DEFENSE STRATEGY OUR PLACE IN EUROPE : Cut U.S. Troops Below the ‘Floor’ : As the notion of a ‘forward defense’ at the inter-Germany border declines, U.S. forces should take up a reserve role.

Even if one deems it necessary to hedge against the possibility, however remote, of a re-establishment of a Soviet invasion threat against Western Europe, it does not necessarily follow that the appropriate precaution is to maintain huge American standing armies on guard in Europe.

NATO’s criterion should be whether the alliance is capable of maintaining deterrence at lower levels and mobilizing and rebuilding to higher levels in time should a Soviet buildup begin.

NATO still has an important role to play in safeguarding Western security--militarily, politically, and diplomatically. However, in these changed circumstances, the burden of proof is on NATO to demonstrate to its publics that it remains relevant. A study by a recognized group of wise men equivalent to the 1967 Harmel Report could play an important role in establishing a new transatlantic consensus of the alliance’s defense needs and posture for the future.

I believe this study must take account of three realities:

--NATO’s reliance on the threat of early first use of short-range nuclear weapons to deter a conventional attack is no longer credible.

--NATO’s assumption that the United States will maintain 195,000 troops in Central Europe is no longer realistic.

--NATO’s current strategy for forward defense at the inter-German border is no longer viable.

In light of future instabilities in Europe which are likely, if not inevitable, caution and prudence are clearly in order as we build down our military forces in NATO. American troops in Europe can and should play a stabilizing role during this period of transition. Nevertheless, the greatly lengthened warning time of a credible Soviet conventional attack against NATO allows the United States to reduce the size of our standing armies defending well forward and to emphasize reinforcement instead.

Despite the Administration’s view that 195,000 U.S. troops in Central Europe is a “floor” below which the United States cannot reduce, I think we must begin planning for a significantly lower level in the years ahead. I agree with former Secretary of Defense James Schlesinger that we should start planning on a residual force in Europe on the order of 75,000 to 100,000 troops within five years.

For many years, NATO’s strategy in the center region has been to defend well forward, along the West German border with East Germany and Czechoslovakia. This border has been divided into eight corps sectors, and the ground defense of each sector has been assigned to the national forces of a single country. Within each corp sector, logistics and support is also the sole responsibility of the country defending that sector. This is, of course, the opposite of “specialization”--because within its area of responsibility each nation replicates virtually all of the military capabilities in the other national sectors. In addition, the traditional strategy of “defending forward” is about to be transformed by the uniting of the two Germanys.

Assuming Soviet unilateral and (the treaty on conventional forces in Europe) CFE-agreed reductions are completed, the changes in both the threat and alliance geography offer the opportunity to sharply modify the traditional concept of corps areas of responsibility. NATO must have a new strategy, one that is developed by the alliance as a whole. My ideas as to the role our nation should play in a new NATO strategy are as follows:

--We must insist on greater specialization of roles and missions among NATO nations. The European members of NATO should assume the primary responsibility for the initial forward ground defenses, which should be heavily anti-armor and not rely on large numbers of forward-deployed U.S. ground forces. The U.S. ground force commitment to NATO should be restructured to provide NATO’s mobile strategic reserves, rather than NATO’s forward defenders.

--The United States should continue to maintain large pre-positioned stocks of combat and support equipment in Europe. With this, an initial U.S. reinforcement of NATO could be accomplished by transporting Army combat personnel from the United States to Europe, where they would break out their pre-positioned combat equipment and move to reinforce NATO’s ground forces.

--The United States should maintain some tactical air force units in Europe for both conventional and nuclear missions, and would commit to provide significant numbers of reinforcing tactical aircraft from the United States to Europe. This pledge must be contingent on NATO providing adequate numbers of semi-hardened aircraft shelters, fuel and munitions storage, and maintenance and operations areas at co-located operating bases in Europe.