Document created: 6 February 03
Air University Review, March-April 1977

The Integrity of the Warsaw Pact

One should know one's enemies, their alliances, their resources and nature of their country, in order to plan a campaign.

FREDERICK THE GREAT,
Instructions for His Generals, 1747

ON 1 August 1975, at the conclusion of the European Conference on Security and Cooperation (CSCE), the 15 participating nations signed a declaration, which, in essence, was a formal acceptance of the status quo in Europe and the existence of a climate of détente between NATO and the Warsaw Pact. However, should détente  really breakdown and armed conflict between the two organizations occur, how could the Non-Soviet Warsaw Pact (NSWP) members be expected to react? Would they support their Soviet ally, or would they take the opportunity to gain their independence? These are questions that need to be addressed now since they inevitably affect the force structures of the NATO nations.

The purpose of this article is to examine both the unifying and divisive factors affecting the NSWP members and try to assess their most likely reactions to the outbreak of conventional hostilities between the two alliances. It will also consider the economic, social, and political situation of the Pact as an entity to establish a general assessment of its cohesiveness. Individual countries will also be examined with emphasis on those factors or attitudes that differ from those of the NSWP area as a whole to try to assess their individual reliability. Obviously, it is impossible to conduct a public opinion poll of the Eastern European population in order to elicit their true feelings towards the Pact; therefore, consideration will be limited to relatively recent historical demonstrations of attitudes and to the experience and opinions of reasonably well informed contemporary writers.

One major assumption made in setting the scene for this examination is that there will remain a reasonable military balance between NATO and the Warsaw Pact, or rather between NATO and the U.S.S.R. If the Soviets had significant superiority to the extent that there was no doubt they would succeed in extending their control further into Europe, then all the NSWP states could be expected to display the utmost loyalty; to do otherwise would be sheer folly with obvious consequences at the end of the conflict.

The Warsaw Pact as an Entity

The Warsaw Treaty of Friendship, Cooperation, and Mutual Aid (Warsaw Pact) was signed in Warsaw on 14 May 1955, within a week of the admittance of the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) to NATO, to which it was an obvious response. The Warsaw Pact's twentieth anniversary, was celebrated very quietly in 1975, possibly by Soviet decree in accordance with her desire for détente . The original signatories of the treaty were the Soviet Union, Albania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, the German Democratic Republic (GDR), Poland, Hungary, and Romania. Albania formally withdrew from the Pact in 1968 although she had been a virtual nonparticipant since 1962. It is interesting to note that Soviet troops have been employed in maintaining good "communist order and discipline" in three of the remaining member states since World War II, namely, the GDR, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia, and nearly in Poland, where the Soviets were apparently deterred by their perception that the Polish military would resist a Soviet invasion.¹ More details on the employment of Soviet troops in these countries will be given in the individual country sections. The Warsaw Pact, although a military organization, has proved to be a convenient vehicle for, the portrayal of a common Soviet bloc foreign policy towards the West.

The Pact also provides the Soviets with a justification for stationing troops in Eastern Europe, although within the Pact itself this location of troops is brought about by bilateral agreements²--perhaps arrangements would be a better term since it is unlikely that the Czechs willingly agreed to accommodate Soviet troops following the invasion of 1968! Although members participate in fairly regular "showpiece" exercises, the only major military action undertaken by the entire Pact was the 1968 invasion of Czechoslovakia, a member state, but Romania did not participate.³ Paradoxically, the Brezhnev Doctrine, by which the Soviets have assumed the right to take military action to preserve Communist rule in East European countries and which resulted from the Czech affair, makes no reference to the Warsaw Pact.

Factors Linking NSWP Members

Obviously the greatest factor linking the NSWP members is the defence alliance, the Pact itself, and all the senior command appointments within the Pact are held by Soviet officers. Nevertheless, following the invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968, the Soviet Warsaw Pact Commander-in-Chief, Marshal Yakabovsky, created two multinational committees to advise him; the junior of the two committees comprises two or three star officers of each of the Pact member states. Whether this was done genuinely to obtain multinational advice or to placate the national armed forces, who may have expressed dissatisfaction with Soviet monopoly of senior appointments, makes little difference. Whatever the reason, moves of this nature can only assist in improving the Pact's cohesiveness.

A Soviet military mission headed by a two or three star officer is maintained in each of the NSWP countries, but they have no equivalent mission in Moscow.⁴ Some genuine wartime friendships between NSWP officers and the Soviets exist from the time that they fought together against the Germans; this, plus the multinational representation and the careful watch maintained by the Soviet military missions, or perhaps in spite of them, has engendered surprising loyalty to the Soviets by the military elite of the NSWP countries. However, the term "military elite" requires some qualification; it refers primarily to the GDR and Poland since NSWP armed forces are still arranged on more or less traditional lines and, except for the GDR and Poland, their prewar armed forces were a form of gendarmerie. At present Polish officers are trained along side their Soviet counterparts, and the National Peoples Army (NPA) of the GDR is subordinated to the Group of Soviet Forces Germany (GSFG). Although the loyalty of the armed forces in the lower echelons could be questioned, they would certainly appreciate that their potential for independent action is severely limited by their complete dependence on the Soviets for resupply and spares for their equipment that is almost exclusively of Soviet origin. Overall, the military of the NSWP countries must be considered more unifying than divisive and unlikely to take any real initiatives. Furthermore, perhaps because of their declining influence in politics--and the military representation on the party central commit tees has declined in recent years--they will become more institutionalised and more likely to support national government policies. ⁵

Within the Warsaw Pact obviously the greatest politico-ideological unifying factor is the Communist ideology. All member states are one-party, Communist ruled, although they operate under various names. (Where the term "socialist" is used later in this article, it should be regarded as being synonymous with" communist.") These parties came to power either by direct transfer from the occupying Soviet military governments or by take-overs by indigenous Communists with Soviet support. Thus, despite recent increased confidence of the national Communist parties and their apparent desire to assert themselves, the political leadership of the Warsaw Pact is linked by Marxist / Leninist ideology and their opposition to the capitalist West. Any attempted dilution of the single party Communist leadership in any NSWP state has swiftly and brutally been suppressed by the Soviets, as in Hungary in 1956 and in Czechoslovakia in 1968. Some leadership changes have been accepted by the Soviets but only to the extent that loyal Communists more acceptable to their own people have been allowed to move into office.

While the Communist parties remain firmly in control, they will tend to be supportive of each other and act as a unifying force. Furthermore, the Soviet and NSWP leaders are aware of this and, in recognising the ideological dangers inherent in a policy of détente , mutual ideological control and propaganda is being stepped-up. For example, in the build-up to the détente  era in "1973, ten bi-lateral cooperation agreements on ideology and propaganda were signed between the various Eastern European States." ⁶ One other factor, which could be termed politico-ideological, has been and in deed remains the Western reaction to political initiatives and Soviet repressive actions in Eastern Europe.

Although there may have been some diplomatic reaction by the West following Soviet actions in Hungary and Czechoslovakia, these actions were not obvious enough to be recognised by the people of those countries. Such apparent inactivity by the West is unlikely to instill in the NSWP countries a great degree of confidence that they would receive Western support for any initiatives that they might take to detach themselves from their Soviet overlords in the future. The recent Helsinki talks have done little to change this situation and encourage Eastern Europe to look to the West for support. It would certainly appear to the general public, both eastern and western, that United States policy, and the policy of the West in general, is currently aimed at stability in Eastern Europe rather than risk destroying United States/Soviet détente . ⁷

Following World War II, the United States, through the Marshall Plan, made available aid to assist the economic recovery of Western Europe. The East Europeans, or rather the Soviets on their behalf, declined such assistance and established instead the Council for Mutual Economic Aid (COMECON). Although COMECON includes countries like Cuba and Yugoslavia, the latter with associate status, the members of the Warsaw Pact comprise the hardcore. It is not too difficult to assess overall whether or not COMECON has added to the cohesiveness of the Warsaw Pact; multinational trade between the member states is considerable although the bilateral trade between the NSWP states and the U.S.S.B. predominates. In the early years of COMECON, attempts were made to organise on a national specialisation basis. It was specified, however, that individual nations should not become solely suppliers of food and raw materials to the others; presumably this was the result of the desire of all nations to achieve "industrialised" status. Even as late as 1970, there still existed a thread of "national specialisation" in centralised COMECON planning, ⁸ and slow economic progress has resulted since this tends to stifle increased efficiency resulting from free competition.

Basically, however, the economic structure of Eastern Europe has been geared to the Soviet economy, and to some extent this has proved to be of benefit to those countries that have cooperated most, at least by comparison with Romania, which has attempted to create an autarchic economy. However, the essence of COMECON has been to create a dependency upon the U.S.S.R. for the supply of raw materials. Despite the fact that many consumer goods are sold to the Soviets to pay for the raw materials at the expense of their own national demands, during a period of resource scarcity, this may still prove attractive to the NSWP countries. It is difficult to discover how dearly the NSWP countries have to pay for their raw materials, but it would appear that they pay less to the Soviets, in monetary terms, than world market prices for both energy supplies, including oil, and raw materials.⁹ This is indeed a concession by the Soviets who would, no doubt, prefer the hard currency obtainable by selling their raw materials to the West.

The current mood of COMECON, a mood that seems to have developed coincident with détente , is one of integration of economies rather than economic cooperation.¹⁰ Certainly, if its own forecast is to be believed, that, "they are the only group of countries in the world that can be self-sufficient in energy and raw materials," ¹¹ COMECON must be considered a significant factor in holding the Warsaw Pact together. Furthermore, despite the fact that the need to trade with the West increases as the need to meet consumer demands also increases, there are no obvious signs that this trade will reduce the mutual trade between COMECON members. Even Romania, the most independent and, in the past, the COMECON member most eager to trade with the West, must see real benefits from its COMECON membership since its current five-year plan envisages a cutback in trade with the West in favor of trade with its fellow COMECON members. Certainly there are divisive influences within COMECON, which will be covered later, but the current atmosphere appears to be one of stability.

It is difficult to separate purely social or cultural factors that genuinely contribute to the cohesiveness of Eastern Europe as an entity from those of a political, ideological, or economic nature. Geographically, the member states of the Warsaw Pact are contiguous. They have similar social systems in the main, they are Christian to a degree, and there are also some language similarities, but the latter are not sufficient to produce any genuine area identity. Maybe the Slavonic origin of some of the states could be exploited in the interests of unity, but, if current trends continue, even Soviets of Slavic origin will soon be numerically inferior to the Asiatic Soviets.

Perhaps the only recognisable social unifying factor is one brought about by the Pact itself: the greater freedom of travel permitted between member states in comparison with the restricted travel to the West and the Third World. The social intercourse brought about by such travel must to some extent bring about an atmosphere of mutual identity, although it is unlikely that it would be very significant in the face of any real conflict of individual national interests.

Divisive Factors within
the Warsaw Pact

From a Western viewpoint it would be comforting to think that there were real divisive influences created by the armed forces of the NSWP countries. However, these forces are for the most part defensively organised and equipped¹² and are sufficiently institutionalised that they will most likely act as their political leaders, the national Communist parties, decree. Thus, any divisive actions taken by the military are likely to have been originated politically. However, as was pointed out earlier, Soviet troops have been used in the GDR, Hungary, and Czechoslovakia in "police" actions and are still there. Despite their professed defensive role against a Western threat, the earlier suppressive actions of Soviet forces are unlikely to endear them to a large portion of the population of these countries. The situation is somewhat similar in Poland, which also has Soviet troops stationed on its territory; many Poles regard the Soviets as their traditional enemies, particularly those Poles who remember events at the beginning of World War II.

Communist ideology and the Communist Party have been described as a factor that tends to unify the Warsaw Pact. However, it is worth pointing out that party members comprise only about ten percent of the population of the NSWP states--limited deliberately in some cases to those whose loyalty is above reproach--and it is an aging membership. There also appears to be no great enthusiasm by many of the young to seek membership; for example, in 1968 in Hungary only 1.1 percent of the students in Budapest were party members, and in 1971 40 percent of the Czechoslovakian Communist Party working class members were pensioners.¹³ The youth of Eastern Europe are not as vigorously revolutionary as some of the preceding generation, nor has ideological propaganda and indoctrination been an unqualified success. What is more, the youth see the inequity of a system that allows party members to obtain preferential treatment in education and employment, and it could cause friction between party and nonparty members of the member of the population. ¹⁴

Throughout Eastern Europe in recent years there has been a noticeable increase in nationalism. ¹⁵ To a large extent, it is reflected in the differing approaches to government in the NSWP countries: the strong independent line of Romania; the "Hungarian" way; and there was the German way, prior to Honecker (in the GDR there was the general national strengthening of the country by Ulbricht).

Some of these different approaches were reflected in the speeches and contacts with the West made by the NSWP leaders at Helsinki during the CSCE.¹⁶ There were significant differences displayed by the NSWP leaders on the question of sovereignty, While Romania emphasised independence, Polish leadership commented that lasting peace in the past had not come about because it "had been based upon fragile foundations of spheres of influence and upon domination of some countries over others." ¹⁷ These departures from the absolute Soviet line over CSCE tend to support the apparent increasing confidence of the East European national communist parties who may see CSCE not as recognising the status quo but as a means of obtaining a greater degree of independence. After all, it must be recognised that the CSCE initiatives probably came more from the NSWP countries than from the U.S.S.R. and almost certainly for different motives. ¹⁸ This may account for the problems being experienced in trying to conduct a summit meeting of European Communist leaders! As reported in the Times (London) of 21 November 1975, the editorial commission working on the conference was encountering difficulty in reaching a compromise in document language between the Soviets and some national Communist parties. The Soviets are supported by the orthodox Communist parties such as exist in the GDR, but Yugoslavia and Romania, among others, are seeking to reduce Soviet influence in their affairs.

The Soviet policy of détente  with the West, whatever the motives, increases the possibility of weaning Soviet influence in Eastern Europe, assuming that the promised relaxations in the restrictions on East-West contacts materialise. The ideological freedom in the West can only compare favorably with that in Eastern Europe, other than to the truly dedicated Communist. However, the differences tolerated by the Soviets since the Czechoslovakian affair, including those at Helsinki, and provided the NSWP members do not stray too far from the Soviet model, could be a deliberate Soviet policy to make the national Communist parties more acceptable to their own people when comparisons are made with the West. If this is the case, then presumably the Soviets and the national Communist leaders of Eastern Europe recognise the potential for domestic instability and are trying to head it off. Nevertheless, while the perceived threat from the West tended to act as a unifying factor, during the era of détente  the NSWP leadership may wish to "spread their wings" a little now that the threat is apparently reduced; if the Soviets were to initiate a departure from détente  at any time in the future, then there might be resentment displayed at any loss of new-found independence.

Ideologically, the other most significant divisive factor is, of course, the tension and diplomatic conflict that exist between the U.S.S.R. and the People's Republic of China (PRC). While the Soviets would resist most strongly a change of loyalty of any of its East European allies from Moscow to Peking, the protection of a strong champion, sufficiently far removed geographically so as not to dominate them physically, might well tempt some of the NSWP countries to consider loosening ties with Moscow should the Soviets' attention and efforts be diverted elsewhere. After all, Albania broke with Moscow in favour of Peking, but she had no common border with the U.S.S.R.!

Given that the economies of the NSWP states are now well on the way to integration with the U.S.S.R. and with each other through COMECON, and that recognizable progress continues to be made in satisfying consumer demands, there appear to be few really divisive economic issues. Certainly there are some differences within COMECON, such as internal trade balances and no truly convertible currency, but these problems are not significantly different from those faced by other regional economic organizations. However, throughout the NSWP area, as with the U.S.S.R., there is progressively increasing trade with the West, and exposure to the variety and quality of Western consumer goods might produce dissatisfaction with the less efficient, centrally planned economy and industry that prevail in Eastern Europe. While the Communist governments may not wish to expose their people to such comparisons, it may be the price they will have to pay for the technological expertise they need from the West. Furthermore, those NSWP countries with particular industrial specialisations --for example, the GDR which has a relatively advanced computer industry¹⁹--might well lose markets within COMECON to even more technologically advanced Western nations. This could be a source of considerable friction among the NSWP countries.

One other significant divisive economic factor is very much dependent on the Western approach to trading with Eastern Europe. The extending of credit to make available the hard currency required by East European countries in their trade with the West opens up an avenue for a degree of political influence. The blatant attempt to extend political pressure failed with the Soviets over the Jewish emigration question. However, with increasing trade with the West by the NSWP countries, who are following the Soviet East-West trade initiatives, they may well be more susceptible to subtle political influence of a limited kind. If such influence cannot be exerted at present, it is surely possible in the future if these countries do, in fact, become increasingly dependent on Western trade to satisfy consumer demands.

Again it is difficult to separate social factors from those that could be described as ideological or economic. The privileges enjoyed by the Communist party members in education and employment must be socially divisive, as must the restriction of intellectual freedom. Also, the resurgence of nationalism that has taken place in Eastern Europe must, inevitably, present a potential risk of conflict with the Sovietisation that has taken place, particularly during the Stalin era.

The casual observer in the West might be forgiven for assuming that the much publicised propaganda and indoctrination by the Soviets and national Communist parties must, by now, have eliminated traditional views held before Communist rule. However, this may not be the case, and at least one observer has noted that pre-Communist attitudes still prevail in some areas through parental influences.²⁰ While those with memories of pre-Communist days are now much reduced in numbers, those who experienced Soviet activities in Hungary and Czechoslovakia will be able, for many years yet, to pass on to their children the hatred that the Soviet activities will have engendered.

Warsaw Pact
General Assessment

Within the scenario of no significant conventional military imbalance, upon which this examination is based, it is difficult to assess whether the cohesive or divisive factors so far discussed would predominate. One recent analysis of the Warsaw Pact,²¹ based upon the variation of national defence expenditures as an indicator of an individual nation's confidence in the defence alliance, suggested that there was little evidence to indicate a change in the solidarity or integrity of the Pact, despite the events in Czechoslovakia in 1968. However, in the NSWP countries the national resources devoted to the armed forces is entirely at the discretion of the Communist governments, which have no need to submit defence policy decisions to mass public opinion. Thus, the analysis referred to is valid only for the national Communist parties and not necessarily the majority of the NSWP population.

LOOKED AT overall it would be more likely that the ideological, military, economic, and social factors discussed would, on balance, tend to act towards cohesiveness between the governing Communist parties during normal times, when they could call upon Soviet support or support from other governments of the Pact. However, while Soviet forces were diverted from their policing role so would the national Communist parties be preoccupied with their own problems. At that time those Communist parties that were sufficiently nationalistic might wish to declare their independence of the Soviets and the Pact, and in those countries where the Communist leadership ruled only on the basis of external support, they might be overthrown by their own people. For an assessment of these possibilities one must look in greater detail at each of the countries involved.

Air War College

Notes

1. Carl Beck and Karen Eide Rawling, The Military as a Channel of Entry into Positions of Political Leadership in Communist Party States, Air University Conference on the Role of the Military in Communist Societies, November 1975, p. 20.

2. Reinhart Meier, "Warsaw Pact Jubilee," Swiss Review of World Affairs, July 1975, p. 4.

3. Stanislav J. Kirschbaum, "Trade and Détente  Challenge Uniformity in Eastern Europe," International Perspectives, March/April l975.

4. Malcolm Mackintosh, "The Warsaw Pact Today," Survival, May/June 1974, pp. 123-4.

5. Beck and Rawling, pp. 19-22.

6. Kirschbaum, p. 22.

7. Charles Gati, "The Forgotten Region," Foreign Policy, no. 12, Summer 1975.

8. East Europe, January 1971, p. 50.

9. Michael Kaser, "Soviet Trade Turns to Europe," Foreign Policy, no. 12, 1975.

10. Radio Free Europe Research, RAD Background Report/124 (Eastern Europe), 6 May 1975.

11. Kaser, p. 124.

12. The Military Balance 1975-76 (London: International Institute for Strategic Studies, 1975).

13. Paul Neuburg, The Hero's Children: The Post-War Generation in Eastern Europe (New York: William Morrow & Company, 1973).

14. Ibid.

15. David S. Collier and Kurt Glaser, editors, Elements of Change in Eastern Europe, Prospects for Freedom (Chicago: Henry Regnery Company, 1968).

16. J. L. Kerr, "Bilateral Talks at Helsinki," Radio Free Europe Research, RAD Background Report/122 (East-West), 6 August 1975.

17. Times, 12 August 1975, p. 12.

18. Hearings Before the Subcommittee on Europe, Committee on Foreign Affairs, House of Representatives, 92d Congress (Washington: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1972), p. 61.

19. Peter Christian Ludz, "Two Germanys in One World," The Atlantic Papers 3/1973 (Farnborough, England: The Atlantic Institute for International Affairs, 1973).

20. Neuburg, p. 101.

21. Harvey Starr, "A Collective Goods Analysis of the Warsaw Pact after Czechoslovakia," International Perspectives, Summer 1974, pp. 521-32.

Contributor

Wing Commander Peter M. Papworth, RAF, (Royal Air Force College, Cranwell) is Royal Air Force Advisor to the Commandant, Air Command and Staff College, Air University, and a member of the Air University Review Awards Committee. His flying assignments have been in RAF Training Command as a pilot instructor, squadron commander and wing commander/chief instructor. His staff tours have been in Training Command on missile staff duties, and as Senior RAF Liaison Officer at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst. His interest in the subject of this article was increased by a tour on basic intelligence duties at SHAPE, Belgium. Wing Commander Papworth is a graduate of the RAF Staff College and of the USAF Air War College class of 1976.

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