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PASTOR GENERAL'S REPORT, AUGUST 19, 1983
PAGE 16
their past opposition to German reunification. The reason for
this rethink, they say, is the recognition by the Soviet Union
that the development of nuclear missiles has destroyed the
rationale for maintaining the states of Eastern Europe as a
"buffer" between Russia and the West. However loyal Poland and
Hungary and the rest might be in a nuclear war, they could do
nothing to prevent the annihilation of the Soviet Union....
Faced with the missile threat and more serious long-term risk of
a hostile China, the Soviet leadership sees its security as lying
in a combination of arms control agreements with the United
States and political stabilisation in Europe....
The Hungarians would not be surprised if, among the offers from
Moscow would be a striking one: the withdrawal of military forces
from Eastern Europe in exchangec,f American :!orces withdrawing
from Western Europe.
The Hungarians believe the Soviet Union is determined to persuade
the West that it has no aggressive plans for spreading Soviet
ideology.
In support of this view, the Hungarians claim to
detect evidence of a growing liberalisatTon in Eastern Europe';
especially_!!! reiTgion. One e � ample 1s the rece � t honour paid in
Hungary to a prominent Jewish leader, Rabbi Dr. Alexander
Scheiber, director of the Hungarian Jewish Seminary, who was
presented with Hungary's highest award •...
Finally, informed Hungarians believe the most startling develop
ment has been the extent to which soviet leaders have allowed
talk of German�unification to revive. The publi'cr'aising of
�German question by Chancellor Kohl of West Germany on his
visit to Andropov was not, in the Hungarian view, a bolt from the
blue.
It is also of interest that Franz Josef Strauss recently (and apparently
rather impulsively) made a sudden fact-finding trip to Eastern Europe,
driving through East Germany, Czechoslovakia and Hungary, in his own turbo
diesel Mercedes. Even on such short notice he was able to arrange a private
summit with East German party boss Erich Honecker. While walking through
the streets of Dresden one day, several East Germans came near him asking
for his personal help in arranging for them to leave their country for West
Germany. Police restrained, then dragged off one woman, prompting an angry
Strauss to demand what they were going to do with her! The incident proves
the influence Strauss has in the Communist-run "zone."
--Gene H. Hogberg, News Bureau