marked increase in the tidiness, literacy and quantity of Soviet information handouts. They provided, under bright blue headings, quick responses to American statements and also carried the texts of speeches by Soviet leaders. Kremlinologists took note of this cautious entry into the age of total communication, but few others did.

Now we see another evolutionary step. The Soviets have been dragged into the great public arena, where the free nations have always had to contend. Ever since the Korean airliner was shot down we have been at war with the Soviets. This time the salvos have been adjectives and not explosives. The high-intensity rhetoric has frightened some people, and nobody in the diplomatic business dismisses the risk that tempers could boil over and lead to military action.

There is, however, another and more hopeful view. We are arguing instead of fighting, whether at the United Nations, where President Reagan appeared last week, or through the printed statements that rolled off the Kremlin presses in response to Reagan. In this day of cataclysmic weapons, is the pen proving mightier than the Minuteman and the SS-20? Opinions are cautious and contradictory. Still, there has been born in these past chaotic weeks a small idea that more energy, time and wealth are being spent on persuading than on military maneuvering.

Experts at the State Department point out that beneath the rhetorical barrages the actual commitments of troops and other military units in areas of aggravation and possible confrontation (El Salvador, Lebanon) are quite small compared with those of ten or 20 years ago (Viet Nam, Cuba). One top official, watching the angry Shultz-Gromyko meeting in Madrid after the airliner was shot down, saw all the elements of a classic diplomatic explosion and instant walkout. Yet something kept the two men talking. They feared for their images. In this skirmish, Gromyko faltered. He suggested to the world that his government would do it again, and the shock waves were visible on the faces of the world's reporters. They, in turn, conveyed their dismay to readers and listeners back home. But the Soviets could not run off and close the doors as they used to do.

"It is increasingly more difficult to control information and keep it from ordinary people," says Oswald Ganley, information-resources expert at Harvard. Generally speaking, he suggests, the more people talk the less they fight. At the same time, we have to be careful. There are opportunities for misunderstanding if the communication gets careless, as in the Iranian hostage crisis, which Ganley believes was prolonged by excessive rhetoric.