5 ms·

Theoretically it would have been pretty useful in helping suppress any Soviet ground invasion of Western Europe, giving an entirely new scale to the "scorched

Theoretically it would have been pretty useful in helping suppress any Soviet ground invasion of Western Europe, giving an entirely new scale to the "scorched earth" strategy. I've long had a fascination with the Cold War, but I'm glad I was only around for about three years of it.

atemerev 8y ago
According to the Soviet defectors, this is what have ultimately saved West Germany from a full-scale invasion similarly to what have happened to Czechoslovakia at 1968.
- lukasLansky 8y ago
  Occupation of West Germany would be a much bigger deal from international relationships standpoint than Czechoslovakia occupation was. I'm saying that as a Czech citizen. Taking West Germany would be revisionist. Reaffirming the fact that Czechoslovakia "belonged" to Russia? No one expected West would be concerned, not after political decission was made during WW2 that Soviets are going to "liberate" the land.
  - atemerev 8y ago
    As a Russian, I am saying that taking West Germany had been the Soviet wet dream since the beginning of the Cold War. :) Soviets were (and probably are) just fine with revisionism, as the Ukrainian affair teaches us. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Days_to_the_River_Rhine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Days_to_the_River_Rhine.
- hef19898 8y ago
  Not sure about that, I read more than one article analysing Soviet Cold War plans and coming to the conclusion that, as mich as NATO, the majority focused on defense against any offensive operations. They seemes, for the most part, pretty content to hold on to the Warsaw Pact countries. Not to say that thay most likely would have jumped at the chance of swaling West Germany, pretty much like NATO whith any opportunity to get a Warsaw Pact countrey without nuclear war.
- qubax 8y ago
  According to which soviet defectors? US and our allies outnumbered the soviet union nearly 10 to 1. The US and allied GDP had even a greater advantage in terms of wealth/GDP. The soviet union was much poorer and weaker than the US alone. Throw in western europe and the soviets were ridiculously outmatched. Nevermind that the soviet union had nearly lost an entire generation a few years prior (ww2), in what conceivable way would the soviet union be able to invade west germany?
  - hodgesrm 8y ago
    Can you cite sources for your numbers? It's well known that Warsaw Pact forces considerably outnumbered NATO at the German border. (See https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/declassified_138256.htm https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/declassified_138256.htm for typical estimates.) I was assigned to a unit in HQ US Air Forces Europe from 1981 to 1984. It was a fairly common view that the Russians + Warsaw Pact allies would be at the Rhine in 3 days at which point the conflict would go nuclear. The latter development was the subject of exercises like Able Archer.
    - qubax 8y ago
      > Can you cite sources for your numbers? It was a general ballpark number. Population of british commonwealth, population of western europe + turkey, US, SK, Japan, etc would come out to be near 10X the population of the soviet union. And that's not including china, who switched sides in 60s. If you want to see the GDP figures, you could also do it for these countries/regions. > It was a fairly common view that the Russians + Warsaw Pact allies I specifically said the soviet union. Not Russia ( which was the largest part of the soviet union ) and certainly not warsaw pact "allies". Would you really call warsaw pact nations "allies" considering that the soviet union had to invade and crush the czechs, hungarians, poles, etc? In any conflict with NATO, I have a sneaking suspicion that the warsaw pact nations would join NATO's side. But even if you include warsaw pact, it would still be close to 10X. It was a common view that the soviet union wouldn't collapse also. And it was in our interest to build up the enemy as stronger than they were. It's called propaganda. The "stronger" the enemy, the bigger the military budgets. If the soviets launched a sneak attack, they would gain an initial advantage, but they were never going to hold onto west germany. In any conventional war, the soviets would have lost. The soviets knew this and that's why they switch from a massive conventional military to a massive nuclear military ( which bankrupted them and had a hand in their collapse ). If you were a grunt in the military, I'm sure you just simply brainwashed with whatever nonsense you were told. But if you look at the objective data ( demographics, GDP, etc ), the soviets had no chance against the US, let alone US and vast array of our allies.
- rbanffy 8y ago
  Mutually Assured Destruction saved us all, multiple times.
- roywiggins 8y ago
  Daniel Ellsberg says that the threat wasn't tactical nukes, so much as all-out nuclear war. "In mid-1961, the only plan the Pentagon actually had for a large conflict with Soviet forces, left over from Eisenhower, was an all-out nuclear attack on the Soviet Union... NATO planning simply wasn't designed- by the nature of the alliance, and by the realities of the situation- for offensive operations into the Warsaw Pact territory... There was, after all, just one way to hold on to West Berlin [in the event of a blockade]... to threaten to carry out our actual Berlin planning... best described by a skeptical Pentagon colleague: 'We send in a series of increasingly larger probes. If they're all stopped, we fire a [nuclear] warning shot. If that doesn't work, we blow up the world.' " https://books.google.com/books?id=I3gvDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PP1&pg=PT158#v=onepage&q=warsaw%20pact&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=I3gvDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PP1&pg=PT... And furthermore: "any conflict pitting US forces against more than several battalions of Soviet troops anywhere in the world- Iran, Korea, the Middle East, Indochina- would lead to instant US strategic attacks on every city and command center in the Soviet Union and China... no alternative plans existed for a war involving Soviet forces on a level beyond a division or two except for the general war plan. And that lack was by the directive of President Eisenhower, who had decreed that there should be no plans for "limited war" with the Soviet Union, whether nuclear or conventional, under any circumstances, anywhere in the world. This reflected Eisenhower's military judgement that no war between any significant forces of the United States and the Soviet Union could remain limited more than momentarily. Therefore if such a conflict were pending, the United STates should immediately go to an all-out nuclear first strike rather than allow the Soviets to do so... he was convinced that preparation to fight even a limited number of Soviet divisions on the ground, with or without the use of tactical nuclear weapons, would compel an increase in defense spending that would... [cause a ] 'national bankruptcy'. ... both American and NATO intelligence had produced enormously inflated estimates of Soviet ground strength. For example, they ignored that a Russian division was less than half the size of an American division. Moreover, the supposed number of Soviet divisions was grotesquely overstated. Most of the oft-quoted figure of "175 Soviet divisions" referred to units that existed only on paper, subject to wartime mobilization, or to units that were grossly undermanned and under-equipped, and many that consisted of nothing more than a headquarters staff. Still, matching even the twenty crack Soviet armored divisions deployed in East Germany would legitimize large budgetary Army requests. These, if granted, would come at the direct cost of Air Force and Navy budgets." https://books.google.com/books?id=I3gvDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PP1&pg=PT97#v=onepage&q=soviet%20forces&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=I3gvDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PP1&pg=PT... And indeed it might actually have worked, but would have been a bit of a Pyrric victory, as it would also have destroyed Europe: "In 1960-61 it was in reality quite possible... that not a single nuclear warhead would land on US territory after such an American first strike... But our Western European allies in NATO would be quickly annihilated twice over: first from the mobile Soviet medium-range missiles and tactical bombers targeted on them... and second from the close-in fallout from our own nuclear strikes on Soviet bloc territory." https://books.google.com/books?id=I3gvDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PP1&pg=PT102#v=onepage&q=soviet%20forces&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=I3gvDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PP1&pg=PT...

atemerev 8y ago

According to the Soviet defectors, this is what have ultimately saved West Germany from a full-scale invasion similarly to what have happened to Czechoslovakia at 1968.

lukasLansky 8y ago
Occupation of West Germany would be a much bigger deal from international relationships standpoint than Czechoslovakia occupation was. I'm saying that as a Czech citizen. Taking West Germany would be revisionist. Reaffirming the fact that Czechoslovakia "belonged" to Russia? No one expected West would be concerned, not after political decission was made during WW2 that Soviets are going to "liberate" the land.
- atemerev 8y ago
  As a Russian, I am saying that taking West Germany had been the Soviet wet dream since the beginning of the Cold War. :) Soviets were (and probably are) just fine with revisionism, as the Ukrainian affair teaches us. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Days_to_the_River_Rhine https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seven_Days_to_the_River_Rhine.
hef19898 8y ago
Not sure about that, I read more than one article analysing Soviet Cold War plans and coming to the conclusion that, as mich as NATO, the majority focused on defense against any offensive operations. They seemes, for the most part, pretty content to hold on to the Warsaw Pact countries. Not to say that thay most likely would have jumped at the chance of swaling West Germany, pretty much like NATO whith any opportunity to get a Warsaw Pact countrey without nuclear war.
qubax 8y ago
According to which soviet defectors? US and our allies outnumbered the soviet union nearly 10 to 1. The US and allied GDP had even a greater advantage in terms of wealth/GDP. The soviet union was much poorer and weaker than the US alone. Throw in western europe and the soviets were ridiculously outmatched. Nevermind that the soviet union had nearly lost an entire generation a few years prior (ww2), in what conceivable way would the soviet union be able to invade west germany?
- hodgesrm 8y ago
  Can you cite sources for your numbers? It's well known that Warsaw Pact forces considerably outnumbered NATO at the German border. (See https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/declassified_138256.htm https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/declassified_138256.htm for typical estimates.) I was assigned to a unit in HQ US Air Forces Europe from 1981 to 1984. It was a fairly common view that the Russians + Warsaw Pact allies would be at the Rhine in 3 days at which point the conflict would go nuclear. The latter development was the subject of exercises like Able Archer.
  - qubax 8y ago
    > Can you cite sources for your numbers? It was a general ballpark number. Population of british commonwealth, population of western europe + turkey, US, SK, Japan, etc would come out to be near 10X the population of the soviet union. And that's not including china, who switched sides in 60s. If you want to see the GDP figures, you could also do it for these countries/regions. > It was a fairly common view that the Russians + Warsaw Pact allies I specifically said the soviet union. Not Russia ( which was the largest part of the soviet union ) and certainly not warsaw pact "allies". Would you really call warsaw pact nations "allies" considering that the soviet union had to invade and crush the czechs, hungarians, poles, etc? In any conflict with NATO, I have a sneaking suspicion that the warsaw pact nations would join NATO's side. But even if you include warsaw pact, it would still be close to 10X. It was a common view that the soviet union wouldn't collapse also. And it was in our interest to build up the enemy as stronger than they were. It's called propaganda. The "stronger" the enemy, the bigger the military budgets. If the soviets launched a sneak attack, they would gain an initial advantage, but they were never going to hold onto west germany. In any conventional war, the soviets would have lost. The soviets knew this and that's why they switch from a massive conventional military to a massive nuclear military ( which bankrupted them and had a hand in their collapse ). If you were a grunt in the military, I'm sure you just simply brainwashed with whatever nonsense you were told. But if you look at the objective data ( demographics, GDP, etc ), the soviets had no chance against the US, let alone US and vast array of our allies.
rbanffy 8y ago
Mutually Assured Destruction saved us all, multiple times.
roywiggins 8y ago
Daniel Ellsberg says that the threat wasn't tactical nukes, so much as all-out nuclear war. "In mid-1961, the only plan the Pentagon actually had for a large conflict with Soviet forces, left over from Eisenhower, was an all-out nuclear attack on the Soviet Union... NATO planning simply wasn't designed- by the nature of the alliance, and by the realities of the situation- for offensive operations into the Warsaw Pact territory... There was, after all, just one way to hold on to West Berlin [in the event of a blockade]... to threaten to carry out our actual Berlin planning... best described by a skeptical Pentagon colleague: 'We send in a series of increasingly larger probes. If they're all stopped, we fire a [nuclear] warning shot. If that doesn't work, we blow up the world.' " https://books.google.com/books?id=I3gvDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PP1&pg=PT158#v=onepage&q=warsaw%20pact&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=I3gvDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PP1&pg=PT... And furthermore: "any conflict pitting US forces against more than several battalions of Soviet troops anywhere in the world- Iran, Korea, the Middle East, Indochina- would lead to instant US strategic attacks on every city and command center in the Soviet Union and China... no alternative plans existed for a war involving Soviet forces on a level beyond a division or two except for the general war plan. And that lack was by the directive of President Eisenhower, who had decreed that there should be no plans for "limited war" with the Soviet Union, whether nuclear or conventional, under any circumstances, anywhere in the world. This reflected Eisenhower's military judgement that no war between any significant forces of the United States and the Soviet Union could remain limited more than momentarily. Therefore if such a conflict were pending, the United STates should immediately go to an all-out nuclear first strike rather than allow the Soviets to do so... he was convinced that preparation to fight even a limited number of Soviet divisions on the ground, with or without the use of tactical nuclear weapons, would compel an increase in defense spending that would... [cause a ] 'national bankruptcy'. ... both American and NATO intelligence had produced enormously inflated estimates of Soviet ground strength. For example, they ignored that a Russian division was less than half the size of an American division. Moreover, the supposed number of Soviet divisions was grotesquely overstated. Most of the oft-quoted figure of "175 Soviet divisions" referred to units that existed only on paper, subject to wartime mobilization, or to units that were grossly undermanned and under-equipped, and many that consisted of nothing more than a headquarters staff. Still, matching even the twenty crack Soviet armored divisions deployed in East Germany would legitimize large budgetary Army requests. These, if granted, would come at the direct cost of Air Force and Navy budgets." https://books.google.com/books?id=I3gvDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PP1&pg=PT97#v=onepage&q=soviet%20forces&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=I3gvDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PP1&pg=PT... And indeed it might actually have worked, but would have been a bit of a Pyrric victory, as it would also have destroyed Europe: "In 1960-61 it was in reality quite possible... that not a single nuclear warhead would land on US territory after such an American first strike... But our Western European allies in NATO would be quickly annihilated twice over: first from the mobile Soviet medium-range missiles and tactical bombers targeted on them... and second from the close-in fallout from our own nuclear strikes on Soviet bloc territory." https://books.google.com/books?id=I3gvDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PP1&pg=PT102#v=onepage&q=soviet%20forces&f=false https://books.google.com/books?id=I3gvDwAAQBAJ&lpg=PP1&pg=PT...