The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour

Intro JIM LEHRER: Good evening. Leading the news this Thursday, an unmanned NASA rocket went out of control and was destroyed shortly after launch at Cape Canaveral. The U. S. --Soviet arms talks recessed in Geneva. Michael Deaver entered an official plea of innocent to perjury charges. And President Reagan said he was sorry about the Supreme Court's affirmative action decision. We'll have the details in our news summary in a moment. Robin? ROBERT MacNEIL: After the news summary, we examine the new political climate on arms control issues with a report by congressional correspondent Cokie Roberts and a debate between Assistant Defense Secretary Richard Perle and Democratic Senator Dale Bumpers. Then we discuss the new climate in U. S. --Soviet relations with the new U. S. ambassador to Moscow Jack Matlock. We have a documentary report from Seattle on safety standards in the commercial fishing industry. And we close with a Roger Mudd essay in the mind set of Washington, D. C. News Summary LEHRER: NASA lost another rocket late this afternoon. An Atlas Centaur rocket went out of control 60 seconds after launch at Cape Canaveral, Florida. NASA officials then destroyed it by radio remote control. The rocket was carrying an $83 million military communications satellite. Here's what a portion of the launch sounded like from NASA's mission control.

NASA OFFICIAL: And we have lift off. Lift off of AC with the fleet satcom F 6. Vehicle has cleared the tower. The role program has commenced. Its program is in, the vehicle now beginning to move down range. The two main Atlas engines will burn for two minutes and 35 seconds, then be jettisoned. The vehicle looks good. Very clean burn coming from the Atlas stage. Coming up now on 30 seconds into the flight. No problems reported with the Atlas stage. Flight proceeding very normally. We have lost telemetry. We don't know quite why yet. We have no data. We have an indication that the vehicle did go out of control just before we lost telemetry. We have had a loss of thrust. Powered flight has been discontinued. LEHRER: NASA officials said afterward the rocket was destroyed to keep it from falling into populated areas. Its wreckage fell into the Atlantic Ocean several miles offshore, they said. NASA had seven successful rocket launches since the three failures last year that included the space shuttle Challenger tragedy. Robin? MacNEIL: The United States and the Soviet Union recessed their Geneva talks on medium range missiles today to await some fresh political impetus. Diplomats on both sides said they were waiting until Secretary of State Shultz met Soviet Foreign Minister Shevardnadze in Moscow in April. Prospects for an agreement to remove medium range missiles in Europe rose last month, when Moscow said it didn't have to be linked to curbs on President Reagan's Strategic Defense Initiative. Today, the U. S. side said there were still difficult issues to resolve. In Washington, debate continued over the administration's re interpretation of the 1972 Anti Ballistic Missile Treaty. State Department Legal Adviser Abraham Sofaer ran into criticism from Democratic senators, including Patrick Leahy of Vermont.

Sen. PATRICK LEAHY (D) Vermont: I just wonder how you can allow yourself to be a party to what I think is a charade. I really think this is a charade. Your legal skills have been used to try to rewrite a treaty 15 years after it's signed by the President, after it is advised and consented to by the United States Senate. ABRAHAM SOFAER, State Department Legal Adviser: I regret you feel that way, Senator. I would suggest that if you look at the negotiating record study, you will see -- and you will see, furthermore, in the rest of the work that we turn out -- that there are very substantial and real questions that have to be looked at in connection with this question of what the ABM Treaty means. MacNEIL: Defense Secretary Weinberger said today that even if arms control agreements covering all manner of nuclear weapons were reached, the Strategic Defense Initiative or Star Wars should still be built, because it was the only way of being sure Americans could be protected. Weinberger said he thought there was a good chance of agreement on intermediate range missiles in Europe. LEHRER: President Reagan expressed dissatisfaction today with the Supreme Court's affirmative action decision. He told reporters he disagreed with the high court's six to three approval yesterday of promoting women over men to correct past discrimination against women.

Pres. RONALD REAGAN: Obviously, I disagree with the decision. But the court has made it, and I'm not going to quarrel with that. But all our position has been is that we shouldn't let affirmative action deteriorate into a quota system that would then be counter discriminary or discriminatory. LEHRER: The President made the comments as he left the White House for Columbia, Missouri -- the first trip outside Washington since his prostate surgery in January. He spoke to an education conference in Columbia, saying money was not the key to higher quality education. And he stopped by a sixth grade civics class while he was there. And there, he was asked about the Iran arms affair.

Pres. REAGAN: I'm afraid it wasn't carried out the way we had thought it would be. It sort of settled down to just trading arms for hostages. And that's a little like paying ransom to a kidnapper. If you do it, then the kidnapper's just encouraged to go kidnap someone else. MacNEIL: One of the American hostages in Lebanon, Jesse Turner, today confirmed that a fellow hostage, Alan Steen, is dying. In a videotape released by the kidnappers, Turner said, ''The situation is very tough. Our fellow Alan Steen is dying. The doctor said in his report that he had a crisis in his blood pressure. '' Earlier this week, the group called Islamic Jihad said they might free Steen if Israel released 100 Arab prisoners. Israel has refused. Steen and Turner are two of four teachers at Beirut University College kidnapped last January. LEHRER: Michael Deaver pleaded innocent today to perjury charges. The longtime Reagan friend and former White House official was arraigned in a Washington federal court. He is charged with five counts of lying to a grand jury and to a congressional committee about his lobbying activities. In New York City and another federal courtroom today, a former Secretary of the Treasury pleaded guilty to tax evasion and bank fraud. He is 77 year old Robert B. Anderson, who served in the Eisenhower cabinet. He admitted evading taxes on income in 1984 and operating an illegal, offshore bank. He faces a maximum prison sentence of ten years. MacNEIL: The Democratic chairmen of the House and Senate Budget Committees both offered 1988 budget proposals today. The Senate chairman released a plan he called better than President Reagan's. Senator Lawton Chiles presented a proposal to cut the budget deficit by $37 billion -- half of that from taxation and half from spending cuts. He told reporters the committee would consider raising taxes on tobacco, alcohol and gasoline. The House Budget Committee Chairman, Congressman Bill Gray, said his plan was also better than the President's. And he said the budget deficit would be less than the $108 billion Gramm Rudman target. LEHRER: The new board of the PTL Television Ministry moved today to restore credibility to its shaken enterprise. Board Chairman Jerry Falwell told reporters in Fort Mill, South Carolina, there will be a full financial audit of the organization. He also said former PTL head Jim Bakker will continue to be paid out of compassion but that he would not be returning to his leadership post. Bakker resigned last week, following the disclosure of an extramarital affair with a church secretary. Falwell was asked about the scandal's impact on the ministry.

Rev. JERRY FALWELL: Of course it's embarrassing. I'm a parent. If my children misbehave, I'm embarrassed for them and for Mom and Dad. But I don't discard them. I don't disown them. I try to help them not to do it again. The same is true in the family of God. Of course, we're all embarrassed when a brother or sister falls. But we don't discard them or disown them. We attempt to restore them. MacNEIL: That's our summary of the news. Ahead on the News Hour, the politics of arms control, the new ambassador to Moscow, safety for fishermen, and a Roger Mudd essay. Disarming Politics LEHRER: We lead tonight with what they're calling the Sam Nunn debate. Nunn is the Democratic senator from Georgia. Some in Congress and elsewhere claim he has single handedly change the nature of the arms control debate in this country by disputing the administration's attempt to broaden the reading of the 1972 Anti Ballistic Missile Treaty. That claim has been labelled nonsense by those in the administration and elsewhere who disagree. Senator Dale Bumpers is here with us tonight to make the claim, Assistant Secretary Richard Perle to call it nonsense. They will do so after our congressional correspondent Cokie Roberts tells the Nunn story.

COKIE ROBERTS [voice over]: One of President Reagan's highest priorities has been the development of a space based defense shield designed to protect against incoming missiles. Derided by opponents as a technologically ridiculous Star Wars concept, the administration's allies went to the people to gain support for the Strategic Defense Initiative. [clip from ad] CHILD: I asked my daddy what the Star Wars stuff is all about. He said that right now we can't protect ourselves from nuclear weapons. And that's why the President wants to build a peace shield.

ROBERTS [voice over]: For the last few years, Congress has appropriated funds for SDI research. But as the pressure heats up to go beyond research to testing and development, the argument about whether the Anti Ballistic Missile Treaty allows those steps becomes more urgent. The issue came before a joint hearing of two Senate committees today. The author of the Reagan administration's interpretation, State Department Counsel Abraham Sofaer, and one of the Pentagon's staunchest supporters of SDI, Richard Perle, were the chief witnesses. RICHARD PERLE, Assistant Secretary of Defense: The question before us is whether we will, by tying our hands in a manner that is neither necessary nor wise, dash the hope that we might continue the SDI program in an efficient and effective manner. For adoption by the Congress of a restrictive statute prohibiting the development and testing upon which the success of the SDI program ultimately depends will damage it once and in time destroy this vital program to defend against ballistic missiles. Mr. SOFAER: I was asked by the President of the United States, ''What is the scope of my discretion under the ABM Treaty?'' Now, it's quite clear he can renounce the treaty. He can also negotiate with the Soviets about the treaty. But the question is, does he have any other options. And a lawyer is supposed to tell his client if he has any other options. And I looked at the treaty. Everyone told -- a lot of people said it was clear and unambiguous. Everyone now agrees it's ambiguous -- or a lot of people do, anyway. ROBERTS: This whole issue -- the Anti Ballistic Missile Treaty's interpretation and its implications for the Strategic Defense Initiative -- has been greatly influenced by one man. Perhaps at no time in modern history have one senator's views so affected the course of debate. The man is Sam Nunn, who took charge recently of the Armed Services Committee. Two weeks ago, Nunn provided the Senate with an exhaustive study of the ABM Treaty and its implications. Sen. SAM NUNN (D) Alabama: Based on the information provided to the Senate to date by the State Department, I have found no evidence which contradicted the Senate's original understanding of the meaning of the treaty. On the contrary, I noted that successive administrations, including this administration -- the Reagan administration -- had prior to1985 consistently indicated that the treaty banned the development and testing of mobile space based ABMs using exotics.

ROBERTS [voice over]: For three days, the conservative pro defense Democrat stood on the floor of the Senate detailing his conclusions. The treaty, he insisted, could not be interpreted to allow testing and deployment of space based antimissile systems. A pro arms control colleague, Michigan Democrat Carl Levin, describes the impact of those three days. Sen. CARL LEVIN (D) Michigan: I'm afraid it's something like the Titanic hitting the iceberg, saying Nunn was the iceberg and the re interpretation of Judge Sofaer hit it and is sinking rapidly. ROBERTS [voice over]: Senator Levin's view is shared by Tennessee Democrat Albert Gore, who had tried unsuccessfully to work out a deal with the administration on the ABM interpretation. Sen. ALBERT GORE (D) Tennessee: Sam Nunn has changed the calculus of arms control outcomes with his definitive statements on why the traditional interpretation of the ABM Treaty is the only legally correct interpretation. ROBERTS [voice over]: Supporters of the Strategic Defense Initiative agree that Nunn has changed the calculus, and that's distressing to New York Republican Jack Kemp. Sen. JACK KEMP (R) New York: It mystifies me why Sam Nunn would be taking this position when, in fact, he has been one of the champions of using a nuclear deterrent to keep the alliance between the United States and NATO alive. Sen. NUNN: Well, that's rather easy to answer. The old story is that that bed was on fire when I got into it. I didn't start this debate. It is a legal debate because the legal interpretation -- the re interpretation -- was a matter that they came up with based on their own analysis. They were the ones who reinterpreted the treaty. And the only way you can respond to that and examine -- determine if indeed they are correct in that is to look at the legal part of it yourself. And that's what the Senate's done. That's what I'm doing. ROBERTS: Do you see any political motivation? Sen. GORE: I really do not. It's hard ever to completely divorce such considerations from actions taken in the Congress. But I personally feel that he would have come out in exactly the same place, regardless of whether or not people were mentioning him as a potential dark horse candidate. Sen. LEVIN: I don't believe there's a political motive behind it. He has always supported, in general, the purpose of the ABM Treaty. ROBERTS [voice over]: Democratic political consultant Greg Schneiders argues, whatever the motive, Nunn's statements were good politics. GREG SCHNEIDERS, political consultant: It is an issue that he's been involved in for a long time and cares deeply about. So I think you can explain it without resorting to a political explanation. But I think it's good politics for him too. It's an issue that he has great credibility on and in which he can really move the debate significantly. And I think that's a demonstration of leadership, which is what voters ultimately are looking for in candidates for the Senate or for President. Sen. NUNN: Once your name has been mentioned by the great mentioner in that Presidential business, then there are people who disagree with you on any decision you come up with, whether it's the people on the right or the left who will say, ''Oh, if he disagrees with me, he must be doing it for political purposes. '' The answer to it is, that's crazy. The last thing I want to do is to spend somewhere between 50 and 75 hours on a subject like this as a Presidential move. It just simply does not make sense. I do not believe that we have reached the point where the -- a debate about the ABM Treaty is going to have an appreciable effect on the 1988 Presidential choice. ROBERTS [voice over]: Now that Nunn has shifted the debate toward acceptance of the narrower version of the ABM Treaty, the question is where the Congress goes from here. Sen. LEVIN: If we just gave an unlimited amount of money to the President or a large amount of money without limits on it, we would, in effect, be participating in that new interpretation. Sen. KEMP: I want to just emphasize one more time, the Soviet Union is developing its own ABM ballistic missile defense system -- an SDI program. They're testing it in space. They have violated ABM with their Krazniarsk radar. And while we debate ABM, they're moving towards that breakout potential and capability. And it's a very, very serious moment for American foreign policy to have us becoming legalistic and challenging the President with a constitutional crisis when we've got to get on with the problem of defending ourselves and our allies in Europe and in Israel and around the world. Sen. NUNN: Well, if that's the case, the Reagan administration in six years up to this date has never said that. They never said that. There may be some people saying that. They have listed violations the Soviets are suspected of, including one that I agree with them on, and that is the so called Krazniarsk radar. But that has nothing to do with the narrow or broad interpretation of the treaty. LEHRER: And now to one each of the Strategic Defense Initiative's major advocates and critics. Assistant Secretary of Defense Richard Perle is the advocate. Senator Dale Bumpers, Democrat of Arkansas is the critic. He joins us from Capitol Hill. Mr. Secretary, what do you think the impact of the Nunn speeches have been on this debate about SDI and the ABM Treaty? Mr. PERLE: Well, I think it's helped to focus attention on an important issue and an issue that in the normal course of events might not have received the attention in the Senate of the United States that it deserves. I'm convinced that a serious debate -- one in which senators read and reflect on the negotiating record that led to the ABM Treaty in 1972 -- will lead a majority of the Senate to the conclusion that the Soviet Union never accepted the interpretation that would restrict the United States in what is commonly referred to as the restrictive interpretation of the treaty. LEHRER: In other words, Nunn brought the attention, but he's wrong. Mr. PERLE: I think he's wrong on the facts. I think the record will demonstrate that. I think the more senators we can encourage to read that record and study it, the better. Since Senator Nunn gave his speech, Senator Hollings has examined the record and has come to precisely the opposite conclusion. He believes that the broad interpretation is justified. I think you'll see other senators lining up on both sides of this issue. But I'm confident that a majority of the Senate will not impose on the President the kinds of restrictions that will do such damage both to the SDI program and to the critical negotiations we have underway now in Geneva. And I'm not even sure Sam Nunn would vote to do that. LEHRER: Senator Bumpers, what's your feeling about what the majority of the Senate feels about this issue now, as a result of what Senator Nunn did? Sen. DALE BUMPERS (D) Arkansas: Well, I feel a majority of the Senate -- probably as many as 70% -- would agree with Senator Nunn's interpretation of the treaty. When you consider the fact that six of the past seven Secretaries of Defense, all of today's sitting chiefs of staff, including the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Admiral Crowe, and all the negotiators who negotiated this treaty, you find that Secretary Perle and Judge Sofaer and Secretary Weinberger are almost isolated and alone in their interpretation. There are a few senators who will accept Judge Sofaer's interpretation and agree to a broad interpretation, because they are so committed to getting something up in space to commit us to SDI. But I can tell you that Congress, in my opinion, is not about to go along with the broad interpretation and trash the treaty. When we unilaterally interpret that treaty the way Secretary Perle proposes to do, that is tantamount to trashing the treaty. The Soviets may be dumb, but they aren't stupid. And they're not going to sit idly by and say after 14 years that we can change the interpretation of the treaty that everybody has lived with for 14 years to accommodate a military of strategic or political interest in this country. So in summary, I think this is one the administration's going to lose. And I think Secretary Perle's position is certainly going to lose. LEHRER: You're saying that when it comes right down to it, it's not a legal argument anymore. It's going to become a geopolitical argument between the positions of the United States and the Soviet Union? Sen. BUMPERS: To the contrary, there is a legal argument to be made. I am what you call a country lawyer. And there are a lot of country lawyers, I guess, in the United States Senate. But when you look at the language and you look at the debate in the Senate when it was being ratified, you find that the debate was very clear. Even Secretary Perle's former boss, Senator Scoop Jackson, engaged in debate on the floor specifically setting out -- and I don't want to get into all of that, because we'll lose our viewing audience if we get too detailed -- but Senator Jackson specifically pointed out that sea, air and space based mobile systems were absolutely prohibited. Only fixed base land systems could employ futuristic systems. And with that, Jim, if I might, I might just pose a question for Secretary Perle. And that is, what we're trying to do is tantamount to trashing the treaty, as the President has already trashed SALT II. We virtually have nothing left now to restrain the arms race. My question is, the treaty provides that either side can unilaterally torpedo the treaty or withdraw upon giving six months' notice. Now, if we're going to do this when virtually all the legal arguments in the country -- and I just gave you a list of the people who negotiated the treaty a moment ago -- said that Senator Nunn is absolutely correct, why not just serve notice on the Soviets that we're going withdraw from the treaty and stop this legalistic argument and this charade in order to get something into space, God knows what. LEHRER: Secretary Perle? Mr. PERLE: Well, we profoundly disagree on the question of what the correct interpretation of the treaty is. Senator Bumpers is begging the question by declaring that the administration and its legal analysis is trashing the treaty. He says he's a country lawyer. The problem is, we've got too many country lawyers and not enough international lawyers looking at this. What is at issue here is, what did the Soviet Union agree to? What did the United States and the Soviet Union together agree would constitute the rights and the obligations of the parties under a contract between them in 1972? And when you read the record of that negotiation carefully -- I've read it carefully, Judge Sofaer has read it carefully -- you will discover that, over and over again, the American negotiators tried to get the Soviets to accept a restricted view of their rights to do certain kinds of testing in space and elsewhere. And over and over again, the Soviets refused to accept the American proposals. Ultimately, those proposals were withdrawn. And in their place, there was compromise language which we believe can only be interpreted correctly in terms of that negotiating record. So we're quite confident about that. LEHRER: And you deny the senator's suggestion or statement that you want to do away with the treaty. Mr. PERLE: No, if we wanted to do away with the treaty, the senator's quite right. We have the right under the terms of the treaty to give notice and withdraw in six months' time. But that's not in our interest, and we don't propose to do that. LEHRER: Mr. Secretary, what's going on here? What, from your perspective? Why, first of all, did the administration -- I mean, as the senator says, this treaty was ratified 14 years ago. Why has this suddenly come up now? Just because of SDI, right? Mr. PERLE: There was no program. There was no SDI program, so the treaty was irrelevant to the behavior of the United States. The Department of Defense did not need guidance on what it could and couldn't do, because it wasn't doing anything at all. Once we began the program in 1983, as a society based on laws, we instructed our lawyers to go out and examine the treaty and its associated negotiating record and tell us what we could and what we couldn't do. They did that. They read the treaty with a fresh eye. They delved into the negotiating record. And they came back and told us that there were certain things we could do with respect to tests in space, provided that the systems involved were based on new technologies. Because that's what had been agreed in 1972. LEHRER: Did the U. S. ask the Soviet Union how they interpreted the treaty, or did you all know when you went the broad route that you were going to start this flap? Mr. PERLE: We had no idea. We had no idea. And in fact, the lawyer who did the original research had never read the treaty. He'd never read the negotiating record. And I was astonished when I sat down with the record that he compiled and saw how successfully the Soviets had resisted the American effort to constrain development and testing. LEHRER: Senator, what do you make of that story? Sen. BUMPERS: Well, let me just shift gears for a moment, Jim, and to say that the truth of the matter is, he says that the subject has never come up before. And to an extent, that's true. The reason it hasn't come up before is because there was never any argument about the interpretation of the treaty. In 1972, Secretary Laerd pointed out very carefully, in response to a question, I think, from Congress, what the treaty permitted and what it did not permit. This record was made abundantly clear. One of the really paradoxical things about this whole thing is we're arguing about a legal interpretation of a treaty here when, if you can get past that, what would we do if Secretary Perle's position prevailed? What would we put up in space? Now, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Crowe, the top military man in the United States, says this is not technologyout on the parking lot that you just go retrieve and put in space. Harold Braun said it would be years before we could put anything in space. What they want to do is not put a new technology in space; they want to put some kinetic energy devices in space by 1992 in order to try to commit Congress to the total deployment of SDI. Now, that's what all the Joint Chiefs of Staff say would be premature. And Harold Braun and George Miller -- Harold Braun being the former Secretary of Defense, and George Miller being the head of Lawrence Livermore Laboratories in California -- testified this very day here on Capitol Hill that to put kinetic energy devices in space right now would be the height of folly, because the Soviet Union could destroy those -- could defeat those things by simply increasing the burn phase of their booster rockets. And probably for one tenth of the cost it would take us to put those things in space. LEHRER: Let's ask the secretary, is that what you all are up to? Mr. PERLE: No, of course not. We don't propose to do anything of the sort. What we are doing is a program of research, development and testing aimed at determining whether we can provide an effective defense for this country. We have none today. We have no ability whatsoever to interfere with a missile that might be launched at the United States, whether from the Soviet Union or anyplace else. LEHRER: Let me ask you this, Mr. Secretary, finally. Do you see any connection between the possibility of Senator Nunn's being a Democratic candidate for President or a 1988 Presidential year at all -- any connection between that and this position and what's happened here on the ABM Treaty? Mr. PERLE: No, I think that Sam Nunn, who's a serious and effective senator and a patriotic American, would not create an issue where there is no issue for the sake of political advantage. LEHRER: So it's an honest difference of opinion? Mr. PERLE: It's an honest difference of opinion. And I hope the critics of the administration position and Jim Sofaer and the rest of us will accord us the same courtesy in regarding our motives as serious and patriotic as well. LEHRER: Senator Bumpers, as a Democrat, this is a good issue, though, right? Do you think for '88? Sen. BUMPERS: Jim, you know, if Senator Nunn was doing this for political purposes, he would be the next President of the United States. Because probably 95% of the American people agree with his position on this. LEHRER: Is that right, Mr. Secretary. Sen. BUMPERS: I don't think that was the reason at all. Senator Nunn did a very detailed, laborious study of this, came up with one of the most cogent, persuasive documents I have ever seen, which I thought made imminent good sense, was imminently correct. And I must say again, Secretary Perle and Secretary Weinberger and Judge Sofaer are virtually alone in their interpretation of the treaty. LEHRER: Ninety five percent of the American people agree with Senator Nunn and Senator Bumpers? Mr. PERLE: I think if you asked the American people what their view is of agreed statement D modifying article 5 of the 1972 treaty, not only would 95% not have an opinion; I doubt if you'd have one tenth of one percent who had an opinion. LEHRER: I won't take your bet. Mr. Secretary, Senator, thank you both very much. Sen. BUMPERS: Thank you, Jim. Our Man in Moscow MacNEIL: U. S. --Soviet relations are likely to be a dominant issue for the remainder of the Reagan administration. And we talk next withthe man who will be in the middle of that process: Jack Matlock, who was sworn in today as U. S. ambassador to the Soviet Union. A professional diplomat, Mr. Matlock is the former Director of Soviet Affairs at the State Department and the Soviet experts at the National Security Council since 1983. This will be his fourth tour in Moscow, and it come at a time of considerable ferment inside the Soviet Union itself. Welcome, Mr. Ambassador. Washington officials seem to come of two kinds these days: people who are pessimistic about U. S. relations with the Soviets and people who are optimistic. Which kind are you? JACK MATLOCK, U. S. ambassador to Moscow: Well, I'm certainly optimistic that we are going to manage our relations with the Soviet Union peacefully. I'm not one of these who feels that we're on a collision course in terms of a military confrontation. On the other hand, I'm one who believes that the differences are very deep, that we're likely to be in an adversarial relationship for the foreseeable future, and that we must stay strong in order to keep the peace, and at the same time that we must negotiate in order to manage the relationship and, if possible, achieve some progress in solving some of the problems. MacNEIL: Nothing different there than any newly appointed American ambassador to the Soviet Union might have said over the last several decades. Is that right? Amb. MATLOCK: Probably so. MacNEIL: Do you feel -- is there some difference, though, right now, or are we all looking at something that is a myth? Do you feel you're taking up the Moscow embassy at a moment that is unique -- historically unique or uniquely right for some constructive improvement in relations? Amb. MATLOCK: Whether it turns out to be unique or not, I believe history will judge. I do think that there are possibilities -- real possibilities -- now, which may not have existed to the same degree in the past. First of all, I think we have a very good and well balanced American policy -- a solid one involving both the firmness and strength to keep peace and to negotiate and a willingness to negotiate. Second, I think we do see some Soviet policies and practices modifying in a way which, if this continues, could be very healthy for the relationship. MacNEIL: Are you excited, as somebody who has spent a good deal of your life studying the Soviet Union and the Russian language and everything? Are you excited at some sense that this may be a historic opportunity? Amb. MATLOCK: Well, yes, in the sense that, as one who has specialized in Russian language and Soviet affairs and particularly in Russian culture, there's always a certain excitement in going to Moscow and having a chance to meet old friends and acquaintances there. In that sense, yes. In another sense, of course, as one sees some of the changes which are taking place, it is an interesting time, I believe, to be there. I was in Moscow as a junior diplomat in 1961, when Mr. Khrushchev made his public speech against Stalin. I saw the process of thaw and opening up that occurred for a few years after that. I recall that as a very exciting period intellectually. MacNEIL: Do you expect it to be exciting to go back now and find some relative freedom -- some dissidents freed, some poets and other writers rehabilitated, their works allowed to be published. How would you describe this present ferment as compared with the thaw under Khrushchev? Amb. MATLOCK: Well, I think we've not, of course, seen the outcome. A number of things have happened which I believe are to be welcomed. At the same time, I think it would be premature to conclude that the problems are solved. They're not. There are many problems still out there. And I think the interesting thing is going to be to observe to what degree developments will move us toward a more constructive relationship or whether this doesn't happen. And we have many examples in the past where hopes were not fulfilled. MacNEIL: How does an American ambassador who knows the Soviet Union well and speaks the language -- how do you use that in practical terms there. You live a sort of circumscribed life there, don't you? Amb. MATLOCK: Oh, I think one can exaggerate the degree to which life is circumscribed. Obviously, in some respects it is. On the other hand, I've always found that I could do a number of relevant things and about as much as I had time to do. First of all, I do all of my official business, unless it is a highly technical and formal negotiation, in Russian. I believe it's normal to expect diplomats in Washington to use English, and I think that it's only normal in a capital to do that. And I think that does help. It gets your points across. Second, I would hope to have the opportunity to use the language also in a more public way. It's too early to tell how much public exposure we'll get. But I certainly will be available for the media. And if they will accept me, I'll be very happy to go on shows like this there, explaining our policies, explaining why we act as we do. MacNEIL: In practical matters, shortly after you get there, there's going to be a big meeting between Secretary Shultz and Shevardnadze, his opposite member, to discuss a lot of issues. And when it was announced, U. S. officials were saying maybe a summit. Do you have a feeling still that another summit is in the air? Amb. MATLOCK: Well, I think Secretary Shultz's visit is very important. And the secretary will be going over the whole gamut of the relationship. Now, whether a summit is in the air or not, it's hard to say. The President has invited Mr. Gorbachev to visit the United States. And I'm sure he is welcome whenever he decides that he would like to make that visit. But as far as I know, there has been no move to indicate that he is interested at this point in setting a date. MacNEIL: What happened to the euphoria of several weeks ago about the prospect of an agreement on intermediate range nuclear missiles? The talks recessed today. Some people in Geneva, it was just reported, were saying, ''Well, I need to wait until the Shultz Shevardnadze meeting before they can move ahead. '' How do you read all that? Amb. MATLOCK: Well, one thing, I think the euphoria is always dangerous in this relationship. The steps we take are likely to be limited ones, though sometimes they may be important. Actually, I think the position or the condition of negotiations on the INF agreement are pretty good. This doesn't mean that we are there yet. We're not. And we have some important things still to negotiate. But the agreements that were made at Reykjavik, which really agreed on the most basic elements that would go into it, plus the fact that the Soviets have now de linked this from the other issues, I think is promising. Now, if we find that they will negotiate promptly, as they had assured us they would, such provisions as the verification provisions we have proposed, then I think we can move rapidly toward an agreement. But obviously, one takes a recess from time to time. This certainly will be one of the topics that Secretary Shultz brings up next month when he comes to Moscow. MacNEIL: Well, has it reached a point where the two secretaries or their governments need to decide something before the talks can go ahead any further? Amb. MATLOCK: Well, I think it will be useful for them to discuss the issues there. I would not go so far as to say they have to decide something before the talks can go ahead. Presumably, the negotiations will resume in Geneva at an appropriate time. When we have higher level political meetings, one always hopes that the maximum number of issues are solved. But again, experience tells us that this sometimes is a slow process. MacNEIL: You've been in the Moscow -- served in the Moscow embassy before. You're going to take it over at a somewhat awkward time. The Soviet personnel have moved out because of the situation last year. A second Marine guard is now under arrest. And the reports from officials are that he and the first arrested Marine guard fraternized with Soviet women, were seduced. And even today, it's reported allowed Soviet agents inside the embassy. I'd like to ask you this. Obviously, you can't go into the details of the case. But how do you provide a life in a place like Moscow for young Marine personnel who'd be expected to be interested in pretty Soviet girls and pretty any other girls? Is there something about the culture of that embassy that makes situations like this more likely than you'd like them to be? Amb. MATLOCK: I don't think a situation of that sort is particularly likely. I think the problems that have been uncovered, occurred last year, were very unusual. Obviously, these are matters under investigation, and I would not be able and should not go into details. But I would say, obviously, for many people, particularly those who are not specialists in the area, the life can be difficult -- particularly for young, single people. That is true. And this is a problem in embassy management. But it is one which I believe is manageable. What is remarkable, I believe, is the fact that we have had so few such problems over the years. And I think that, on the whole, this is because we have selected our people very carefully. And the fact that once in a while we do come across a bad situation shouldn't blind us to the fact that we have a very large number of very dedicated, highly skilled and loyal people working there, and I think working very heroically under conditions which are often adverse in terms of efficiency and normal living. MacNEIL: Well, Ambassador Matlock, thank you and good luck. Safety Catch LEHRER: Going fishing is one of life's most pleasant and peaceful ways of life, but not if it's done commercially, which is considered one of the most dangerous industries in America. Legislation was introduced in Congress today to do something about it. We have a report by Lee Hochberg of public station KCTS, Seattle.

LEE HOCHBERG [voice over]: When this commercial fishing boat sank in the North Atlantic in 1980, four crewmen died. They were among the 75 people who died that year and who die every year in commercial fishing accidents. More than 250 boats go down in American waters every year. It's the most dangerous industry in America today. Families all over the country have lost friends and loved ones to commercial fishing. Peggy Barry of Washington, D. C. , lost her son. PEGGY BARRY, victim's mother: I can't think of anything harder than losing a child. Because it's your future. HOCHBERG [voice over]: Pete Zimny of Edmunds, Washington, lost two sons in two separate accidents. PETE ZIMNY, victim's father: I feel a total loss. But there's nothing that will really bring them back. HOCHBERG [voice over]: The ocean itself makes fishing dangerous. Conditions are harsh, and the weather can change without warning. In the Bering Sea off Alaska, winds may howl at more than 60 knots. Icy, 40 foot waves spring up suddenly. But more and more people outside the industry say many fishing deaths could be prevented. They occur only because the commercial fishing vessel, like no other workplace in America, operates without government safety regulations. Capt. JOHN deCARTERET, U. S. Coast Guard, retired: Basically, the fishing industry is the last frontier. It's the last unregulated business in the United States. HOCHBERG [voice over]: Coast Guard Captain John deCarteret of Seattle investigated sunken fishing vessels for 30 years before retiring last year. Capt. deCARTERET: Basically, the only thing the Coast Guard can do is check for fire extinguishers and life jackets on the vessel and see that they don't pump oil over the side. HOCHBERG: A dangerous industry like that with no -- Capt. deCARTERET: With absolutely no regulation. There is none. HOCHBERG [voice over]: Free of safety regulations, many owners take ships to sea that are old, battered, unseaworthy and without life rafts. And the Coast Guard says ship owners often aggravate the problem by re configuring their boats, adding heavy, new equipment in hopes of increasing their catch. Sometimes, that leaves the boat top heavy and prone to capsize. Capt. deCARTERET: What you started out with was just a crab boat. As you can see here, these are the crab pickers, these little cranes right here. They use them to pick the crab pots up, okay? When there was a good crab fishing season, these guys mainly went out, and they used them for crab. However, over the years, the crab has dropped off. And now what we have is a vessel that's probably only being used three or four months out of the year, as far as a crab vessel goes. So the guy doesn't make any money. So what he does is he converts it then to a trawler, so he can go out and catch bottom fish, salmon, whatever else he can get. The conversion then is the adding of the winches, which wouldn't be on there. The adding of the gantry and the troll gear back aft. And what that does is, it adds a tremendous amount of weight. With the addition of the higher weights and without adding some weight down below in order to compensate and re lower your center of gravity on the vessel, the vessel then becomes basically unstable. And in a heavy sea, it can capsize. HOCHBERG [voice over]: That's what happened to this boat, the Aleutian Harvester, in 1985. A few months after these pictures were taken, the Aleutian Harvester took on water and capsized in the frigid waters of the Bering Sea, drowning its crew of three. Mr. ZIMNY: Two hundred and fifty vessels go down along our coast every year. And if I can help five fathers or five mothers, then I've done something in memory of my sons. HOCHBERG [voice over]: Pete Zimny willingly shares the story of his oldest son Mark, who went down with the Aleutian Harvester. Zimny lost two sons in two separate commercial fishing accidents. Eighteen year old Mitchell died when his fishing boat mysteriously vanished on Puget Sound. Mark's death on the Harvester had come only a few months earlier. And the story of the Harvester torments Zimny to this day. Mr. ZIMNY: They knew they had electrical problems, and they knew they had hatch cover problems. But yet -- and they knew they didn't have the stability and sent the boat out with those boys on it, because they wanted to fish now. Anything that it can possibly do to get the fish to make money. Pushing them beyond the limit that the boat can endure and beyond the limit possibly men can endure. And there's no laws to protect them, not laws for safety. Rep. MIKE LOWRY (D) Washington: When I first started looking at this a couple of years ago after these tragedies, I found this lack of safety preparation absolutely absurd. HOCHBERG [voice over]: The safety bill Washington Congressman Mike Lowry introduced today is like one that failed last year. It required basic safety equipment to be aboard any fishing vessel. Rep. LOWRY: I mean, this is equipment that makes sense. You're saying no lifeboats on a fishing boat, no survival suits for the crew, no emergency beacons so that you can locate a downed boat. These are, relatively speaking, not very expensive. And how in the world do those not make sense? HOCHBERG [voice over]: They might make sense, but they cost dollars -- anywhere from $4,000 to $10,000 per boat, Lowry says. And the fishing industry long has opposed such costs. JOHN SABELLA, North Pacific Vessel Owners Association: The simple fact of the matter is that regulation, by itself, in and of itself, is no panacea. It doesn't solve the problem. HOCHBERG [voice over]: John Sabella heads an industry group: the North Pacific Fishing Vessel Owners Association. Mr. SABELLA: Fishing is never going to be safe. If anybody thinks that that is what regulation is going to do for us, that's simply naive. HOCHBERG [voice over]: Just the same, Sabella said he's support Lowry's bill last year if Congress did something about soaring insurance costs. Vessel owners say those costs may force them out of business. Congress tried. It coupled the safety bill with a provision to cap boat owner's liability at $500,000 if someone's injured or killed on the job. But that doomed the bill. The Association of Trial Lawyers of America moved in to scuttle it. Parents of victims at sea could only stand by as competing self interests drowned the bill. BOB DARLING, victim's father: They were like ants that came to the sugar. People who were lobbying for safety equipment that manufactured it, they were there. The insurance people were there. The Trial Lawyers Associations were there. And I was just absolutely shocked. I couldn't believe it. I thought, we're talking about saving lives. We're talking about making a boat a safe vessel. HOCHBERG [voice over]: Bob Darling is a career navy man whose 25 year old son Stuart died on a rickety, old fishing boat, the Western Sea, in the Gulf of Alaska. Stuart had gone fishing to earn money to go to college. Just days before he died, Stuart told his father that the boat scared him. Mr. DARLING: When I talked to him, he expressed concern over the vessel -- how frightened he was of being on that vessel. The vessel would heel over, and it would hang there. It was the gunnels awash. And then it would come back very slowly. When they were crossing the Gulf of Alaska, it was slipping back and forth. According to my son, it just frightened him. He'd never been so frightened in his life. HOCHBERG [voice over]: Not long after that, Darling received a call from the Alaska State Patrol. Mr. DARLING: And they questioned me if my son were aboard the Western Sea. I said that he was. And then they identified the crewmen that had been recovered. HOCHBERG [voice over]: Bob and Peggy Barry also got a phone call that night, along with four other families. Their son Peter, a Yale student, had drowned. They say Peter had gone fishing after seeing an ad like this one in a college newspaper. Like many college students, he went searching for money and adventure on his summer ROBERT BARRYvacation. , victim's father: The first question I asked was, ''Well, you know, where was the life raft and when was the boat last inspected?'' And then I was told, of course, that all these boats are exempt from any of that. And I was incredulous. I just couldn't imagine that if you operate a 14 foot skiff in the Potomac River out here, you're subject to a lot more regulation than you are if you have a crew of 10 or 15 people on a 60 or 70 foot fishing vessel in some of the most dangerous waters in the world. HOCHBERG [voice over]: The fishing industry's John Sabella is convinced that fishermen can clean up their business on their own. [on camera] In Seattle, Sabella has started a volunteer safety program. These fishermen are learning how to put out a fire that might flare up on ship. TRAINER: We're trying to give them the techniques that they need to be able to fight fire at sea very quickly and effectively, and fight it as a team. Fighting a fire when you're all by yourself in the middle of the ocean with nobody to call on for help is a pretty tough position to be in. HOCHBERG [voice over]: Sabella's program also trains Seattle fishermen to use lifeboats and survival suits -- training most fishermen don't have or haven't bothered to get. TRAINER: There's no way to remove the ultimate responsibility for safety from the man on the boat. College kids like Peter Barry flock to Alaska looking for work. They aren't seamen. They don't know a good boat from a bad boat. That lemming migration that heads north every year of college kids looking for work represent a nonprofessional element of the work force that contributes to the problem. HOCHBERG [voice over]: Congressman Lowry says his safety bill has only a 50 50 chance of passing. As it and another bill are debated this session, it will continue to fall to those who go aboard fishing boats to be sure they're safe at sea. Beltway Bound MacNEIL: Finally tonight, we have an essay. Roger Mudd has some thoughts about what separates people in Washington from the rest of America.

ROGER MUDD: This is the capital beltway. And it's no wonder President Reagan likes to get beyond it out into the country, even for a few hours. Because it's inside the beltway that's what's bothering Mr. Reagan and his administration. Inside the beltway are the Democrats, the congressional committees, the special prosecutor, Colonel North, the TV talk shows with all those insiders who know too much. And there's always the press. REPORTER: Did Don Regan pressure you, sir, to change your --

MUDD: Outside the beltway -- that is, in the rest of the country -- there live thousands of President worshippers -- Americans who jump and scream and wave, no matter what. Voters who have probably never heard of General Singlaub or Adnan Kashogi and who wouldn't ask if they had. And outside the beltway, Mr. Reagan gets to fly around in Air Force One, which tends to make any President look powerful, if not downright awesome. So this 66 mile, six lane, concrete loop around the nation's capital has come to symbolize the division between Washington and America. And given a choice, an American politician will go with America every time. Ronald Reagan would like us to believe he really doesn't live inside the beltway; he only works there. And at night, he goes home to his shining city on a hill. And Gary Hart recently made the ultimate anti beltway, anti Washington move. He has transferred his Presidential headquarters out of Washington, so he can run his entire 1988 operation out of Denver. It was probably Lyndon Johnson with his swollen government and Richard Nixon with his sneaking government who gave Washington and life inside the beltway such a bad name. And they spawned a whole new breed of Presidential candidates led by Jimmy Carter, who campaigned directly against the very government they wanted to become. They found it easy to feed off the voters' growing resentment toward Washington, the government and the insiders. Phrases like ''inside the beltway'' and ''inside baseball'' and ''inside politics'' became terms of political disparagement. Sen. ROBERT DOLE, Minority Leader: There is a lot of inside baseball around this town, and we sometimes dwell on things that people in Kansas, for example, wonder why we're wasting our time. Pres. REAGAN: We've spent enough time the last few months on inside Washington politics -- who's up and who's down, who's in and out.

MUDD: Of course, those politicians were not only ridiculing the minutiae of government; they were also ridiculing the reporter's questions so they wouldn't have to answer. For all their public contempt of beltway culture, however, Presidents and politicians could not get along without the 1. 2 million people who live within the beltway's 50 square miles. They depend on the efficiency and the dedication of the Civil Service to carry out their programs. Notice, they are careful to use the phrase ''faceless bureaucrats'' only when they are outside the circulation area of the Washington Post. They rely on the expertise and institutional memory of the congressional, diplomatic and executive career people to protect them from dumb mistakes and embarrassing proposals. And when they get into serious political trouble, Presidents turn instinctively to the beltway insiders. Because insiders love the system, can run the system, and know how to fix the system. President Reagan's summoning of Howard Baker, Frank Carlucci and Kenneth Duberstein is the most recent example. And it was that premiere beltway insider, Attorney Robert Strauss, to whom not only Jimmy Carter turned when his campaign was coming apart in 1980, but also Nancy Reagan when her husband's grip seemed to be coming loose last winter. It is one of politics' sweet ironies: the newly elected come to Washington promising to govern without it, vowing to remain above it. But in the end, they are subsumed by it, dependent on it, identified with it and probably retiring in it. Ronald Reagan is not the first to find out that once you come here, you can't go home again. LEHRER: Again, the major story of this Thursday. NASA lost another rocket. The unmanned vehicle failed one minute after it was launched in a rainstorm from Cape Canaveral. Good night, Robin. MacNEIL: Good night, Jim. That's the News Hour tonight. We'll be back tomorrow. I'm Robert MacNeil. Good night.