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Mot making much progress. There were also problems over
whether the Soviet Union was complying with the Salt II agreement and the ABM Treaty. We believed that agreements
should be kept meticulously by both sides.
The Prime Minister continued that she believed there was
time to make enough progress on arms control issues to enable a summit to be held at the turn of the year. Public opinion would be disappointed if there was no summit given the high expectations aroused by the previous one. But to be a success, a summit must be a success for both sides.
Hu Yaobang said that China had a number of indications of
current Soviet attitudes. For instance, at the recent
conference of Soviet Ambassadors in Moscow, Gorbachev had adopted a critical attitude to the Soviet Foreign Ministry's diplomacy over the past years, which he had characterised as too rigid. He had also spoken in terms of sufficiency of nuclear weapons, a remark which appeared to be aimed at the
Soviet military. He had added that it was not advisable to seek military supremacy in every field. The Soviet Union had to be selective. More generally the Soviet Union wanted to develop its economy but this would be a slow business. There were major obstacles, both in the conservative mentality of officials and the bad habits of many decades. The greatest
dilemma facing the Soviet Union was how both to develop the national economy and maintain military parity with the United
States. The Soviet Union wanted the best of both worlds. In
Confucius' words: "to have the fish and the bear's paw". But
in practice if they were to succeed in boosting the national economy, they must reduce military expenditure. The Prime Minister observed that there was no sign of such a reduction.
Chernobyl
The Prime Minister said that the area of damage as a
result of the nuclear accident at Chernobyl was clearly wider
There were reports of damage as far
than had been admitted.
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