When Soviet and American negotiators meet in Geneva on May 17 to resume talks on intermediate-range nuclear forces (INF) the most formidable obstacle to a Soviet-American agreement will be the issue of whether to count British and French INF weapons as part of NATO's intermediate-range nuclear forces. But this issue is really not a dispute over Soviet INF policy toward Britain and France. The dispute is over Soviet INF policy toward the Federal Republic of Germany.

Since the first Soviet INF proposal of October, 1979 the USSR has tried to prevent or at least reduce the planned deployment of 572 American missiles in Europe. By trying to prevent or limit Undeployment of the U.S. missiles scheduled for basing in Europe the Soviets are trying to preserve the military and political significance of the Soviet INF threat to West Germany. The traditional Soviet preoccupation with Germany, and with the possibility of German reunification is evident in Soviet policies to ward other arms control and security issues in Europe.

The Helsinki accords of 1975, long sought by the USSR, raised international legal barriers to the reunification of Germany and to the restoration of the former German territories ceded to Czechoslovakia. Poland and the USSR. The Soviet search for an enduring solution to the Germany question is also evident in the Soviet proposals to the Vienna talks on the reduction of conventional forces in Central Europe Every Soviet proposal at the Vienna talks from the opening of the negotiations in 1973 to the Warsaw Pact proposal of February, 1983 has sought to establish a 1:1 ratio between Soviet and West German military personnel in central Europe.

Although the Soviets have sought to limit American INF deployments in Europe, they have never proposed reductions of British and French INF: 263 delivery vehicles consisting of 64 British missiles, 55 British bombers, 98 French missiles and 46 French bombers. Instead, the Soviets have publicly insisted since November. 1981 that the USSR be permitted to exclude from any Soviet-American INF agreement a Soviet INF arsenal equal to the combined total of British and French nuclear delivery vehicles.

Soviet spokesmen have publicly noted that the British and French are planning to increase the number of warheads on their missiles from the present total of about 300 to approximately 1300 by the end of the decade. This increase of nearly 1000 warheads is considerably more than the 572 INF warheads the US will add to its European nuclear forces if it proceeds with the deployment of the Pershing 11s and GLCMs.

Yet the Soviets have not once objected to the British and French programs for increasing the number of their INF warheads. Nor have the Soviets ever invited the British and French to place their nuclear forces in an arms control forum Instead, the Soviets have declared on many occasions that the proper Soviet response to the planned increase in British and French INF weapons is a corresponding increase in Soviet INF weapons.

This was the gist of Andropov's proposal last December when he suggested that the NATO-Soviet balance of INF missiles consist of 162. British and French missiles (with no American missiles) and 162 Soviet SS-20 missiles. Andropov added that the Soviets were entitled to match future British French INF deployments with equivalent Soviet INF deployments. He also noted that the Soviet Union would insist on a balance of nuclear-capable aircraft against NATO aircraft (British, French and American as well) Last week, Andropov specifically proposed a numerical balance between the number of warheads of British French INF missiles and the number of warheads on Soviet INF missiles.

The political objective of the Soviet insistence on a separate INF balance of Soviet forces against British French forces is to maintain outside the Soviet-American balance a separate Soviet arsenal of "European" nuclear missiles and bombers. The Soviets have aimed these "European" weapons both militarily and politically at West Germany. This special category of Soviet INF weapons seeks to preempt the "worst case scenario" for Soviet military planners the reunification of Germany as a result of political upheavals in East Germany or the adjoining East European Communist states.

By repeatedly declaring that their INF weapons are "national" forces rather than "NATO" forces, the British and French governments have declared that their nuclear weapons do not provide Bonn with a nuclear guarantee to deter Soviet nuclear and conventional threats against West Germany. Only the United States has been willing to make a nuclear guarantee to Bonn.

In Soviet INF policies, which would appear to involve only the three NATO nuclear powers, the fundamental focus remains the German question. Whenever Soviet leaders have travelled to West Europe to make public statements on INF issues, they have made these statements in Bonn, not Geneva, the site of the INF talks. When the Soviets have chosen to make public statements on INF policy in Moscow, the preferred guests have been West Germans, not Americans. When Soviet officials have given INF interviews to the Western press, they have chosen to speak to West German publications. To head the Soviet INF delegation in Geneva the Soviets chose a diplomat whose areas of expertise was neither nuclear weapons nor American foreign policy but West German politics.

Andropoy himself raised the German issue last week when he made his latest proposal for a separate balance of Soviet INF warheads and the corresponding British French warheads Before making this proposal, he declared "..FRG statesmen have repeatedly expressed agreement that war should never again be unleashed from German soil. How can this be squared with support for the plans to deploy American missiles on West German soil."

The primary though unspoken reason for the Soviet insistence on maintaining a balance of Soviet INF against British French INF is to pose a distinct nuclear threat to West Germany outside the Soviet-American balance of both INF weapons and strategic nuclear forces. In his press conference of early April, 1983 Soviet foreign minister Gromyko justified such a separate Soviet INF-British French INF balance in purely nuclear terms.

"Imagine," suggested Gromyko, "that a terrible tragedy has occurred and that say, a nuclear-armed British missile is in flight. Should it carry a tag. 'I am British'? Or imagine," Gromyko continued, "a French missile flying Perhaps it will also carry a tag saying. 'I am French, I should not have been included in the count."

To be sure, Gromyko pointed out two other major obstacles to the conclusion of a Soviet-American INF agreement. One is that the United States refuses to place on the negotiating table its forward based aircraft in Europe some 723 planes by Soviet count. The other is the Soviet refusal to include in the Geneva negotiations the SS 20 missiles deployed in the Far East in range of China. Japan and South Korea. The United States has argued that these mobile missiles about 100 by the American count could be moved with in striking distance of Europe.

But the major impediment to teaching a Soviet American INF agreement is counting British and French missiles Despite Gromyko's explanation, the real issue is not affixing tags to NATO missiles which read "I am British" or "I am French." The real issue is affixing tags to Soviet SS-20s which read. "I'm headed for Germany."

Christopher Jones is a research associate at the Russian Research Center and a visiting research, he professor at the U.S. Arms War College in Carlisle Penn.