Word: chernenko
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...Politburo. One of the oldest and most familiar Kremlin figures of all, Andrei Gromyko, who has been his country's Foreign Minister for the past 28 years, was raised to the prestigious but largely ceremonial post of President, a position that had been vacant since the death of Konstantin Chernenko on March 10. Immediately thereafter, the Foreign Ministry passed into the untried hands of Eduard Shevardnadze, party boss of the southern Soviet republic of Georgia...
...more than 300 members strong, had just concluded its first plenary session under the leadership of General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev, 54. The outcome of the meeting, held behind closed doors last week, would provide some evidence of Gorbachev's grasp on the authority he inherited from the late Konstantin Chernenko on March...
These words and deeds signaled a definite switch in the Kremlin's mood after the painfully indecisive 13-month reign of Chernenko. They also seemed to confirm that, as some Western analysts had suspected, the new General Secretary is a disciple of policies conceived by Chernenko's predecessor, Yuri Andropov. Explained Jeremy Azrael, senior analyst of Soviet affairs at the Rand Corp.: "To say that there have been new ideas on the domestic front would be a gross overstatement." Gorbachev, said Azrael, "is the heir of Andropov...
...More than once we have expressed readiness to dissolve the Warsaw Treaty if NATO should agree to respond in kind. This principled stand continues to be fully valid." What undoubtedly impressed all of Gorbachev's listeners was the vigor of his public performance compared with that of the frail Chernenko...
...President's original proposal for a meeting was contained in a letter carried by George Bush to Konstantin Chernenko's funeral. The offer was meant to be private, but White House operatives, eager to have Reagan appear as the prince of peace, leaked it. Had the offer remained confidential until some agreement had been reached, Reagan would have retained greater leverage; once the proposal was out in the open, Gorbachev had the upper hand, and Reagan, though the icebreaker, was reduced to the role of supplicant...