Till Next Time

Despite barking guns from Viet Nam to Kashmir, the seven-week summer session of the disarmament delegates in Geneva wound up last week in a burst of cocktail conviviality. To be sure, the report to the U.N. would, as usual, read "no progress." Russia was as unwilling as ever to provide the on-site inspection rights that the U.S. demands to guarantee an underground nuclear test ban. And Washington could hardly have cut loose the last, frayed mooring to MLF and Bonn's hopes for nuclear sharing in NATO in the middle of West Germany's national election campaign--Moscow's price for a non-proliferation treaty.

Still, optimism bubbled like champagne during the final round of parties. After all, Chief Soviet Delegate Semyon K. ("Scratchy") Tsarapkin had confined his anti-American blasts to the Moscow minimal two: fore and aft of the session. U.S. Disarmament Negotiator William C. Foster allowed as how both sides had "come a long way." Britain's Lord Chalfont saw a positive "chance of success" next time around for a non-proliferation treaty. What did Scratchy think? "It all depends on the West," he rasped between `a bientOt toasts. "Don't put me with my back to the wall when I'm drinking."

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