ABSTRACT
This chapter examines both the traditional sources of Soviet opposition to serious conventional arms reduction talks and the changes that have occurred and reviews current Soviet strategy and tactics. Conventional arms control in Europe emerged as a Soviet foreign policy priority in 1986 with General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev's April 18 speech in East Berlin and the Warsaw Pact's June 11 Budapest appeal. The new Soviet approach to some extent reflects a shift in attitudes toward conventional arms talks that has been under way since well before Gorbachev's accession to power. The Soviet Union hoped to use mutual and balanced force reduction to promote agreements that would codify and legitimate Soviet conceptions of a desirable European security order. The nuclear emphasis inevitably entailed a downgrading of conventional arms control in Soviet propaganda and diplomacy. The Belgrade conference focused on Soviet human rights violations and produced only a minimal concluding document.
