VIEWS OF THE SOVIET MILITARY TO THE EDITORS: Raymond Garthoff's article, "SALT and the Soviet Military" (Problems of Communism, January-February 1975) is purportedly written from an "informed perspective" but contains numerous omissions, errors, and inconsistencies when subjected to close scrutiny. Having so scrutinized it, I must conclude that Garthoff's observations concerning the Soviet military attitude in 1969 as well as at the present time constitute an awkward, invalid and deceptive mix of politicallyinspired assertions and wishful thinking-not carefullydocumented scholarly analysis. Garthoff fails to cite any Soviet source to support the section entitled "Soviet Objectives in SALT," preferring to cite American interpretations of varying degrees of currency and usefulness. Furthermore, in the section entitled "Military Doctrine," only a single Pravda article is cited. This approach, lack of one, would be hardly adequate in a freshman term paper to support the contentions of the article. Any serious commentary on SoIviet affairs would not methodologically isolate the Soviet approach to SALT from the Soviet world view in general. Garthoff omits any mention of, or reference to, the Leninist politico-military dialectic which permeates recent Soviet military writings, especially the book, The Philosophical Heritage of V. I. Lenin and Problems of Contemporary War.1 The thesis behind current Soviet military thought has not changed significantly since SALT I. If anything, the writings are bolder regarding nuclear war since the Soviet Union achieved rough strategic parity with the USespecially as to the desirability of initiating nuclear strikes in certain circumstances. Garthoff misleadingly asserts: "By 1969, the Soviet military had reached the conclusion that strategic superiority in the sense of a first-strike option, permitting escape from a crushing retaliatory strike, was not possible for either side in contemporary conditions." Such a statement is a perfect example of the invalid common attempt to "mirrorimage" Soviet doctrine in terms of US doctrine. The "straw man" is the demand for retaliation-proof firststrike capability by the Soviet Union as an absolute precondition for preemption. As can be seen by their writings in recent years, the Soviets understand that no such condition of absolute safety is possible in the real world. Neither is it necessary in order to contemplate a preemptive nuclear blow. Politico-military doctrine involves matters of relative, not absolute, advantage. Contrary to Garthoff's unfounded assertion, Soviet military doctrine is very favorably disposed to preemption by means of what Col. A. Sidorenko of the Frunze Military Academy termed "massed nuclear strikes," "2 where the 1 Major-General A.S. Milovidov and Col. V.G. Kozlov, Eds., Filosofskoe Nasledie V.I. Lenina i problemy sovremennoi voiny, Moscow, Voenizdat, 1972; translated in US Air Force series, Soviet Military Thought, Vol. 5, Washington, DC, US Government Printing Office, 1974. See Chapter 1, pp. 7-22. 2 Col. A.A. Sidorenko, Nastuplenie (The Offensive), Moscow, Voenizdat, 1970; translated in US Air Force series, Soviet Military Thought, Vol. 1, 1973. See p. 111. 3 Milovidov, op. cit., p. 17. enemy and the Soviet Union are locked in conventional combat. The means necessary to launch such strikes would no doubt require a measure of Soviet strategicnuclear superiority which SALT may or may not prevent them from achieving. To quote a leading Soviet military theoretician, Col. V. Khalipov (a major contributor to the Milovidov-Koslov book): "There is profound error and harm in the disorienting claims of bourgeois ideologues that there will be no victor in a thermonuclear world war." 3 In ignoring contemporary Soviet military attitudes, the Garthoff article was unrealistic and "disorienting" to students of the SALT process. LEWIS A. FRANK Washington, D.C. MR. GARTHOFF REPLIES: I appreciate the opportunity to comment on Mr. Frank's remarks, although the task of doing so is made difficult by his polemical approach. Mr. Frank seems chiefly troubled by my use of an approach drawing principally on sources other than published Soviet military writings. (Some other readers, familiar with my extensive use of such materials in other publications over the years, may welcome the change.) Mr. Frank would broaden his own understanding if he recognized that there are sources for learning about Soviet attitudes and objectives in addition to Soviet publications. He would also do well to recognize the importance of interpreting Soviet writings, and specifically to take account of the observations made by Matthew Gallagher in a review appearing in the March-April 1975 issue of Problem of Communism, in which he notes some of the particular purposes underlying certain Soviet military writings (including, it so happens, one of the two sources cited by Mr. Frank). Mr. Frank should also eschew citing statements out of context, as when he cites a Soviet author (who in turn cites "foreign" and "NATO" sources for the discussion) on the application of nuclear strikes in a situation of ground forces in field combat a context irrelevant to the point under discussion (and obviously not "contrary to Garthoff's unfounded assertion," since I make no assertion whatever about that situation). Nor do I address in the article Soviet "absolute" or any other kind of "preconditions for preemption." It is not I who has been indulging in building "straw men." I also deny that I engage in "mirror-image" thinking in my characterization of Soviet military thinking in 1969 and subsequently. I understand how a reader such as Mr. Frank could be inclined to question the basis for my assertion that by 1969 the Soviet military had reached the conclusion that strategic superiority, in the sense of a first-strike option, was not possible in contemporary conditions. I regret that I am not in a position at this time to document that assertion on the open record in a way that might convince even Mr. Frank, but I can assure him and other readers that my conclusion is not based on mirror-image extrapolation. I do not believe it is necessary to rebut Mr. Frank's polemical thrusts, but I do wish to reject categorically his statement that my observations include "politically-inspired assertions." RAYMOND L. GARTHOFF Washington, DC Problems of Communism NOV-DEC 1975 VOL XXIV Problems of Communism is a bimonthly publication. 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INDEXING: Articles in Problems of Communism are indexed, inter alia, in the Social Sciences and Humanities Index, the Bibliographie Internationale des Sciences Sociales (all sections), ABC POL SCI, and International Political Science Abstracts. EDITOR: Paul A. Smith, Jr. MANAGING EDITOR: Marie T. House SENIOR TEXT EDITOR: Clarke H. Kawakami ASSOCIATE EDITORS: David E. Albright, Wayne Hall, Patricia H. Kushlis DESIGNER: Joseph D. Hockersmith |