Air University Review, May-June 1979

"How good are they, how much of a threat are they, and can we cope with them?"

Who are Those Guys?

Today, America finds itself in a situation similar to that of Paul Newman and Robert Redford, when as Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid they were on the run; and no matter which way they turned or what trick they used, they found their pursuers still hot on their trail. Staring at their harassers, they moaned: "Who are those guys, anyway?" The U.S. security establishment has also tried many strategies--detente, cold war, massive retaliation, flexible response, assured destruction, volunteer forces, a draft, increasing and decreasing percentages of military expenditures from our gross national product (GNP), and, indeed, even military intervention--yet we, too, look around only to see our pursuer still on our trail, just behind, and today, some would say, overtaking, if not already having overtaken, us.

Cassidy and the Kid almost committed suicide to escape their foes. Will the U.S. have to do the same? Will we, too, be forced to such desperate remedies and jump off the ridge into a raging river without knowing how to swim and trust the Lord to rescue us miraculously? Our cult heroes survived their wild exploit, but, remember, it proved merely the beginning of their end.

Their persistent stalkers were the forces of law and order and a sinister, corporate-paid private detective. If one can believe the reams of information pouring forth from the media, America's never-ceasing and equally sinister adversary is the U.S.S.R. and, specifically, its military power.

The purpose of this article is to examine Soviet military might, in perhaps a different way, and answer the question, "Who are those guys?" As Redford stated his query, the "who" has a deeper meaning than simple identification. The question really means: How good are they, how much of a threat are they, and can we cope with them? These are precisely the questions I will address.

This will not be one of those numerical comparisons. Studies of this kind are about a dime a dozen now and have glutted the market. Some of them are quite good.¹ However, I believe such studies are often misleading and relatively irrelevant to the gut issues: How good? How much of a threat? Why are they as they are? And can we cope? Thus, this article will not compare percentages of GNP devoted to weapons, defense, and research; numbers of strategic launchers or warheads; numbers of divisions; ratios of combat to support; equivalent combat units; equivalent megatonnage; readiness measurements; throw-weight; or even numbers of available youth at the military age.

Why? Partly because, as noted earlier, such comparisons are readily available. But, more important because such data have lost their relevance when one compares the superpowers of the '70s; additionally because so much of it is simply noncomparable and only leaves the observer thinking it should tell him something, but he is not sure exactly what. This is why we hear such widely diverse conclusions about U.S./Soviet military power, even when the comparisons are made by assorted groups of very intelligent and reasonable people. There is a tendency to be too scientific, to try to reduce value judgments to quantifiable terms and let the judgment then be more objective. But I argue that military force comparisons must go beyond numerical listings and include informed subjective analysis.

Before leaving numerical comparisons, however, something should be said about numbers of strategic weapons because there is a magic number somewhere that nations need to become true superpowers while beyond that number, I believe numbers are only important as they affect perceptions of power.

By strategic forces I mean intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), submarine-launched ballistic missiles (SLBMs), strategic bombers, cruise missiles, and antiballistic missiles (ABMs).² In 1964 I began preparations for a tour of duty at the U.S. embassy in the U.S.S.R. At that time, the U.S. had a clear-cut strategic superiority over the U.S.S.R., a significant quantitative and qualitative advantage that few disputed. In 1968, when I returned from the U.S.S.R. and before SALT I began, the U.S. still had a measurable, if declining, lead in all categories,³ but that lead was no longer significant, exploitable, or meaningful. Since then the Soviets have seized the quantitative advantage and lessened the U.S. qualitative lead in at least many categories of comparison, but in spite of their enormous expenditures of investment (money, resources, and manpower), in my opinion, they have not accomplished a meaningful, effective change in the 1968 power relationship. This, I posit, is the most significant fact of the nuclear era: Once a nation acquires a certain level of strategic nuclear capability,⁴ it has "conclusive capability"; additions or quantitative improvements by that state or its adversary(ies) will not change that fact. Today the U.S. and U.S.S.R. have, and the People's Republic of China (PRC), United Kingdom (U.K.), and France nearly have, those sufficient numbers. This is a meaningful accomplishment and well worth the magnitude of the costs. It is not mere entry into the nuclear club or the increased shot at a U.N. Security Council seat (note the PRC only got her seat after she had nuclear weapons) that makes it all so worthwhile. It-is the deterrence. One clear fact revealed by the short history of nuclear weapons ("nukes") is that no nation that has acquired an operational system has ever seriously had its borders attacked by another nation, in spite of provocation or temptation.⁵

What all this means to the U.S./U.S.S.R. balance and particularly to the question "Who are those guys?" is that somewhere around 1965-67 the U.S.S.R. became a nuclear superpower. Additions to that nuclear force have added to their prestige, their trappings of world power, and created a perception of more near equality with the U.S.; but they have not significantly changed the real strategic balance, and balance is the right word. We and the U.S.S.R. are now, and were by at least 1967 for all practical purposes, equal nuclear powers, and the addition by one side or the other of even 500 or so more launchers or warheads or multiple independently targetable reentry vehicle (MIRV) or maneuverable reentry vehicle (MaRV) capability⁶ will not effectively change that parity, equity, or balance to a degree that would enable either of them to feel free to use nuclear forces or allow them an advantage politically that could force the other down. We are both now deterred, and that is why detente has been and is inevitable and why both nations have as their undebatable number one goal the avoidance of a nuclear war with one another.

The only way the U.S. or the Soviet Union can effectively change that fact of equity would be either through some revolutionary technological breakthrough (e.g., a new kind of and actually effective ABM that makes one side immune to nuclear attack, an effective death ray, etc.), or for the other to opt out of the game and over the years phase out its nuclear strike force. Neither of these alternatives, as an exclusive achievement, looms very expectantly on the horizon today. As a result of the strategic mix and the numbers involved, plus the possibility of launch on warning, all discussions of first strike are merely exercises in theory. In the nuclear art of today, first strike is simply not a plausible alternative. Even if one side or the other were 90 percent sure it could seriously weaken the other side via a first strike try, the 10 percent doubt caused by only theoretical knowledge of nuclear war and the launch on warning possibility and degree of holocaust a miscalculation can cause is still sufficient deterrence.⁷

So it is my hypothesis that "those guys," in the strategic arena at least, are clearly our equal. We did not allow or cause this state by any failure to take precautions,⁸ by any niggardly attitude toward defense expenditures, or by any diplomatic failure. It was their decision to become our equal, and, in the nuclear game and today's state of technology, all it takes for many advanced states is that commitment to expend the effort. There are numerous other countries that can, if they so decide, also accomplish this task.⁹ The PRC will soon be at that level and cannot be stopped--it is too late to prevent her by preemptive attack. The U. K. and France are, for all practical purposes, in the range also. Neither we, the Soviets, nor apparently a nuclear nonproliferation treaty (NPT) signed by over 100 states can change this fact. Even that possible technological breakthrough would offer only a limited time advantage, so it is best we learn to live with this changed fact of life in the nuclear age--that individual national strategic nuclear superiority is now a most unlikely possibility. But I argue this is not bad; it forces us to work more carefully together to avoid nuclear war and to try to understand and cope with the growing world interdependence and lessening ability for anyone state to dominate.

The other area of statistical overkill being foisted on thinking America is the attempt to reach conclusions based on comparisons of costs of defense or defense research, either as totals in rubles or dollars or as percentages of national effort as -reflected by the GNP. I have read numerous such studies,¹⁰ each seemingly more efficiently done than the last, but I always arrive at the same conclusion: They really do not tell us much about the Soviet military or the Soviet potential or threat. Rubles and dollars are not comparable, and trying to transfer U.S. costs to Soviet effort, or vice versa, produces only theoretical results, not convincingly accurate or meaningful ones. The ruble has no accurate exchange rate via Western currency; and, due to an entirely different concept of secrecy and reporting, we have no accurate way of determining what the Soviets mean when their budgets record broad categories with some defense connotation. I admire the men and women who have grappled with this insoluble dilemma, and I have been impressed by the logic of their patchwork solutions; but, alas, none of them has convinced me that there is a way to determine how good the other guy is or what threat he offers, potential or real, by saying that he spends more or less rubles or dollar equivalents on defense than we do. What really counts, it seems to me, is not how much he spends in investment (money, resources, and manpower) but what he gets for that expenditure and how and why he perceives his need and use for these products.

The Soviet production system is operated with incredible inefficiency; this is lessened in high priority industry but still exists. I contend that official Soviet data on production and costs are basically based on millions of little lies, and any relation to the truth is purely coincidental. Unfortunately, many U.S. analyses of Soviet capability are also based on this faulty Soviet data. Additionally, actual costs in the U.S.S.R., if known, do not predict the quality or quantity of the output.

According to a Soviet friend, a Leningrad concern that produces a highly technical generator contracted to build and install one for a scientific institute in Novosibirsk. As usually happens, even on high priority projects, the enterprise cannot complete the contract on time because of a shortage of required materials from elsewhere. Failure to meet plan dates looks bad, so management meets and contrives a way to transfer blame. They realize transportation from Leningrad to Siberia is at best slow and usually slower due to foul-ups and mismanagement. They conclude that the recipients in Siberia, once told the shipment is on the way, will blame the failure of arrival on the transport industry. So Leningrad sends a message to Siberia, "Project completed, en route such and such date. Leningrad management pats itself on the back for its ingenuity and relaxes. The Siberian management, however, is also experienced in the Soviet game of "lie to achieve." They receive the eagerly awaited message, recognize there will be a transportation delay, and decide to get a jump on the system by sending a message after a few days: "Generator arrived, send installation team." This is Catch-22, Soviet style, and it is not an isolated case but merely everyday life in the U.S.S.R.¹¹ One simply cannot judge Soviet success based on investment in any comparable way with a U.S. or West European industry.

Not to be one-sided, I should note that U.S. expenditures also can be quite misleading about our military product. One needs only to listen to a select few of the "60 Minutes" shows to learn of tank fiascoes or to get to know the defense industry better and learn that a small item like the cost of beautiful color brochures is included in defense contract expenditures, even if not line-itemed in the contracts. Dollar for dollar, our investment cannot translate directly to weapons output either, but I trust expenditure-to-product ratios are clearly more relatable here than in the Soviet Union and not comparable. Thus, we should not be concerned with what percent of their GNP they put into the military, for it may well be that a 10 percent effort on our part exceeds our needs and supplies excellent equipment, while a 30 to 40 percent investment of theirs is still inadequate, or, of course, vice versa. Instead, we should be concerned with what their military has and how that relates to their strategy and tactics as they, not we, see them.

I will broadly assess the historical background, social status and national influence, strengths and weaknesses, the perceived need, and the grand strategy of "those guys." My purpose is to offer the reader a better understanding of them and, therefore, their comparability to the military force of the U.S.

In 1917, Lenin took over a distraught country, and his government was reckoned to survive no more than 90 days. Sixty years later, if there is one force that has carried the Communist party of the U.S.S.R. through all its travail, one must seriously consider giving that credit to the Red military. Lenin gave away huge chunks of former Russian territory in order to survive and stop the Germans in World War I. The Red military gained most of that territory back before, and all of it after, World War II. Few will dispute the fact that the Red military made possible the East European commonwealth and that it remains a loyal Soviet commonwealth today, more due to the actual presence or proximity of that oft-committed military force than for any other reason. In the brief 60-year history of the U.S.S.R., "those guys" have played a truly significant role. In fact, they secured the revolution from within and without and spearheaded the expansion of the U.S.S.R. into what it is today. As a result, it is not hard to imagine that the leaders of the Communist party of the U.S.S.R. hold their military in especially high esteem and show a deep appreciation for the advantages of significant military power. The Red military can appropriately be entitled the "defenders of communism."

Who Leads Whom?

This brings us to one of the most debated questions about the Soviet military. If they have played such an important role in the development of the world's first lasting communist state and are so appreciated by the political leadership, how much clout do they have with that leadership? In fact, who leads whom? There have been numerous articles written on this subject, and, as a student of Soviet military affairs for years and a close observer of the Soviet scene, I find myself agreeing with those who conclude that the military leadership is under effective control of the party.¹² Frankly, however, I can understand why the opposite conclusion continues to persist. The Soviet military and its war machine, when compared with civilian counterparts and the civilian consumer industry, simply fare so well that one concludes the military have a favored status. They do. But the critical issue is why? I believe the answer is that political leaders recognize the advantages--indeed, in their minds, the absolute necessity--of considerable military might and a relatively contented military leadership. The politicians are aware of and often indebted for their current status to the same historical facts that I have so briefly summarized here. The military have pulled the fat out of the fire for the political leaders several times, and the nation has prospered both politically and economically by maintaining a large and well-equipped military force. Still, one is hard pressed to find a time when the military-preferred solution to a problem has overridden a party-preferred one or where a military need has prevailed over a political one, while counter examples are common enough:

• The Soviets deployed only one small ABM system and then abandoned the concept.
• In 1967 a new draft law went into effect reducing the amount of time a draftee must spend on active duty, in spite of an obvious military preference that in this era of technological dominance draftees should serve longer, not shorter, terms. The political side of the argument was that, Soviet youth, like most youth in the '60s, were proving to be a difficult problem, and one way to mitigate their rebelliousness was to put more of them on active duty, separated from friends and family and under tight discipline without the additional cost inherent in substantially increasing the total size of the military.
• Marshal Grechko's death was followed by the appointment of a civilian to the Defense Minister post. I cite this merely as an additional fact of the continued and steady subordination of the military. Even when military men Zhukhov, Malinovsky, and Grechko served as Defense Minister, most Sovietologists now believe they were subordinate to the civilian and Politburo candidate member, Dmitri Fedorovich U stinov.¹³ Ustinov apparently chaired or was a key member of the defense committee chaired by Brezhnev or Khrushchev, and his ideas and arguments were the ones most respected by the Politburo then and now. He is not only Defense Minister but also a full member of the Politburo.
• In SALT I the politicians facing the possibility of a Moscow summit without a significant agreement included SLBMs in the agreement, probably unnecessarily, and forfeited a chance for the Soviet navy to continue in one of the few directions in which it had every advantage over the u.s.¹⁴

The leaders of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (KPSS),¹⁵ the Politburo power bloc, appear to have clear control and domination over the Soviet military; however, by choice they take good care and are considerate of the military needs of the U.S.S.R. because all of them have a cultural and historic appreciation for the importance of a powerful military force. Many of them have close ties with the current military leadership or military allegiances based on their World War II experiences.

Concluding that there is civilian control of the Soviet military, however, may not be as meaningful as one would hope. Few argue that the U.S. government does not have civilian control over the military, but many argue that the influence of our military on the civilian leadership is excessive. In the U.S.S.R. this is a much more difficult area to analyze. The Soviet military does influence the Politburo decision-makers. Certainly, there is an active, albeit informal, lobby of military men and men in power posts who rate military needs more important than others and constantly argue in favor of priorities and expenditures that favor national defense over agriculture, consumer goods, arms control, and detente fostering decisions. However, in my judgment, as in the U.S., they sometimes win and sometimes lose, even though they are almost always heard.

Still, if one can accept the fact, as most Sovietologists do, that the Politburo and the Central Committee of the party are the key bodies in the U.S.S.R. decision-making apparatus and the Council of Ministers the key organization for carrying out those decisions, one must conclude that official military influence on decisionmaking is relatively minor. Today, there are no military men represented on the Politburo, and there has been no more than one military member at any time in recent years. The Central Committee, which theoretically (and only theoretically) chooses the Politburo and has on a few isolated occasions overruled the Politburo, averages about 15 military members (under 10 percent), and several of them are old-time war heroes who hold the honor without any current influence.¹⁶ Still, this official representation on key bodies could be considered to offer the Soviet military leadership more entrees into their decision-making bodies than the U.S. military has into ours. No U.S. active duty military man is in Congress or on the cabinet (the Politburo is in some ways similar to the U.S. cabinet but the Central Committee much less an equivalent of our Congress). Still, this ignores the fact that our system uses the National Security Council (NSC) in a way quite similar to Soviet use of the Politburo and its committees and that our cabinet and NSC together greatly influence top decisions¹⁷ but still fall far short of the power of the Politburo. In the U.S., the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) sits on the NSC and represents the corporate body of all the service chiefs. Supporting him is a very effective staff effort from the Joint Staff and their coordination with the service staffs. On each of the committees of the NSC there are military representatives, and it is the studies of those committees that form the basis of U.S. security decisions by our civilian leaders. There is military input at every level. I have worked in this system, and although I must rate the success of the military as erratic depending on the issue, I believe the opportunity for military influence in the U.S. to be quite high and well accepted in principle.

I have not sat in on the Soviet version of their defense council nor, of course, Politburo meetings. I have, however, talked with Soviet civilians and military who have been involved in their foreign and defense policy apparatus and have read material on such subjects reflecting the little precise knowledge we do have.¹⁸ This all leads me to the conclusion that, overall, the U.S. military probably has better opportunities, consistently provided by formal mechanisms arid procedures, to influence national decisions than do our Soviet counterparts. I am totally convinced that military members of U.S. delegations, such as SALT and MBFR, have more clout on the delegation decisions and recommendations than do their Soviet military delegate counterparts,¹⁹ partly because of a freer mix of responsibilities. Our military men are usually involved in all aspects of the issue, while Soviet operations tend to restrict their military to military-related input only. In summary, I conclude that the appearance of great influence by the Soviet military on national decisions is usually exaggerated. In the U.S.S.R. the political leaders take care of the military well but do not pay undue attention to their advice and will decide against that advice with little hesitation.

If, however, the U.S. military have more opportunity to influence national decisions than their Soviet counterparts, they have to take a subordinate position to "those guys" in relative social status. As a young Russian woman once summed it up for me, "A Soviet officer is a hell of a catch." The controlled media of the U.S.S.R. are obviously under constant instructions to glorify, laud, and support the high status of the Soviet military professional and the temporary draftee. Consistent with the aforementioned "defenders of communism" status, Soviet society is constantly told that the socialist military is different from the historic Russian military forces and their western and capitalist counterparts of today. They are representatives of the people, the working class, and allegedly only in service to the people. In this service capacity, they receive privileges similar to those of party members (most officers are members or quasimembers of the party) and important officials. Officers of captain rank or higher usually have a car and a driver; their pay, although low compared to the U.S. scale, is higher on a comparative basis with the rest of their society. It is quite a complicated system and thus hard to cite a simple rank for rank comparison. It includes base pay, responsibility pay, longevity and education pay, and generous fringe benefits that exceed the sometimes-criticized fringe benefit package for our military; e.g., 45-day vacations annually versus 30 for U.S. and a better but later retirement. It is the intangibles, though, that could make military life in the U.S. S. R. more appealing than in the West. Many Soviet soldiers, for example, have noted to me how they are not bothered by the "militsia" (Soviet police) or even the Commission of State Security (KG B)--agencies most Soviet citizens are generally quite concerned about. Military officers are also more likely to receive duty assignments outside of the U.S.S.R. and thus have freer access to better consumer products and foreign currencies. These can be and often are parlayed into considerable profit.

Thus, high social status, generous benefits, and responsive and respectful treatment by the political leadership mean that the U.S.S.R. military can attract high caliber men (and a few women) into its ranks. There are more than 100 military schools in the country,²⁰ and attendance at one is considered a plum leading to a more comfortable, respected, and privileged life. There are also some apparently excellent technical schools and advanced professional schools the military can attend--education both within the military and elsewhere is one of the best passports to success. All this is a definite plus for the Soviet military: high prestige and privileges translate into good people with high morale and effectiveness on the job.

The Special Status of the Plan

Here let me interject a discussion that, on the surface, may not appear to be directly concerned with "those guys." Americans generally do not recognize that one of the fundamental differences between Soviet and American societies is the impact of "the plan" on the U.S.S.R. By "the plan," I refer to the five-year plans and their revisions that guide the development of the U.S.S.R. This plan is all-encompassing and all-consuming. It is not only the contract that determines how many guns, tanks, and missiles will be built but in fact covers almost everything in Soviet society--from paper clips to ice cream cones, from maternity wards to restaurants. Nothing is built, no resource extracted, no employee hired unless covered by the plan. The plan shares a spot along with Lenin's works as the holy scripture of the U.S.S.R. This plan has a definite impact on the Soviet military and the machine they operate. The plan is produced and, more important, approved (read blessed) by the leaders of the party. If the plan calls for something at this location, it must occur; if the plan says the something will do such and such, it must do it, and if it does not, it behooves all to pretend it does.

Translated into military terms, this means, for example, that an aeronautical institute, once called for by the plan, will exist and operate almost in perpetuity. A Soviet official could decide that the air age has passed by, but, in the same breath, he would be most hesitant to say that a research institute established by the plan to build airplanes is no longer needed and does not need funding to design new planes next year, too. That might be interpreted as saying the plan was or is wrong, which means that one thinks the leaders either are or might previously have been wrong--a most unhealthy attitude. So, the military benefits, albeit maybe in only the short term. Soviet tanks roll off the assembly line year after year, partly due to plan infallibility and momentum. Let us call it the "plan syndrome." In the past decade or so, Western analysts have often noted how the Soviets try out and fly military aircraft after aircraft, seemingly several each year, while the U.S. adds only one or two every several years. Is this a clear sign of greater Soviet interest in military things, or is it a reflection of the "plan syndrome"? Once an aircraft development institute is created in the U.S.S.R., it is in business. The design team has guaranteed employment and seemingly guaranteed and gradually increasing funding for its efforts. The initial creation may accurately reflect the Soviet leadership's interest in air power, but its continuation and its far more frequent product appearance springs to considerable degree from the plan syndrome. It is there, therefore it must be needed; it employs people, so it must produce something, and things cost more as the years go by, so give it more. The enterprise has no requirement to produce so many in order to make a profit, and the only incentive to sell to its Air Force or an airline is the prestige that comes from success. But if there is no success this year, just design more next year.

This practice creates a kind of stability for Soviet designers and their military consumers that their Western counterparts surely must envy, but it does not, as is often portrayed, accurately reflect a Soviet decision to achieve military superiority over all. Many of the aircraft are never produced operationally, although more are than the West matches. The syndrome effect is felt across the spectrum of production, design, etc. But it is not a total blessing; more and more Soviets are questioning their inability to examine sunk costs and back out of something no longer needed or perhaps never needed. In 1968 the Soviets even allowed a movie on this theme, "Sovremenik" [The Modern Man], and, alas, as in real life, the film had a sad ending--the infallibility of the plan survived and wasted a few more million rubles while the career of the modern man who questioned it was ruined.

Soviet warehouses are full of shoddy or unneeded consumer goods the people will not buy and do not need. As noted earlier this is caused both by the lies and inefficiency combined with the plan syndrome. But the military are more consuming than consumers; they often relish the oversupply and are not as thrifty with their resources. They will make use of this supply by adding more tanks or armored vehicles per unit, more training equipment, more exhaustible supplies to expend in maneuvers, etc. But, of course, even some of the military recognize that this steady momentum and difficulty, if not inability, to turn off a certain spigot is sometimes wasteful and often gives them more than they need of one item while preventing acquisition of some other modern and perhaps more needed piece of equipment that, as yet, has not made it through the bureaucratic mess into the plan. Thus, partly because so many things and so much investment are already in effect and are so difficult to stop, the Soviets still often seem behind in quality if not quantity.

Before we can finally evaluate the Soviet military, we need to have a more accurate feel for what they perceive as their needs rather than what our experts think they need. To do this, first, we need to try to conceptualize, both the-oretically and from the facts available to us, what grand strategy the Communist leaders of the U.S.S.R. are attempting to follow.

One is tempted to believe that since planning such as SALT\is so important to communism and impacts so much on Soviet society that, unlike us, they must it all carefully written down somewhere--a grand national strategy with pros and cons for each alternative, a final accepted strategy, or perhaps different ones to follow on a set timetable. How neat that would be, but all my efforts to learn of such a plan have failed to hook even a nibble. I am afraid the truth is that they are, after all, not much better at the game than we are and that no such revealing document exists. In 1969 I wrote an article on Soviet strategy for the '70s,²¹ and now, after eight years of the '70s have passed, I am more confident about the accuracy of my description of their grand strategy of practice, if not design, than I was when I wrote it. I called it a policy of détente/expand. Detente/expand matches their obvious long-term goals effectively; in fact, it has been quite successful. In brief, detente/expand means the Soviets will follow policies that, on the issues the West (and especially the U.S.) consider important, will lead to a reduction of tensions, accommodation, peaceful coexistence, etc.--essentially a no-risk policy. But, on the other hand, on those issues they judge to be on the periphery of Western (U.S.) interests, they will feel free to exert their growing ability to influence and even cautiously export military pressure and power. In describing the "expand" leg of detente/expand in 1969, I indicated that I would expect the Soviets, by around the mid70s for the first time, to apply military force in some part of Africa to influence the outcome of a struggle for power. The Angola and Ethiopian operations fit the prediction quite well. In fact, I am less surprised by the fact they supplied force than by their conservative, cautious manner; they continued to use proxies (Cuba this time) to do the actual fighting. I have long felt the most apparent Soviet international trait has been conservatism, but their African act reveals this conservative bent to be even stronger than I had thought.

Détente/expand is an ideal strategy for the Soviets if their leaders' goals are (1) to stay in power, (2) to avoid war with the United States, (3) to maintain control of the Eastern Europe commonwealth and buffer zone, (4) to attain military economic parity or better with the United States, (5) to enjoy economic growth via access to greater technological skill, and (6) to acquire greater worldwide influence. I list them in an approximate order of priority based on Soviet actions internally and externally as well as on a perusal of what Soviet leaders say. As we go down the list, the priority order is less reliable; I would place "to achieve a Soviet-dominated Communist world" far, far down the list. Detente/expand as a strategy explains Brezhnev's emphasis on detente via agreements and negotiations like Helsinki, MBFR, SALT, the Berlin agreement, etc., yet, the dichotomy of Angola and Soviet expansion into the Middle East and Africa (Yemen, Somalia, Ethiopia, and Uganda).²² It also indicates, however, that a war in Europe or even direct confrontation with the U.S. is something to be avoided. Supporting the detente/expand strategy choice is an underlying and rather sophisticated Soviet understanding that relaxed tensions favor the U.S.S.R. and its goals accomplishment. Why threaten Western Europe and arouse their and America's fear and ire when together they overmatch the U.S.S.R. and then some and when history shows that when aroused they consistently outdo the Communists? On the other hand, relaxation of East! West tensions tends to split U.S. and European interests, lessens their willingness to spend money on defense, and opens the door for Soviet access to what the West has and the U.S.S.R. needs--technological know-how and machinery. War, on the other hand, risks failure on so many of these top objectives, and, even if carried out successfully, probably destroys the very thing (the technology) the U.S.S.R. would most likely hope to gain from it. Additionally, relaxed tensions increase pressure to reduce the U.S. presence in Europe. The Soviets like to point out to West Europeans the inevitable fact that someday the U.S. will go home, but the U.S.S.R. will always remain only 400 miles away.

If the U.S.S.R. wants to avoid war with the U.S. and seeks perhaps only to increase political influence over Europe and access to Western technology in the future, then why a 4,000,000man armed force, why 840,000 men in Central Europe, why all those tanks, airplanes, guns, missiles, rockets, armored carriers, and more and more coming that are better and better?²³ Because this, too, fits well with detente/expand. To the Soviet view--and I rather suspect every informed observer's view--detente, at least equal treatment in detente, is possible only if you are indeed an equal of those you want detente with. Furthermore, expand on the periphery is possible only if your borders are secure and you are a big enough threat so that no one dares to push you around or to pick a fight with you over an issue not really vital to them. In perhaps simpler terms, the U.S.S.R. leadership has studied history and noted that great powers--Rome, Greece, Great Britain, and the U.S.--all developed very large military forces more modern than those of their potential foes and always capable of being exported to far away places effectively.

In addition, when we talk in conventional military terms (all but strategic), "those guys" have a need that they perceive, perhaps irrationally, but nonetheless "real" to them, which we simply do not share and include in our evaluation of their need. The U.S. is surrounded by friends or, if one is more bluntly valueless in judgment, weaker nation-states that offer no threat at all. The U.S. S. R., on the other hand, shares a 5000-mile, sometimes-disputed border with the nation-state that is her greatest rival in their special Communist world and a nation from which once erupted a force that conquered and dominated what is now the U.S.S.R. for 300 years.²⁴

Furthermore, as noted earlier, the Soviet presence in Eastern Europe is objectively evaluated as at least as much to hold onto Eastern Europe as it is to threaten the West. All those Eastern Europe nations have been enemies and have provided the route for invasions from West European foes. Additionally, they are surrounded by U.S. forces, which, with the French, British, and Japanese (again. allies), at the inception of Communist rule in the U.S.S.R., invaded Soviet territory and sided with their opponents.²⁵

And, finally, another reason for all those numbers is a reflection of the plan syndrome. After World War II, extremely large Russian forces were needed, not only to occupy and hold but also to counter U.S. potential domination via our nuclear possession. Most Soviets I know will strongly make the case that the only reason the U.S. did not dictate terms to them or even attack with our atomic advantage in the late forties and the fifties was that the huge Soviet ground forces in Eastern Europe held Western Europe as their counterattack hostage. It is not important whether that is true. It is important that they believe it to be true and that it set a precedent, now perpetuated by the plan syndrome, for far larger forces in Eastern Europe than Western analysts believe are necessary only to assure the peace. Additionally, one needs to be aware of the Soviet inferiority complex and the irrational estimate of the forces of opposition resulting from that complex.²⁶

When the Communists took over in 1917, no one, apparently including themselves, really thought they would long survive. This was perhaps nurtured by the Russian cultural inheritance; Russians always seemed to be the weak sisters of Europe. They had everything the others had, and even more, but always seemed to bungle it some way and remain the most backward, least important, and least effective. Also, the Communist takeover was at least in part expected to fail because it represented such a small portion of Russian society. Yet, somehow--and this .is not the place to deal with that fascinating story--the Communists prevailed. They prevailed while almost always appearing on the prink, always threatened from within and without, always barely surviving the predicted disasters. All this shaped a strange psychosocial ailment that infects the Soviet leadership and many of their citizens to this day. They try to hide it with grandiloquent claims of fantastic success. They sound like the Mohammed Ali of the world environment, always shouting, "We are the greatest!" Nevertheless, it always rings insincere and comes across not as if they are the greatest but as people who want to be as great as the rest but who somehow know everyone else judges them as less so. Yet in the silence of their back rooms, before going to sleep at night, one suspects they seriously doubt even their equality, much less their superiority.

The result is a kind of paranoia that impels Soviet leaders to acquire more and more military might and more and more world influence. For years they have shouted, "We are number one in everything...(and soon we'll even equal America)!" Their goal for so long has been to be able to say, "Look, world, we are as strong or stronger than America." That desire dominates their thinking, 90ntrols their international negotiations, and determines the acceptability or unacceptability of so much that they do. A trade agreement with the U.S. is a clear and high Soviet priority; yet, when virtually won via detente/expand, it had to be rejected.²⁷ Not because the Soviets were not willing to let more Jews leave the U.S.S.R.--that decision had already been made--but because the U.S. Congress tried to make it a public and notable part of the agreement, and that would make the Soviets appear inferior. That was and is unacceptable. The realities of a SALT, MBFR, or a Helsinki agreement are far less important, or at least can be overridden by the cosmetics, if they enhance the world view of Soviet equity or, even better, superiority over the U.S. This equity or better attitude clearly dominates Soviet bargaining positions. One has to conclude that this is an inferiority complex, and that complex fuels the Communists' need to keep improving and keep inordinately large Soviet military forces.

And this psychosocial complex produces another serious malady that spurs the U.S.S.R.'s military-industrial complex. The Soviets exaggerate the threat and believe in it. The Federal Republic of Germany is far too small a nationstate today to realistically threaten the U.S. S. R., but the Russians are genuinely fearful, and, on the basis of a rearmed Germany almost alone, they justify 460,000 ground forces in Central Europe. We all know that the U.S. and NATO have no intention of attacking the U.S.S.R. and that Czechoslovakia, Poland, Hungary, Romania, et al. could not really throw out their Communist dictators and join NATO. But Soviet leaders consider it a realistic threat that must be prevented by the sheer weight of power. Indeed, the huge KGB (a virtual military force in itself), the Border Guards, and the millions of Soviet military men scattered throughout the U.S.S.R. are, by our standards, excessive, but by theirs a required force to thwart dissidence and the infiltration of those who want to overthrow them. It sounds incredible, but many of the most sophisticated and informed Russians I know have admitted to me that it is true and that to them, instinctively, they always feel threatened. I refer you to an old book of the cold war days, In the Name of Conscience. ²⁸ The author, a brilliant defector, tells the story of how the KGB files built up the reputation of an anti-Soviet group in Germany to the point that it was deemed vital to destroy it, and he was so as-signed. On reaching Germany he learned the reality that the organization was most ineffective and not at all guilty of even a minute portion of the charges recorded against it in the KGB files. This is simply the "lie syndrome" in another form. Whenever anything goes wrong, the Soviets officially blame it on "Western influence, saboteurs, the threat," which absolves any failure of the socialist concept. This creates a vastly exaggerated and false threat but, nonetheless, one that is official and makes the acceptability of large and very powerful military forces appear most needed and logical, and, in fact, considering the alleged threat, a smaller, weaker force would appear to be a failure on the party's part to do what is necessary for security requirements. Another factor contributing to this is the recognition that the Communist party in the U.S.S.R., even today, is relatively small but was even smaller arid less representative of the masses in 1917. Yet, it overthrew the government. Consequently, small forces of resistance and threat must quickly be overwhelmed and stifled, or they, too, might succeed; this is a Communist dictum for survival.

These discussions relate closely to the current debate regarding Soviet civil defense (CD) efforts,²⁹ a subject I specialized in while I was in the U.S.S.R.

There is, indeed, a CD program, and it is certainly consuming more time and money than any Western counterpart. Why? In part, what I have already said supplies the answer. The Soviets feel inferior and have exaggerated the threat. Additionally, the plan momentum exacts a much larger expenditure on war materials than on consumer items, and that needs to be continuously justified. One clear way to remind people of an external threat that has been somewhat exaggerated is to require them periodically to sit through classes describing the horror of that threat and showing the government's efforts to lessen its calamitous effect. People accept the sacrifices, the restrictions, and the indignities a bit more easily if there seems to be some justification for them. That is the theory, at least, of the program directors and the Politburo. I believe the reality is quite different.

The Soviet CD program is in reality a farce--an excessive waste of money, time, and manpower. The overwhelming majority of the Soviet citizenry, who must participate in it, recognize the program as a joke and a typical example of bureaucratic mishmash. They mock the program and take advantage of it. It provides a day or several days away from the office, to read a novel, to sleep through lectures, and to socialize with friends. More often than not, this attitude is shared by the teacher, who is not a pro and is merely earning party brownie points. A Soviet doctor, now in the U.S., described his experience as the CD program director in his hospital in much the same way--as a farce. For example, in the basement of the hospital there were boxes and boxes of CD emergency supplies; but, alas, not food, not clothing, not medical supplies--only World War II gas masks!

Still, the masses participate, the boxes are there, and the reports are lodged--all indicating the fantastic success and overachievement of the CD plan. Who is fooling whom?

How Good Are They?

Some of you will argue that I have begged the question, especially on the conventional side. Is not the issue, simply stated, that due to the deterrence of strategic war, there is increased likelihood of a conventional war? And cannot the Soviets march to the Rhine in 19 to 20 days? How good are they in conventional power?³⁰

The answer is damn good, but not that good. So good that my advice to any U.S. military leader or president would be not to attack the U.S.S.R. Assuming we could keep it conventional (and I don't), I think the U.S. and our allies currently would be overmatched. The U.S.S.R. and its East European buffer zone is an armed camp. Our losses would be tremendous, and we would be stopped sooner than Hitler or Napoleon were.

But I would give the same advice to General Rybkin,³¹ Minister Ustinov, or to Brezhnev if they were contemplating a war in Europe. In-place NATO forces are inferior to the Warsaw Pact in offensive punch but not in defensive capability, their real raison d'être. The Red offensive weaknesses and our defensive capability combined are too much for them to overcome without considerable increases in their current numbers and weapon systems.

In spite of rumors to the contrary, the Soviets are not tank crazy; they are combined-arms oriented and have devoted their greatest buildups in recent years to mobilizing the infantry into fast-moving armored personnel carriers. Such carriers are even more vulnerable to the modern, smart (guided) weapons being acquired by both sides than is the tank--and the tank is [now more vulnerable than ever before. The Arab/Israeli War of 1973 was fought with many very good Soviet-made smart weapons, and the I results augured very poorly for European style mass army wars.³² The Soviets have learned that lesson well and are very much concerned over the impact of the smart weapons on their force structure; but as yet they have not devised answers in spite of lengthy debate and serious consideration.³³ If the U.S. and our allies benefit equally from our knowledge of Vietnam and the Middle East, and there are very encouraging signs we have, Soviet conventional power takes on more and more the role of mere superpower trappings to be exploited politically, to be exported to the periphery, to cost money, and to successfully serve the purpose of ensuring internal survival of the Communists in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, but not to being a credible alternative .to detente in Europe or against the U.S.

For years the Soviet military experts reflected in their exercises and writings that European war would inevitably lead to nuclear war. They practiced it that way, even though they did not like it. The same occurred in the West, but then we worried about nuclear stalemate and tried to create flexible response. The Soviets liked our lead and have tried to match it. Except for modern technology they might have succeeded, though I doubt it.

The battlefield model of the next war is going through a rapidly evolving and dynamic change. The most likely result appears to be a solid decrease in the number of soldiers needed to defend and a quantum increase in the numbers needed to wage a successful assault. As is typical, it is mostly the younger military men who are recognizing this. The most innovative of these are now foreseeing, and proving, that very small groups of highly trained infantrymen, using the new sophisticated smart weapons and supported by new technology like the latest helicopters, can combine to achieve kill ratios on tanks or armored vehicles that are quantum improvements over even the recent past. In a defensive role, teams of 3 to 20 men now or soon will be able to thwart the advance of hundreds and maybe thousands.³⁴

Frankly, even 5 to 10 years ago I considered the current Soviet manpower and armor advantage to be insufficient to guarantee success in a war in Europe. I felt they would need at least 50 percent more to meet their conservative demands. But the smart weapons and the apparent willingness of the U.S. and NATO to train and deploy our personnel to take advantage of their revolutionary capability now would force the Soviets to be prepared to commit an additional force of two million or so in order to be assured of success. The U.S. and NATO have under arms the capability to stop the current Red threat. One can question the ability of that inplace force to live up to this potential due to serious weaknesses in command organization, weapons compatibility, morale, and state of readiness, but that must be the subject of another analysis and does not detract from the fact that the manpower and financial resources are currently on hand to counter a Soviet threat. If the U.S. and NATO do not get carried away with the numbers-game hysteria, we can spend our money wisely by adding these new weapons in much larger numbers to our current forces and counter the threat.

Thus, even after tremendous modernization expenditures, the Russians now find themselves back where they started; the only way for them to overrun Europe is by all-out attack, including nuclear weapons and chemical and biological weapons from the outset. That might succeed, but the risk far exceeds the possible gain, and the potential nuclear holocaust is an unacceptable outcome. Perhaps more important, that means they have to destroy the very thing they want from Western Europe--its technology.

That Soviet offensive advantage, albeit not a conclusive one, does still offer the Soviets an edge. If one accepts detente/expand as a strategy, and the concomitant belief that it will eventually lead to relaxed tensions and drastically lessened American commitment and involvement in Western Europe, the Soviet conventional military advantage in Europe grows as and if American troops withdraw. The Europeans have the capability to counter that edge, but measurements of their willingness or belief that it is necessary to do so all indicate they will not. Thus, the chance appears on the horizon of the Soviets' achieving their goal of increased political influence, if not hegemony, over Europe, not by attack but by their presence and their comparative strength advantage. They expect the Europeans to be unwilling to match them and be nervous enough over the resultant inferiority to make judgments and decisions more favorable to the U.S.S.R., if and after the U.S. withdraws. They are quite possibly correct.

The Red Navy represents perhaps the most dramatic area of improvement in Soviet power in the last ten years. We have watched it grow from a purely coastal, defensive force (minus the SLBM submarine force) to a worldwide naval force to be reckoned with. Their navy could now challenge the U.S. on many of the high seas; it contributes significantly (approximately 800 launchers) to Soviet nuclear equity, and it would have an easier task in a conventional European war than its U.S. counterpart since only our side would need to keep the sea lanes of communication secure.

But the navy follows the example of the other areas of Soviet military power. It was brought up to snuff only after the others. In my opinion, it is at its current capability to rival the West and makes the U.S.S.R. a true superpower. It cannot be the decisive force, just as in today's nuclear and aerospace age the U.S. and United! Kingdom navies also must play slight second fiddle (with the exception of their SLBM role) to the other services.

This Communist ocean force led the naval forces of the world into missiles by being the first to deploy operationally the now famous cruise missile. In addition the Soviet fleet is relatively new and well constructed. Its weaknesses are the lack of a strong air arm for additional protection, its relative inexperience in naval warfare, and the fact that it cannot yet match combined Western naval forces. There are numerous excellent articles on the Soviet Navy,³⁵ and a few of them agree with the estimate of Jane's All the World's Navies that it is number one today. I disagree and classify it a close second or in a tie for number one, if an old-fashioned World War II-like conventional war were to be fought. But in the more likely role of showing the flag³⁶ and trying to influence an outcome via pressure or limited force, the U.S. Navy still excels due to our clear-cut superiority in aircraft carriers, experience, and much larger Marine Corps.

On occasion I have referred to Soviet military weaknesses, and I believe the first is size. In order to offer a genuinely credible offensive capability against Europe today, with U.S. presence, the Soviets would have to increase their conventional force by some two million or more in men and the needed equipment. That approaches the size of the force it took to beat Hitler, and he was fighting a two-front war. To assume that it could be done with less today, considering the weapons advances that, at least currently, favor the defense, seems drastically unrealistic. Yes, the Soviets have large forces; larger than we would and do deploy in these days, but far smaller than their historical concept of what would be needed to overrun Europe or Germany rapidly, and "rapidly" is a necessary ingredient if one hopes to avoid nuclear escalation.

Additionally, they have other serious weaknesses that would need correction. Next is their lack of combat experience. Almost every Russian military man I have talked with bemoans the U.S. experiences in Vietnam and Korea. Soldiers know that nothing can replace combat experience and always prefer to have seasoned troops and officers in the forefront of an attack. It is not a crippling weakness, but it is one that contributes to Soviet conservative hesitation in the use of force.

Also, the Soviet military machine has the reverse of its U.S. counterpart's most criticized ailment. The U.S. Army is often jabbed by its critics for its alleged overemphasis on "tail" compared to "teeth." The Soviets' "bite" exceeds its "tail" excessively, and little seems to have been accomplished in the last ten years to correct this deficiency. Soviet tanks that rolled into potential combat zones with fuel tanks strapped vulnerably and ridiculously to their backs in Czechoslovakia in 1968 are still observed in that weakened mode. In addition, as in Czechoslovakia, Soviet soldiers to date have no standard combat ration. The Soviet military machine far outstrips the Soviet consumer economy in its efficiency, but all indications are they can nowhere near match U.S. and Western technology or efficiency in logistics supply and control. It is a serious handicap.

The Soviets have altered their World War II strategy of mass with an intelligent application of speed and mobility, yet clearly not in sufficient variation to meet the demands of the modern battlefield. Today, small defensive teams pack the combat capability of the far larger and more vulnerable forces of just a few years past. They offer tremendous problems to the armorladen, massed forces of the U.S. S. R. Moreover, the Soviets do not train or crosstrain their troops as effectively as the U.S. and West Europe.³⁷ U.S. combat men are usually prepared to fire or support several weapon systems, while the Russian soldier masters only one or two.

And, finally, with little concrete evidence other than a feel from association and a knowledge of the importance of leadership, this author questions the effectiveness of Soviet military leadership. The Soviet military, like all others, reflects its society, and in the U.S.S.R. this means advancement to important positions of only the safe ones-the most conservative, noninnovative, nonchallenging individuals. The more exciting, clever, daring, and first-rate ones are either culled out for being too risky or opt out due to their disappointment in the system. As Valery Tsarsis observed, the best conversations in the U.S.S.R. are carried on in the insane asylums, for the best people live there. In my experience, "the best and the brightest" of the U.S.S.R. are eventually, even if initially attracted to the service, turned off by the party; and the military through its "Zampolit" party control system.³⁸ The military is the most partydominated group in the nation. The potential effective leaders opt instead for the menye vso ravno ("I don't give a damn") approach to life--a good job and a quiet life as free of party pressure and influence as possible. As a result, the high-ranking Soviet military leadership is too conservative, too inhibited, too much from the same mold, too often picked on party loyalty instead of merit, and too worried and concerned about things party-wise to be number one soldiers. There will, of course, be exceptions, but generally a glaring weakness of "those guys" is inherited from their stultifying system that snuffs out leadership and promotes mediocrity and in so doing makes it more and more unlikely that the Soviet military will ever get that longed-for combat time or win if they do get it.

For Butch, Sundance, you, and me, that is good. Our pursuers are not ten-feet tall. We can cope with them, need not fear them, should not overrate them, or overspend our resources in false fear of them. This is not to say the Soviet military is a paper tiger. It is to say that prudent U.S./NATO defense investments, a concentration on defense research, more efficient use of resources, and avoiding an overconcern with raw numbers and expenditure comparisons should reasonably ensure our safety in the years ahead. Indeed, with clever and intelligent application, we readily have the resources available to thwart the success ratio of the "expand" portion of detente/expand while encouraging the detente leg of it to mankind's advantage. The West is just as strong as the East.

Being only just as strong is hard to adjust to when you are so used to being stronger; but those days are gone, and adjust we must.

1. I consider these three studies the best of their kind U.S./Soviet Military Balance A Frame of Reference far Congress, Congressional Research Service, Library of Congress, January 1976, GPO 65-316. This is perhaps the most thorough and objective study done in recent years Military Balance, Institute of Strategic Studies, United Kingdom, London annual. This, annual report is so accurate, U.S. negotiators often prefer the unclassified data to official U.S. intelligence SIPRI Yearbook of World Armaments and Disarmament, Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), Stockholm, Sweden annual.

2. My definitions: ICBM, Intercontinental Ballistic Missile-a nuclear missile capable of being delivered over 5000 miles to a target traveling most of that journey in outer space, usually launched from fixed, land-based and hardened launching sites.

SLBM, Submarine-Launched Ballistic Missile--same as an ICBM although usually smaller and launched from a submarine, usually underwater.

Strategic bomber--an aircraft designed for long-range bombing (3-5000 miles), capable of delivering nuclear bombs (specifically U S 8-52s and Soviet Bears).

Cruise missiles--low-altitude, nuclear-capable missiles that are almost miniature aircraft, highly accurate, very fast, and soon to have ranges of around 2000 miles.

ABM, AntiBallistic Missile--a missile designed and deployed to intercept and destroy incoming ICBM or SLBMs.

3. Peter Osnos, "No Saber Rattling in the USSR," Washington Post, February 21, 1977, p. 2. Mr. Osnos notes, as most experts will still acknowledge, that the US. was clearly superior in the mid-60s U.S. annual Military Posture statement charts generally show the Soviets to have fewer than 300 ICBMs and fewer than 500 total delivery vehicles in 1966, but by 1968 they had made quantum jumps to approach US levels.

4. I calculate that level to be about 500 deliverable warheads without having to use aircraft, i.e., SLBMs or ICBMs or, in the future, cruise missiles At that level they can do irreparable and unacceptable damage to any other nationstate Imagine any modern state suddenly awakening to, say, the total destruction of its 300 largest urban centers This concept is growing in support and was recently noted in "The Odds on Arms Control," Atlas, April 1977, pp 1118, when an FRG correspondent, Herbert von Borch, noted, "It's not a question of simply playing with numbers. Are you more secure or do you deter more with 8,500 warheads or 50,000?" Dr Kissinger, in a speech to the National Press Club in January 1977, said numerical supremacy has no operational significance Robert Kaiser in the Washington Post, February 25, 1977, noted simply that counting weapons gives too much credit to the USSR.

5. The U.S. used its two atomic weapons only when no one else had the capability. Since then, and after one other acquired nukes, we restrained in Korea, Vietnam. the Cuban crisis. etc. The U.S.S.R has not used nuclear weapons. in spite of Chinese provocation, the US./Cuban missile stance. the bombing of Hanoi, etc. One now simply has to question their use except in dire defense for survival. Yet, they do seem to deter. For a fuller treatment of this thesis, see Donald L. Clark, "Could We Be Wrong?" Air University Review, September-October 1978, pp. 28—37.

6. MIRV means Multiple, Independently Targeted, Reentry Vehicle It is the act of putting more than one warhead (currently 3-10) on each vehicle and at a set time sending each off to a different target.

MaRV means Maneuverable Reentry Vehicle This allows the separate warheads to alter their course as they approach a target and thus complicate an ABM's task of interception MIRVs are a fact of life in U.S./Soviet inventories MaRVs have not yet been deployed.

7. William J. Beanie, "Strategic Policy Implications of the High Energy Laser," Strategic Review, Winter 1977, pp. 100-107 Read for an exciting new weapon possibility, but even this development. the author suggests, cannot permanently upset the current nuclear balance. Jerome Kahan, Security in the Nuclear Age Developing U.S Strategic Arms Policy (Washington: Brookings, 1975). An excellent study of the pros and cons of first and second strike nuclear equations, etc. Kahan says first strike seems impossible, p. 328 William F Buckley. "On the Right," Bozeman Chronicle, 18 February 1977 Buckley suggests that the particle beam might provide the Soviets an effective ABM.

8. In a speech before the Commonwealth Club and World Affairs Council of Northern California on February 3, 1976, in San Francisco, Henry Kissinger noted that no American policy caused or could have prevented the Soviet buildup to equity.

9. Major Wayne Morawitz, "Nuclear Proliferation and US. Security," Air University Review, January-February 1977, pp. 20-28 Daniel Verzin, "The Terrifying Prospect: Atomic Bombs Everywhere," Atlantic Monthly, April 1977; Ernest W. Lefever, "Undue Alarm over Nuclear Spread?" Wall Street Journal, October 15, 1976. Atlas, April 1977, special report: "Nuclear Power, the Global Controversy." These are just a few of the ever growing lists of articles and warnings about what some consider the most dangerous problem in the world nuclear proliferation. Most list Brazil, South Africa, South Korea, Pakistan, Japan, Israel, and Taiwan as the most likely and capable candidates.

10. William T. Lee's "Soviet Defense Spending," Strategic Review, Winter 1977, pp. 74-79 is one of the most recent and well done approaches. U.S. National Intelligence Estimates often locus on this aspect.

11. Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, The Gulag Archipelago, Part II (New York: Harper & Row, 1974). Even this great treatise on the Soviet prison camps is spiced throughout with recordings of the ingenious lies concocted by prisoner and prison keeper to beat the system.

12. William E. Odom's "Who Controls Whom in Moscow?" Foreign Policy, Summer 1975 is an excellent article that makes this point effectively.

13. Red Star, 31 July 1976, ran a brief biographical sketch of the new Defense Minister, at least partially confirming what students of Soviet defense had long known or suspected--that Ustiuov had long been the most important civilian in the Soviet defense complex.

14. In 1972, when SALT I was on the verge of agreement, the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff were most concerned that SLBMs might be excluded from the agreement. At that time, the U.S. was adding no SLBMs or their submarine carriers to our inventory, but the Soviets, although behind, were adding 200300 missiles a year plus 12 to 15 submarines U S estimates indicated we could not match that level of Soviet production without adding facilities, and by leaving an SLBM limit out of SALT, we would be giving the Soviets at least a five-year running head start in such a race.

15. KPSS (or in Russian, KΠCC) are the initials for the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. The letters are seen all Over the U.S.S.R. and often called by Americans the Howard Johnson sign of the USSR.

16. The number of quite elderly World War II and Civil War heroes is dwindling through the years, but now there seems to be a bloc of military positions 1hat lead to Central Committee membership, more for prestige than as a true power indicator.

17. I refer here to the NSC and its panels and committees that deal with almost every domestic and foreign issue The US military assist in the preparation of background facts for all decisions with even the remotest security impact.

18. Harriet Fast Scott and John Erickson have done the best works on this subject, particularly Scott's Soviet Military Doctrine: Its Formulation and Dissemination (Stanford, California: Stanford Research Institute, June 1971).

19. The author served on the U.S. MBFR delegation and worked in the Washington, D.C., apparatus on SALT, Law of the Sea, European security, nonproliferation, Conference of the Committee on Disarmament, and Laws of Humanitarian Warfare; he also served at the US Embassy, Moscow

20. About 140 have been clearly identified. The most important and prestigious professional school is the Frunze Academy in Moscow See, for example, "Soviet Military Education Technical, Tactical, and Traditional" by Colonel Richard G. Head, Air University Review, November-December 1978, pp. 4557.

21. Donald L. Clark, "Soviet Strategy for the Seventies," Air University Review, January-February 1971, pp. 2-18.

22. Scott Thompson, "What Can Be Done about Idi Amin?" Washington Post, March 6, 1977, pp. C1 and C4 notes increasing Soviet aid to Uganda.

23. James Wallace, "A New Look Inside Russia," U.S. News and World Report, December 6, 1976; John Erickson, "Soviet-Warsaw Pact Force Levels," USSI Report 76-2, 1976.

24. Unfortunately, few Americans are aware that the Mongol hordes dominated the Russian motherland for approximately 300 years--an era the Russians call the "Tartar Yoke."

25. Near the end of World War I, the U.S., France, United Kingdom, Italy, and Japan stationed forces in the U.SS.R. The purpose and record of the action are fuzzy, especially on the U.S. side, but nonetheless the Communists considered it an attempt to aid the anti-Communist forces, and they teach Soviet citizens today that the Reds drove the foreign interventionists out To the West it has always been a minor incident; to the Soviets an important proof of capitalist animosity.

26. Robert Kaiser, "Is Anybody Winning?" Washington Post, February 25, 1977, p. 8 Kaiser, an astute student of the Soviet psychosocial, notes this inferiority complex and the psychic comfort improved military forces give to the Russians.

27. The U.S Congress actually granted the Soviets "most favored nation" trade status--a long-term Soviet goal and expected fruit of Kissinger's detente; yet, when Senator Henry Jackson succeeded in attaching a rider to the authorization requiring increased Soviet emigration of Jews, the Soviets backed out. The Soviets were already allowing an exodus of Jews and even some Germans, far in excess of Western expectations.

28. Nickolai Khokhlov, In the Name of Conscience The true story of one of the first Soviet KGB defectors-well worth reading.

29. Paul Nitze, "Deterring our Deterrent," Foreign Policy, Winter 1976-77, p. 195, and" Assuring Nuclear Stability in an Era of Detente," Foreign Affairs, January 1976.

30. "Nunn-Bartlett Report,"(AP), Bozeman Chronicle, January 24, 1977 Senators Nunn and Bartlett visited NATO, Winter 1977, and reported the Warsaw Pact dangerously superior. A companion article disputed their conclusions via a retired French general, Georges Buis, President of the Foundation for National Defense Studies, France.

31. General Ye Rybkin is a noted Soviet military hardliner and author of a provocative article in the January 1977 Soviet Military Historical Journal Interestingly enough, the article has been quoted by both sides of the current Soviet/U.S. debate to prove the drive for Soviet superiority and their acceptance of détente.

32. Arthur T. Hadley, "Smart Weapons: A Revolution in Arms and Tactics," Washington Post, Jannary 30, 1977, pp. CI andC4. Author Hadley joins General Bar Lev and numerous others in describing the impact of precision-guided missiles (PGMs) on the battlefield as a result of the data from the 1974 Arab/ Israeli War.

33. Red Star, 16 November 1974, noted a high-level Soviet conference at the Frunze Academy on the impact of PGMs on the battlefield. A follow-up conference was held in January 1975 (Soviet World Outlook), and Marshal Grechko revealed his concern for PGMs on tank and armored vehicle warfare in his book, Armed Forces of the Soviet State, second edition, Moscow, 1975.

34. Arthur T. Hadley, op. cit; Phillip A Karber, "The Soviet Anti-tank Debate," Armor, November/December 1976, pp. 10-14; and Colonel E. B Atkeson, "Is the Soviet Army Obsolete?" Army, May 1974, pp. 10-16. All of these authors note the revolution caused by the "smart weapons" and stress the tremendous advantage they present the defense and the force willing to resort to small team use of them.

35. Wolfgang Hopher, "Soviet Global Strategy, a Challenge at Sea," NATO Review, 1974. This work, the best of a recent surge, notes the political advantage of an all-seas navy.

36. James Wallace, op. cit, agrees with this naval role analysis.

37. Robert Kaiser, February 24, 1977, p. A14 In one of an interesting and balanced series of articles on the Soviet military, Kaiser notes Soviet weaknesses in training, quality, and flexibility. He concludes that the Soviet build-up is for political edge, not attack

38. "Zampolit" is the term referring to the political officers in the military. There is a political officer "overseeing" the operation of every unit down to the company level. No commander moves up without the approval of his political counterpart Soviet officers dislike the system but live with it.

Colonel Donald L. Clark, USAF (Ret), (MPA, George Washington University) is, Assistant to the President and a lecturer in political science at Montana State University. Bozeman While in the Air Force, he taught international affairs at Air Command and Staff College, was the first USAF Fellow to Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy. Tufts University. was Assistant Air Attaché in Moscow, and served on the Joint Staff in the Office of International Negotiations He has been a frequent lecturer at the various military staff and war colleges and is a previous contributor to the Review.

Disclaimer

The conclusions and opinions expressed in this document are those of the author cultivated in the freedom of expression, academic environment of Air University. They do not reflect the official position of the U.S. Government, Department of Defense, the United States Air Force or the Air University.

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