Socialist Backing Gradual Unity Will Oppose Kohl : West Germany: The state premier is chosen as candidate for chancellor. He hints that he’s in favor of cutting NATO ties.

BONN —  Oskar Lafontaine, the 46-year-old premier of the depressed West German state of Saarland, was chosen Monday to lead the opposition Social Democratic Party in the election for chancellor against incumbent Helmut Kohl.

Lafontaine was named in a secret party ballot only a day after the allied Social Democrats of East Germany were badly beaten by a center-right coalition of parties aligned with Kohl’s Christian Democrats in the first free elections in that nation.

The West German national elections are scheduled for December.

Lafontaine has been the opposition’s leading candidate since January, when he easily won reelection over the Christian Democrats to the premiership in the coal-and-steel state along the French border.

On a personal basis, the intellectually inclined Lafontaine tops Kohl in public opinion polls, but his party is running only even with the ruling Christian Democrats.

When the exodus of East Germans to West Germany began last fall, Lafontaine won widespread attention, and some support, by arguing that the federal republic could not easily underwrite all the newcomers and calling for them to remain at home.

However, the other major parties quickly took up this position and Lafontaine could no longer claim it as his own.

Rather, he has lately been urging a gradual transition to German unity instead of the faster pace pushed by Kohl--which was apparently supported by East Germans in Sunday’s election.

Lafontaine said Monday that he is in favor of a “cautious transition” to a common currency with East Germany while ensuring that a social welfare net remains in place.

But it is the issue of European security that brings him into sharpest conflict with Kohl’s Christian Democrats and with the members of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

At various times, Lafontaine has called NATO an “anachronism” and advocated that a united Germany leave NATO’s military structure while remaining politically bound to it.

On Monday, he hedged, calling for a “European security system that should come from military cooperation,” adding that his aim is “to overcome the confrontation between the blocs and create a European system to replace existing military alliances.”

Earlier, at a meeting of the Socialist Party in France, Lafontaine suggested an “all-European defense,” which he said would consist of both NATO and Warsaw Pact troops under a joint command.

“Armies under a common high command can hardly march against one another,” he declared.

This is an idea that puts him at odds with NATO allies and a large body of current West German opinion, as well as some leaders of his own party.