News In Brief

USSR warns new A-punch to match US Euromissiles

Marshal Viktor Kulikov, the Warsaw Pact's Soviet commander, has said explicitly what various senior Soviet figures have hinted at for some months: There will be additional ''nuclear'' deployments by Moscow if NATO goes ahead with placing new US rockets in West Europe.

A ranking Soviet official, meanwhile, has privately added the same more-explicit tone to Kremlin hints that Moscow will break off the Geneva talks on both sides' European missiles if the planned Western deployment occurs. The official said such a move would not be permanent, but indicated he believed the break would last considerably longer than most US officials assume.

The official did not say whether Moscow, increasingly bleak in its public assessment of US arms policies, was thinking of interrupting talks before the planned NATO move. NATO is to start deploying the new weapons, which it says are to balance more than 200 Soviet SS-20 rockets already pointed at West Europe, at the end of this year.