COLD WAR'S END: WHAT IS FUTURE OF MILITARY?

Forty-six years and two months after British Prime Minister Winston Churchill delivered the prologue to the Cold War at Westminster College with his "Iron Curtain" speech, former Soviet President and Communist Party Secretary General Mikhail Gorbachev is expected to hearken the era's end.

Tomorrow at 3:30 p.m. in Fulton, Mo., Gorbachev will give his assessment of the Cold War along with predictions and warnings about the era to come. The speech, if nothing else, represents a historic symbol in the evolution of relations between East and West.

There is little doubt that the world has changed in the past 40 years, most dramatically perhaps in the past four. With the collapse of the Iron Curtain and the nation that constructed it, the Soviet Union, Eastern Europe has been set free.

Freedom is a heavy burden, however, often plagued by uncertainty and unease. Witness the carnage in Yugoslavia, Armenia, Azerbaijan and Nagorno-Karabakh, and the economic depression in the Commonwealth of Independent States, Romania, Poland, and to a lesser degree, Czechoslovakia.

Moreover, while the countdown to Nuclear Holocaust has been moved farther back from midnight, many questions about nuclear weapons still are to be resolved. And even more countries like Iran, South Africa and Pakistan are gaining the technology to build their own. Indeed, last year alone we went to war in the Persian Gulf, in part due to the nuclear ambitions of a belligerent state. Is this sort of situation less likely or more likely in today's world?

No matter the inevitable uncertainties, the Cold War, pitting East vs. West, has come to a quiet and welcome end. We should be glad, not in the least because the door of opportunity to tackling other, even greater issues, is now open. As Missouri Eighth District Congressman Bill Emerson said earlier this year, "This is the most exciting time in history to be alive. What has happened in the past four years defies imagination, and the future is bursting with opportunities...We do not have to spend trillions on defense...We now have the opportunity to focus on the ultimate questions: hunger, shelter and health."

In this new world of changed priorities, where do the armed forces and the military fit in? And what shape should they take in the future?

These are the questions we are asking for next Monday's Perspective Page: Profile on the Armed Forces.

In this election year, we are hearing many different calls to action concerning the military. "Cut it." "Cut it by a third." "Cut it in half." "Eliminate the National Guard." "Increase the National Guard." "Do away with the Marines." "Bring the troops home." "America First." "Isolationism is a costly abdication of world responsibility."

If you have a perspective on the future role of the armed forces in America's priorities, please write us. Columns should be no longer than two-and-a-half pages, typed and double-spaced. If you want your column to have a chance of being printed on the Perspective Page next Monday, we must receive it here at the newspaper, P.O. Box 699, Cape Girardeau, Mo., 63701, by Friday at 9:30 a.m. But the sooner we receive it the better. One note: the focus of your column should be more on the armed services themselves and less on technology (although, understandably, it is difficult to separate the two).

Other upcoming Perspective topics include AIDS: What is Our Responsibility? And Wetlands: Where Do We Go From Here? If you are interested in writing on either of these topics, please contact or submit your column to the Southeast Missourian Perspective Desk as soon as possible. Or, if you have suggestions for additional Perspective topics, please do not hesitate to write or call.

The address is, again: Perspective, P.O. Box 699, Cape Girardeau, Mo., 63701. Phone: 314/335-6611. Fax: 314/334-7288.

The Perspective Page has begun with great promise in the Missourian. Many important issues have already been covered informatively and fairly. Thank you for your participation. Please continue.