China limits Russian deployment

Press, 11 October 1978, Page 3

China limits Russian deployment

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Soviet fear of growing Chinese might has led to a sharp reduction in the number of Soviet divisions available to reinforce the Warsaw Pact in operations against the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, according to the Londonbased International Institute for Strategic Studies. The latest edition, of “The Military Balance” says the Soviet Union is unlikely to consider using the divisions deployed in the Eastern parts of the U.S.S R. in a war against the West. 41 Not only are there difficulties of transportation but, more importantly, the Soviets can ill afford to lay bare their border with China. This consideration has led the Institute to scale down its previous estimate of th,e number of Soviet divisions that might reinforce the Warsaw Pact from 141 to 99. While the institute ex«

ANDREW WILSON,

presses concern over the momentum of the Warsaw Pact military build-up in both nuclear and conventional fields, “The Military Balance” concludes that “the overfall balance still appears to make military aggression seem unattractive. N.A.T.O. defences are of a size and quality that any attempt to break them would require a major attack.” On strategic nutlear systems the institute notes that the agreement by the United States and U.S.S.R. to adhere to the levels of the 1974 Vladivostok Accord pending the outcome of the latest Strategic Arms Limitation talks has meant little change in numerical terms against 1977. But this conceals continuing modernisation programmes on both sides. In conventional land arms the discrepancy between Warsaw Pact strength and N.A.T.O. strength continues to widen. The Soviet Union

of the Observer Foreign News Service

has added 7000 tanks of all types this year, to bring its total to 50,000. (The latest model T 72 with improvements in its gun and fire-control system is bejng produced at a rate of well over 2000 annually.) In contrast, N.A.T.O. tank strengths have remained fairly constant, but, according to the Institute, there has been a marked increase in N.A.T.O. anti-tank guided weapons which helps offset a continuing inferiority in tanks. The institute considers that N.A.T.O. is no longer, in a position to control all sea areas of importance to the alliance at the start of a conflict; many sea areas must be fought for. This will mean that N.A.T.Omust decide where to concentrate its assets.

It concludes that “10 years ago N.A.T.O. would almost certainly have attempted all its maritime tasks at once with a good

expectation of success. That it cannot now expect to do so is a measure of the growth of Soviet seadenial capabilities and the relative decline of the West’s ability to use the sea for its own purposes.” The institute also notes a continued rise in the armament of the Third World, where regional rivalries as well as the availability of modern weaponry make it ex-t-emely difficult to bring the proliferation of conventional arms under any form of control. In many Arab countries, Iran and Israel, weapons either transferred or oh order are comparable with systems now being deployed by N.A.T.O. and the Warsaw Pact (Fl 4 Fl 5, Fl 6 aircraft, T 62 tanks,

and the latest anti-tank missiles). The table of defence spending shows a number of countries whose ex« penditure has increased dramatically over the last three to four years. Those who are spending between two and three times as much as in 1975 include: Morocco (up more than 300 per cent), South Korea (up more than 275 per cent) and Ethiopia Japan, while maintain* ing its defence budget at 0.9 per cent of G.N.P., has almost doubled its actual spending on defence (185 per cent). In contrast, N. and Warsaw Pact defence spending has increased much less, both in real terms and as a per centage of G.N,P, — O. Copyright