Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: Notesfiles $Revision: 1.7.0.10 $; site uokvax.UUCP Path: utzoo!lsuc!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxr!mhuxn!ihnp4!inuxc!pur-ee!uiucdcs!okstate.UUCP!uokvax.UUCP!cdrigney From: cdrigney@uokvax.UUCP Newsgroups: net.politics Subject: Re: Orphaned Response Message-ID: <5000174@uokvax.UUCP> Date: Mon, 10-Feb-86 18:41:00 EST Article-I.D.: uokvax.5000174 Posted: Mon Feb 10 18:41:00 1986 Date-Received: Fri, 14-Feb-86 00:46:22 EST References: <45200001@ccvaxa> Lines: 110 Nf-ID: #R:ccvaxa:45200001:uokvax.UUCP:5000174:000:5180 Nf-From: uokvax.UUCP!cdrigney Feb 10 17:41:00 1986 A few replies; I don't want this indentation to go too deep... >>> and > are aglew, >> is me. /* Written 8:04 pm Feb 7, 1986 by aglew@ccvaxa.UUCP in uokvax.UUCP:net.politics */ >>Then again, from the Soviet viewpoint, NATO troops waste too much >>time and money on useless training and luxury - why does everyone >>need to know how to read a map, anyway? >Maps? You've heard the story about instructions to army commanders >on the Finnish Front? "At the first opportunity, capture the >enemy's maps". This was inside Russian territory. I was being mildly derogatory, but Suvorov points out that the less Pact soldiers know about borders, the fewer will try to cross during peacetime. It's in the nature of most special forces to look down on each other - isn't part of being elite knowing that you're the best? And therefore everyone else is inferior? What Yankee weapons are worth stealing, by the way (just out of curiousity)? And why can't the Canadian SF get them? >So you get good career officers - moreover, the brightest >ambitious young men seek to become officers. But because of the soviet military system, and ESPECIALLY because every commander is responsible for any failure that occurs in his command (the vertical stroke), I'd think soviet officers tend to become cynical and greedy alcoholics. Now of course I don't know that, and wouldn't care to say how widespread this is, but Suvorov seems to imply that disillusionment comes pretty fast. The Vertical Stroke means that if you're commanding a platoon and one of your men screws up (for example, he steals equipment and sells it, then gets drunk on duty on the profits - apparently not all that uncommon), and you report it following the proper procedures, not only he gets in trouble, but you do too. It's your platoon, so if anyone in it fails its because you failed as a commander. And likewise, the company commander, the battalion commander, and so forth, all the way up the line, are responsible. This generates tremendous pressure not to take disciplinary action. And once the enlisted men realize they're not going to be disciplined, how do you control them? By "unofficial" punishments? Putting the fear of the Sargeant into them? What do you suppose the lifespan of a commander who rules his men through fear and hate is, once they go into combat and have live ammo? The Vertical Stroke means that its much easier to go along with the system than to buck it and try to do your job properly. >high tech. I think you and I both agree which wins out in >high-tech vs. low-tech. (The cockroaches win) Agreed. I think you take the western-barfight analogy too far - perhaps you're trying Reductio ad Absurdum? Perhaps the soviet wouldn't open with a massive tactical nuclear strike, but Suvorov seems to take it for granted. Your reaction that "perhaps they'll only do it if they *really* have to" is exactly the sort of western wishful thinking that he said Soviet officers couldn't understand. If it's any consolation, he also says that after he's briefed NATO officers on soviet doctrine and given them a simple tactical problem to solve "as if they were soviet officers" that NOT ONCE has anyone gotten it right. Not Once. (If there's any interest, I could post the question - it's very simple.) >As for smooth escalation, or the knock-out blow, no Soviet >commander is going to start a possibly nuclear conflict unless >he was sure he could win. NO ONE is going to start ANY conflict unless they're sure they can win - who would start a war if they thought they'd lose??? The whole point of deterrence, both conventional and nuclear, is to either make the opponent sure he couldn't win a fight if he started it, or at least raise sufficient doubts that he won't be tempted. >Escalation: the Soviets have small scale nuclear munitions, >according to USNI Proceedings. Certainly, although I believe their weapons tend to be larger than U.S. tactical nuclear munitions, possibly to make up for lack of accuracy. I recall reading somewhere that the soviets didn't really believe in a sharp distinction between tactical and strategic nuclear weapons, but the argument wasn't supported strongly enough for me to really believe in it. >(note: but most people don't set out to fight. they set out to >prove themselves, like the Berlin Crisis) Was there fighting in the Berlin Crisis? Perhaps you could choose a better example? I'm familiar with Escalation Theory (cf Herman Kahn's _Escalation: Metaphors & Scenarios_), but the step from "threatening gestures" to "invasion" is very large. Of the 40 steps on the ladder he suggests as a model, I don't believe anyone has gone past 5 or 6, and even 3 is very rare and considered quite extreme. There are very few interests that the U.S. or the U.S.S.R. are really willing to go to a general war for - one of the major reasons for U.S. troops stationed in NATO is to make the Russians believe that a European invasion will involve the U.S., since thousands of its citizens would be killed. But this is already long enough, so we won't get into that. --Carl Rigney USENET: {ihnp4,allegra!cbosgd}!okstate!uokvax!cdrigney