Soviet Defense Cut 1.5%, Scientist Says

The long-anticipated cut in the Soviet defense budget has begun this year with a 1.5% reduction, Roald Z. Sagdeyev, a widely respected Soviet scientist and newly elected representative to the Soviet Congress, said here Thursday.

Next year, he said, the cut will reach a total of 7%, and in 1991, it will achieve the previously announced goal of 14.2%.

While the overall cutback has been disclosed publicly by Soviet officials, Sagdeyev’s remarks in a meeting with reporters provided the first details on how it will be phased in over the next few years.

The defense reductions announced earlier this year have received intense international attention as a reflection of President Mikhail S. Gorbachev’s economic reform program and his campaign to improve relations with the West.

However, the fiscal forecasts will continue to be treated skeptically by U.S. analysts. A U.S. intelligence report last week asserted that Soviet military spending last year had actually increased 3% in real terms, for example, and noted that the Kremlin has yet to reveal the true size of its defense budget.

Sagdeyev, who is in Washington for scientific meetings, predicted that full details of the Soviet defense and space budgets will be published in the fall. The budget figures will not be a true measure of how much the defense and space programs actually cost the Soviet Union, however, because accurate price determinations on items will not be available by then.

The cost of products and programs in the Soviet Union has long been unclear because of the extent of government subsidies for their production. Reforms to set actual prices, once promised for this year, will not be accomplished on schedule, Sagdeyev said.

In other remarks to reporters, Sagdeyev:

--Counseled the Bush Administration to resist making changes in the U.S. position in the Strategic Arms Reduction Talks that will resume soon. He indicated that the proposed treaty, which will cut offensive weapons by roughly half, could be improved but argued that such improvements should wait for a subsequent treaty to be adopted.

--Admitted that the Soviet space program, and particularly its space shuttle project, is troubled because of its high cost. Sagdeyev, a space scientist of international stature, said that the failure of the Soviet probe toward Phobos, a Martian moon, has contributed to strong criticism of the space program.

--Applauded what he said is the responsible approach taken by the Soviet people to elections this month. In the voting, all 15 candidates supported by a neo-Fascist organization were defeated, he noted. Sagdeyev was elected by the Academy of Sciences.

Sagdeyev indicated that, although full details of the defense and space budgets will not be released for several months, the levels have already been set.

Space expenditures are “not modest,” he said, and will underscore criticism that too much has been spent. But he also claimed that the figures are “several times smaller” U.S. expenditures.

On the defense budget, the recent report of the CIA and Defense Intelligence Agency on the Soviet economy estimated that defense spending last year, in constant 1982 rubles, “grew by roughly 3%--in line with the growth rates of the past several years.” Thus, a 14.2% cut by 1991 will only return the military budget to its level five years ago, just before Gorbachev took power.

Asked about possible shifts in U.S. positions at the strategic arms talks by the Bush team, Sagdeyev said that “it will not be a tragedy if the Administration came with modifications” to previous positions. The Soviet official noted, however, that “lots of time” has been lost in the White House review of arms control issues, which has postponed resumption of the negotiations since Feb. 15.

“I would urge that (the United States) not reopen the negotiations with different figures. Consider the START figures a quick fix, with future arms negotiations based on better (positions),” he said.