老布什他后悔了吗？接触主义？

本文摘自1990年五月份，当时美国国内对中共看法极度恶劣，老布什力排众议坚决不制裁中国。据说还私信邓小平，交代自己总统也受压与国会等‘苦衷’，自己还是‘老朋友’身份。

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President Bush indicated today that he would withhold normal trade status from the Soviet Union as long as the Lithuanian question remained unresolved. At the same time he confirmed that he was renewing such economic benefits for China despite Beijing's hard-line policies.

Although he conceded that his relatively accommodating posture toward China had not produced what he called adequate easing of that country's crackdown on a pro-democracy movement, the President said at a White House news conference that most-favored-nation trading status for China was in the interest of the United States. He denied that the economic benefits were ''a reward to Beijing.'' $6 Billion in Annual Exports Mr. Bush said his ''difficult decision'' was based on concern about American exports to China, which total $6 billion a year; about the impact on Hong Kong, through which most Chinese goods bound for the United States pass, and about Chinese students and intellectuals, who he said supported his action. [Excerpts from the news conference on page A12.] Still, less than a week before President Mikhail S. Gorbachev of the Soviet Union is to arrive here for a summit conference, Mr. Bush risked offending the Russians by granting a valuable privilege to a nation that has killed hundreds of its citizens while continuing to deny it to Moscow, which has behaved with far greater restraint in its confrontations with pro-democracy campaigners.

The move brought roars of disapproval from members of Congress, led by the Speaker of the House Representatives, Thomas S. Foley of Washington, who argued that the decision sent completely the wrong signal to Beijing only a year after the Chinese Government ordered demonstrators shot down around Tiananmen Square.

'Tilted Toward the Tyrants'

Senator Alfonse M. D'Amato of New York, a conservative Republican, said that ''sought-after trade concessions should not be given to the butchers of Beijing.'' Senator Edward M. Kennedy of Massachusetts, a liberal Democrat, said that Mr. Bush had again ''tilted toward the tyrants and against the courageous forces of democracy.''

They and many others promised  to try to block most-favored-nation status for China. But that would eventually require a two-thirds vote of both houses. It would be hard though perhaps not impossible to get.

Winston Lord, the United States Ambassador to Beijing under Ronald Reagan, called Mr. Bush's decision ''a serious mistake.'' Mr. Lord had advocated extending most-favored-nation status for China but only as part of a package of measures, agreed to by the White House and Capitol Hill, that would ''make clear our revulsion'' at Chinese policy. A strenuous debate in Congress, Mr. Lord said in an interview, ''is now inevitable, and it will demonstrate to the Chinese that we have no national policy.''

A leader of the Tiananmen Square demonstrations who escaped to the United States, Shen Tong, said, ''The President's action will serve only to undermine the efforts of those struggling for basic human rights in China.''

Mr. Bush was more responsive to strong Congressional sentiment on the question of self-determination for the Baltic states, commenting in the question-and-answer period that sentiment on Capitol Hill would make it ''extraordinarily difficult to grant'' trade concessions to the Soviet Union, adding, ''I must say it concerns me.''

But Senator Tom Daschle, a South Dakota Democrat who recently returned from a trip to the Soviet Union, said it was inconsistent for the President to ''use one standard for China and another for everybody else, especially the Soviet Union.'' Mr. Daschle said the inconsistency was particularly glaring, given the President's announced interest in improved relations with the Soviet Union and the need to strengthen President Gorbachev's hand.

Senator George J. Mitchell of Maine, the majority leader, said: ''The President's position is completely inconsistent. That's what happens when you have a policy based on expediency rather than principle.'' Senator Mitchell went on the trip to the Soviet Union with Senator Daschle.

Bush Defends Baker

Looking toward his meeting with Mr. Gorbachev, the President defended Secretary of State James A. Baker 3d's handling of preliminary negotiations on strategic arms in Moscow last week, which have been criticized by some on the Republican right wing. ''There is no light'' between himself and Mr. Baker, Mr. Bush said. ''I am very satisfied with where we stand,'' he continued.

But when asked whether a Soviet failure to reach an agreement on a reduction of conventional military forces in Europe did not ''tell you something about their ultimate intentions,'' Mr. Bush answered: ''I think that that's a good point, and one that I would expect the Soviets would want to dispel through action, because I don't get the feeling that they are opposed to C.F.E. agreements.''

Twice Mr. Bush referred to a meeting in Geneva on Wednesday between the Soviet Foreign Minister, Eduard A. Shevardnadze, and his West German counterpart, Hans-Dietrich Genscher. Mr. Shevardnadze said his country ''advocates intensification of the Vienna negotiations'' on conventional forces in Europe.

A German official said afterward that ''we can expect quick results on certain issues'' and also expressed optimism about resolving questions on German reunification, which is linked closely to conventional-forces talks.

Call for Israeli Restraint

The President described Mr. Shevardnadze's comments as heartening, and said he thought that the strategic-arms agreement, known as Start, and an agreement on chemical weapons would ''be seen properly as progress.''

On other foreign-policy matters, the President called for restraint by Israeli soldiers in their violent clashes with Palestinian demonstrators, saying he was ''troubled by the loss of human life.'' He vowed to maintain good relations with Mexico despite anger there over the United States Government's role in the abduction of a suspect in a drug trafficking case. And he said a review of United States policy in Cambodia was under way, prompted in part by his fears that American aid is inadvertently strengthening the Khmer Rouge.

Mr. Bush drew a distinction on trade status between the Soviet Union and China by saying that China had ''the proper policy'' on emigration of dissidents and that the Soviet Union did not.

Neither the President nor any of his Congressional critics mentioned Tibet, where China has reacted with considerably less restraint to a difficult nationalities problem than the Soviet Union has in Lithuania.

White House officials said the trade-status distinction was conveniently if unintentionally provided by the Soviets when they delayed enacting the policy beyond the date of the Gorbachev visit here. Approval of the new emigration law had been expected on May 30 or 31, but it was dropped from the Supreme Soviet's calendar.

Trade Linked to Emigration

Reports from Moscow have suggested that the Soviet leadership decided not to pass the liberalized emigration law because of concern of offending Arab states opposed to the already relatively free emigration of Soviet Jews to Israel.

The more important obstacle to regular trade relations with the Soviet Union, the officials said, was Soviet economic and psychological harassment of Lithuania and other Baltic states seeking to break away from Moscow. Asked about that, the President replied, ''I think there's a political climate in this country that would make it extraordinarily difficult to grant it, but that isn't a bridge we have to cross at this juncture because the legislation is not in place in the Soviet Union.''

Without the legislation, the Jackson-Vanik amendment in this country makes normal trade ties impossible.

In the 1970's, the Nixon Administration proposed most-favored-nation treatment for the Soviet Union after Moscow paid the first installment on long-standing debts to the United States. But the trade agreement collapsed when the Jackson-Vanik legislation directly linked trade and Jewish emigration, and the Soviet Union remains one of the few countries - now only a dozen - who are not on the list of most favored nations.

'Resolutions of Disapproval'

For nations on the list, tariffs average 5 to 10 percent, but can amount to 100 percent for products of nonprivileged partners. Tariffs on $12 billion in Chinese exports estimated to come to the United States, including toys, textiles and apparel, would rise an average of about 40 percent if its favorable trade status were to end.

''The people in China who trade with us are the engine of reform opening to the outside world,'' Mr. Bush said. ''Our responsibility to them is best met not by isolating those forces from contact with us or by strengthening the hand of reaction, but by keeping open the channels of commerce and communication.''