A Step Toward Steps

"For the first time in many years," said the President of the U.S., "the path of peace may be open." He saw the nuclear test ban treaty initialed in Moscow as "a shaft of light" in the midst of the discord and disillusion of the postwar years. Measured against the broad range of issues that divide East and West, the treaty is a limited achievement, but the President pointed out that it is "an important first step--a step toward peace--a step toward reason--a step away from war." With what was, in the light of the cleavage within the Communist bloc, a nice touch of irony, he quoted an ancient Chinese proverb: "A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step."

Limited Risk. In his quiet and effective presentation of the case for the treaty in his television address to the nation, John F. Kennedy made efforts to reply in advance to arguments that may be raised when the pact comes before the U.S. Senate for ratification. In fact, there seems little danger that the treaty will be rejected, or will even have a narrow escape. Only a few Senators--Arizona's Barry Goldwater among them--are clearly opposed to it. Some other Senators seem wary, ineluding Georgia's Richard Russell, head of the Armed Services Committee and leader of the Southerners, and Iowa's Bourke Hickenlooper, who wields strong influence among Midwestern Republicans. The force of the opposition will turn upon the extent to which the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who in the past have expressed missgivings about a test ban, are genuinely willing to endorse the new pact.

With the possibilities of opposition in mind, President Kennedy stressed the treaty's safeguards against violations by the Soviet. Against the limited risk of violations, he said, the agreement creates wide new possibilities to reduce the world's fear of fallout, "to reduce tension, to slow down the perilous nuclear arms race." Furthermore, the pact might lead to far-reaching future agreements in such sectors as controls against surprise attack, a halt to the spread of nuclear weapons, and possibly, even a broad disarmament pact.

New Dangers. The treaty, said the President, "will not resolve all conflicts, or cause the Communists to forgo their ambitions, or eliminate the dangers of war." Even if the test ban agreement led to a lasting thaw, it would "bring new problems, new challenges from the Communists, new dangers of relaxing our vigilance or of mistaking their intent."

There indeed will be new challenges, and they may be less deadly but at the same time subtler, more complicated and more difficult to cope with than those of the past. The fact that Nikita Khrushchev is speaking more softly does not mean that he has abandoned his aim to seek the expansion of Communist power, a goal so deeply rooted and institutionalized that Soviet leaders will feel almost a historical duty to exploit gaps in the capacity, unity and will of the West.

But the dangers of the new period are accompanied by new opportunities that the U.S. and its allies must meet, and indeed exploit, with all their ingenuity and effort. The treaty is a new factor in what is plainly a more hopeful era in the cold war (see THE WORLD). As the President said, it is by no means "the millennium." But it carries in its brief and direct text some hope that it may become, in the President's words, "a historic mark in man's age-old pursuit of peace."

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