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24 Obmen or Obman?
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24 OBMEN OR OBMAN ? [Gorbachev’s] “new political thinking” is the indirect result of a long-term process that includes both U.S. containment policy after World War II and the détente of the s, which exposed an influential part of the Soviet elite to Western achievements and values. — . ,“The Pacification of Ronald Reagan” What a difference an“a”makes! Obmen is the Russian word for“exchange,”obman the Russian word for “deception,” and some Americans saw exchanges with the Soviet Union as deceptions. Supporters of exchanges sensed, as the late Alexander Dallin presciently put it, “that the impact of contacts and exposure, whether bread or circus, cannot fail to field a slow, perhaps imperceptible cumulation of new attitudes, perspectives, learning , borrowing. . . . It is bound to make for healthier, more open human relations, whose ultimate political expression remains moot.”1 Dallin also thought that the Soviet leadership underestimated the subtle, long-range impact of dealing with the outside world:“Whatever their severe limitations, every visit to the Soviet Union by an Albee or Steinbeck, a Böll or Stravinsky; every trip abroad by a Kapitsa or Voznesensky ; every USIA exhibit in Rostov or Novosibirsk; every college glee club performing in Vilnius or Tbilisi; every Japanese trade delegation touring Soviet industry, has a subtle effect that perhaps none can fathom or weigh.”2 And, as Walter Laqueur predicted in : “Even if the Soviet leaders regarded peaceful coexistence only as a tactical phase in their ultimate strategy of expanding their political power, was it not possible that a lengthy period of peaceful coexistence and collaboration would trigger irreversible changes in the Soviet system—not of course in a year or two, but in the perspective of several decades?”3 Fifteen years later, that view was endorsed by John D. Negroponte, U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for Oceans and Environmental and Scientific Affairs: “A good case can be made that scientific exchanges provide opportunities for an articulate and politically sensitive sector of Soviet society to be exposed to Western methods, ideas, and values in ways which would not otherwise be possible. I cannot help but believe that such opportunities, . Alexander Dallin, “Current Frustrations and Long-Range Dividends” (paper presented at the conference “Russia and the West: Cultural Contacts and Influences,” Schloss Leopoldskron, Salzburg, Austria, October –November , ). . Ibid. .Walter Laqueur,“Kissinger and the Politics of Détente,”Commentary , no. (December ): . steadily sustained over the years, could make a contribution to the gradual opening of Soviet society, with attendant benefits for the human rights situation.”4 But there were also critics who saw the Soviet Union as gaining more from the exchanges than the United States, particularly in science and technology. Among the more outspoken critics was Richard Perle, a long-time staffer of the Senate Subcommittee on International Security, Proliferation, and Federal Services, chaired by Senator Henry Jackson, and later Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Policy in the Reagan administration. Perle, in , charged that “our Government has long known that the Soviet Union has had an aggressive program of acquiring American and other Western technologies and knowhow . . . . In the détente of the ’s, the Soviet Union got the lion’s share of benefits from exchanges that were supposed to be mutually beneficial. Soviet secrecy prevented us from learning much of interest, while American openness facilitated Soviet acquisition of American technology and know-how.”5 Perle, however, was only partly right. As recounted earlier in these pages, Russia has had a long history of acquiring know-how from the West, and U.S. negotiators of exchanges were well aware that the acquisition of science and technology was a principal Soviet objective. Accordingly, the exchanges and cooperative activities were structured to focus on science rather than technology, and, as will be explained later in these pages, they were prescreened by the U.S. intelligence community to ensure that there was no technology transfer that would impinge on national security.As for Perle’s charge that the Soviet Union got the“lion’s share”of benefits, much of the joint research under the U.S.-Soviet cooperative agreements was of benefit to both superpowers and the rest of the world as well, in fields such as environmental protection, medicine and public health, artificial heart development , transportation, and space. The space agreement, for example, proved useful in preparing the way for the U.S.-Russian space cooperation of later years. Meetings between the United States and the Soviet Union on space exploration began...