Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, June 7, 1990                   TAG: 9006080721
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-10   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: 
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

SUMMIT OF HOPE U.S.-SOVIET RELATIONS ON RIGHT TRACK

That assessment is true only in a narrow sense. Most of the agreements signed, limits on chemical weapons being one exception, were useful but not central. And deep differences remain on large issues: Germany and NATO, Lithuania and the Baltics, arms control.

Still, to dwell on areas of non-agreement and stalled progress is to ignore how astounding are the changes in U.S.-Soviet relations that formed a backdrop to the summit. Particularly striking was the rapport that seemed to develop between Presidents Bush and Gorbachev, a good omen.

Yes, the deadlock over Germany's future remains. The Bush administration wants a reunited Germany within NATO. The Soviets fear German military as well as economic dominance of the European continent. Nevertheless, there was progress in communicating concerns. Suspicion was noticeably lacking, and neither president seemed troubled by the failure to settle the question.

The new trade agreement, conditions and all, doesn't amount to much. It seems peculiar, and not just a little outrageous, that the United States would withhold Most-Favored-Nation status from Gorbachev's Soviet Union while granting it to the bloody Chinese. Still, Bush has reduced the links between improved trade and Gorbachev's handling of Lithuania's drive for independence. And he seems more moved than ever by an awareness that Gorbachev needs help with the Soviet economy to survive domestic political discontent, and that it serves U.S. interests to offer such help.

In arms control, there is still far to go. The presidents agreed to a plan that will destroy within seven years half the nuclear warheads mounted on missiles. Overall, nearly 70 percent of all nuclear warheads would still exist a decade from now. And the best possible option for now, a comprehensive ban on testing and development of new weapons, is not on the table. Still, the agreement that was achieved does not merely set ceilings on new weapons, but cuts back on those now in firing position.

That little progress was made in some areas only confirms that U.S. and Soviet interests aren't identical. Neither nation has freed itself fully from the shadows and habits of Cold War rivalry. But the summit showed yet more evidence of a shared realization that the old way of judging events - if something is good for one superpower, it must be bad for the other - is outmoded. No longer compelled to suspect the worst, American and Soviet leaders, and the rest of us, can hope for the best.