Papier-Mache Bars

One of the happy things about this country is the wealth of opportunities Americans have to be morally self-rightcous. Such an opportunity was taken by the Department of State this week when it made 27 per cent of the United States off limits to citizens of the Soviet Union. But the unfortunate thing about efforts at proper indignation is that they are often silly and ineffective. The new restrictions are no exception.

The limits were imposed, according to the Administration, in an effort to pry similar restrictions off the Russians. But there are a few disparities involved. One of them is that a much larger area of the Soviet Union is closed to Americans who would travel there, and has been almost since this country recognized the USSR in 1933. It is naive to think that Russia values its travel privileges in the United States enough to make serious concessions in its own restrictions. A Russian citizen in this country today has about as much chance of spying on American industry as a Yale man with a crew cut in the Urals. If the USSR intends serious spy work, it would hardly employ Russian nationals for the job.

The new restrictions, then, are just paper so far as their value to the Russians is concerned. This is particularly true since the United States imposed regulations in 1952 requiring all Soviet citizens to notify the Government if they were planning to travel more than 25 miles from New York or Washington. But the travel rights, or lack of them, are far more valuable to this country. The fact that all foreigners--even Russians--were able to travel free of restriction in this country, in contrast to the bars that exist behind the iron curtain, was a major propaganda point to America's advantage. It seems silly to waste it by laying down restrictions that don't mean a thing to anyone except a few righteously indignant U. S. taxpayers.