Tass warns West not to follow Washington's lead

The Soviet news agency Tass said Christmas Day that Western European nations were faced with the choice of following Washington onto a ''fatal path of confrontation'' or pursuing detente by themselves.

The agency, in what amounted to an indirect appeal to Western European leaders to weaken or even break their alliance with the United States, said they should recognize that American and European interests were now very divergent.

Tass said Washington was committed to a crusade against communism that damaged West Europe's interests and was intended to make it economically and militarily more dependent on the US.