Gorbachev meant to reassure the West that the Soviet Union was not sliding back into totalitarianism. George Bush is scheduled to go to Moscow for a summit meeting with Gorbachev Feb. 11-13. Soviet officials expressed hopes that the summit and superpower detente were still on track despite the gulf war, snags in the strategic-arms talks and the Baltic crackdown. The new Soviet foreign minister, Aleksandr Bessmertnykh, flew to Washington to deliver that message–and to help steer U.S.-Soviet relations through one of the roughest patches of the Gorbachev era. Bush has hesitated to do anything that might harm the Soviet leader politically, and the impulse at the White House was to delay the summit but cite the war and problems over the strategic-arms agreement as reasons, rather than linking the move to the Baltics.
The long-simmering Baltic crisis turned violent on Jan. 13 when Soviet troops stormed Lithuania’s broadcasting center in Vilnius, killing at least 13 people. A week later Soviet “black beret” troops–a militia organized by Moscow and made up heavily of veterans of the war in Afghanistan–shot their way into Latvia’s Interior Ministry in Riga. Four people, including Andris Slapins, a 48-year-old Latvian director filming the attack, were killed.
In Lithuania, the mood was somber. There was a flicker of violence: Soviet troops occupied a printing warehouse and shot a civilian on a highway outside Vilnius. Neither side seemed willing to compromise. Moscow still demanded that Lithuania repeal its “anticonstitutional” declaration of independence. The republic’s government insisted that Soviet troops vacate the buildings they occupy in Vilnius. “There is no more middle ground,” said Gediminas Kirkilas, deputy chairman of the Democratic Labor Party, Lithuania’s former Communist Party. “We’ve gotten ourselves even deeper into a political dead end.”
When Soviet authorities cracked down on the independence movement in Latvia, they followed much the same game plan as in Lithuania. A shadowy “committee for social salvation” –a front for the local Communist Party–suddenly materialized and announced that it was disbanding the republic’s elected government and parliament. Then a 50-man squad of black berets attacked Riga’s Interior Ministry. In a gun battle that lit up the sky with tracer bullets, the black berets shot their way into the building. “I thought no one would come out alive,” said Deputy Interior Minister Zenons Indrikovs, who phoned for help as bullets flew past his head. “But they made no demands. This was just a show of force.”
The 120-man black-beret detachment in Riga was confined to barracks last week, but few Latvians thought it would stay there. Although the Soviet Interior Ministry established black-beret units in 1980, ostensibly to combat organized crime, Latvian leaders believe the force’s real mission is to put down nascent democracies. A Soviet Army colonel who is a consultant to the Russian parliament agrees. “Moscow is creating special takeover units among the black berets across the country,” he said. “Forty people in each division will cut phone lines and take over buildings. It’s the Riga scenario, but it will be repeated in each major city across the Soviet Union.” That strategy fits neatly with the new army-police patrols, which Moscow said would be used in large Soviet cities as of Feb. 1–“when the situation becomes complicated.” the measure allows the military to keep closer tabs on police, who in some republics have shifted loyalties from Moscow to their independence movements.
Gorbachev has denied personal responsibility for the bloodshed in the Baltics, though he gave his military commanders in the region to use force. In early January, aides to the Soviet president told “Newsweek,’ they heard him tell military authorities, “If the situation gets out of hand, you can move in to establish order, but I don’t want any casualties.”
The black berets may have been goaded to act by hard-liners in the Baltics. In a taped confession made available to “Newsweek,’ a black beret named Gherman Glazov, who defected to Latvian officials, alleged that he and his comrades in Riga had been bought off by the Latvian Communist Party. “The word is that the Communist Party is paying berets as much as 1,000 rubles a month,” Glazov claimed. He said that KGB officials and a former Latvian interior minister had visited the black-beret barracks in Riga to discuss operations. The troops were worked up into a frenzy by their commander, who told them they were about to be attacked by Latvians and urged them to strike first.
Some Soviet progressives believe only pressure from the West can make Gorbachev return to the liberalism he once championed. They hope Bush will postpone next month’s summit. The decision is not that easy. The president wants to prevent any deterioration in his relationship with the Soviet leader, especially at a time when Moscow is supporting the U.S.-led coalition in the gulf war. But that backing is entirely nonmilitary, and Gorbachev is unlikely to withdraw his political support because he has his own stake in cooperation with the West. He must cut the Soviet military budget if he is to proceed with economic reform, and he needs Western aid. “For domestic and international reasons we want the summit to take place,” said an aide to the Soviet president. “It would be a blow to Gorbachev’s prestige if it doesn’t.” In this game, Bush holds some strong cards–if he is willing to play them.
