Soviet Military Is Proving Commitment to Troop Cuts and a Defensive Posture

The planned reduction of 500,000 Soviet troops, dramatically announced by Mikhail S. Gorbachev during his speech to the United Nations, naturally gives rise to certain very human apprehensions within the Soviet military.

Indeed, when Nikita S. Khrushchev cut the army by 1.2 million in 1961, quite a few people ran into difficulties regarding employment and housing accommodations. Today the situation is different. Privates will get jobs in industry or agriculture. Commissioned officers, with their high degree of professionalism, will easily find employment in the civilian sector.

The Defense Ministry has also provided for the construction of more housing in a number of cities. The Armenian earthquake has made it more difficult to complete the work on time, but we are hoping to succeed, problems notwithstanding.

The redefinition of the Soviet defense budget will play a major role in the reallocation of resources. Twenty billion rubles are budgeted to the Defense Ministry for arms purchases and personnel upkeep. But money is spent on defense through other ministries as well. Following a thorough analysis, the budget figure will soon be made public.

The same applies for the Warsaw Pact’s defense figures. My view is that it is now unwarranted to keep these figures under wraps. The committee of the Warsaw Pact defense ministers recently looked at the matter, and these figures will be published soon.

As for ways by which the West can determine the authenticity of Soviet cuts, I should say that this is a unilateral action and does not call for any verification commitments. This is not to say, however, that the cuts will take place amid secrecy and without any monitoring. All measures related to troop reductions will be carried out openly, with adequate media coverage. Foreign observers will be invited to the sites where military technology will be destroyed.

It was not surprising, in the wake of Gorbachev’s speech, to hear critics raise doubts and try to find loopholes. For instance, the treaty on intermediate-range nuclear forces ensures greater security at the rear of the European theater of operations. Therefore, these critics saw a very clever stratagem: Since troops stationed close to the borders of Western nations would prove to be rather vulnerable under the terms of the new treaty, the Soviets could take the 50,000 troops to be withdrawn from Eastern Europe and relocate them in the rear area. Sadly, the vestiges of mistrust and negative stereotypes linger on.

These troops will be released from military service, and the units being pulled out will be disbanded--not redeployed to the rear. That’s the essential difference. As for the 10,000 tanks set for reduction, they will be dismantled. What will remain are their engines, which may prove useful in other sectors of the economy.

The question now under consideration is what troops should be withdrawn. Of course, this is a matter of interest to our allies, too. So there must be agreement as to the movement of trains, dismantlement sites and so forth.

Admittedly this unilateral reduction plan will take some time to complete. A decision in principle is one thing, and the detailed implementation is quite another. Take the INF treaty. It was signed on Dec. 8, 1987, and came into effect about six months later. Yet, because of the detailed planning required, the actual destruction of missiles started even later.The Soviet Union is going to withdraw combat units with all their equipment, reducing the units that are leaving the territory of our allies and scrapping the equipment that is in service with the divisions being pulled out. There will be no replacement of equipment.

Let us look at two important military aspects of the planned cuts. Until recently we had been under pressure to prove our commitment to what is termed defensive defense. The troops to be reduced include those deployed in forward positions on the Elbe River and near the Sudetes Mountains. This will mean translating into practice the provision calling for the elimination of surprise-attack capability. Besides that, the Soviet Union is reducing the troops of the second echelon, which seem to give so much cause for concern in the West on account of the alleged possibility of their being employed in deep offensive missions and in operations to build on a strategic success.

So the Soviet Union is putting words into deeds to prove its commitment to defensive-based defense.

It should be borne in mind, though, that our moves come at a time when the United States and its North Atlantic allies refuse to have their surface naval systems, at an unquestionable advantage, included in the overall Warsaw Pact/NATO balance.

Recently I returned from Geneva, where I attended Soviet-U.S. talks on mutually balanced force reductions. The Soviet side wanted the talks to cover sea-launched missiles, among other systems. But, strangely enough, the Americans argued that they had no intention of giving up their supremacy on the high seas. NATO has a 7.6-to-1 advantage in large oceangoing surface ships, a 3-to-1 advantage in overall naval tonnage and a 2.4-to-1 superiority in naval aircraft.

The Soviet Union is taking practical measures to demonstrate its commitment to defensive defense, and is even prepared to widen these measures to cover its navy. But, of course, the ultimate aim--to ensure that the armed forces of the two blocs rely only on defensive military strategy--can be achieved only in the context of reciprocity. We are hoping that NATO will meet us halfway. The developments of the past few years have raised hopes that what was once impossible is possible now.