1983: The Brink of Apocalypse

[MovinTarget]

Channel 4 in the UK screened this documentary on the Able Archer/Operation RYAN warscare last night. I found it fairly well done but with little new information except for one part which described the Soviet reaction to the issuing of simulated nuclear release authorisation. It stated that they reacted like 'a scalded cat', bringing a section of their nuclear forces on high alert, dispersing a number of SS-20's, having the Soviet 'football' open and ready to be used by Andropov etc and ending with the implication that all that was necessary for war to break out would have been a mistaken belief that the NATO forces (or the US) had actually launched a nuclear strike.

 

I had read elsewhere that there is some confusion to the actual nature of this incident with some sources stating that there was little Soviet reaction to the incident at all and others that the world was inches away from an accidentally nuclear war. I was wondering if the documentary makers had access to some new information.

 

So was this really as dangerous an incident as the Cuban Missile Crisis?

 

edited to add: Sorry everyone I meant to put this in the Military History forum if a moderator could move it I'd appreciate it!!!

Edited January 6, 2008 by MovinTarget

[ShotMagnet]

If they accept that there WAS such a serious state of affairs, it reflects exceptionally poorly on them that it took MI6 to point it out to them particularly with the amount of technical means they had at their disposal.

I'm not so sure. I'll be the first in a long line of nay-sayers who will tell you that my knowledge of how to collect intelligence is incomplete at best, but from what I've read and/or inferred, the matter depends on HUMINT input as much as it does the other kinds. I'd even go so far as to say that if you have good HUMINT and you ELINT/SIGINT/ETCINT is lacking, you'd probably swing in favor of the HUMINT (especially if the source(s) were/are reliable). We're all human beings; we rely on certain cues that faceless data can neither speak to nor negate. HUMINT-gathered data would seem therefore to trump (barring exceptional circumstances) contrary evidence, even when logic suggests that it's solid.

 

Technical means are not enough, I'd wager; and I'd further bet that the further-removed an intel-gathering agency is from the 'cutting edge' the less-solid its fact will be, regardless of technological gimcrackery.

 

Plus; imagine yourself delivering this particular NIA to the president of the US, who will then ask you 'How solid is this?'. To which you reply, honestly; "Mr. President, we got it from another intelligence source'.

 

 

Shot

[philgollin]

Incidentally, there is an excellent new document on the PHP on 'Military planning for European theatre conflict during the cold war'. Only had a glance at it so far, but its free and it looks absolutely facinating.

 

Well having read through it once QUICKLY, I'd say it was deeply embarrassing for the West's "public" view of the Cold War - that is IF it can be believed ?

 

What the intelligence services really knew about Soviet/Warsaw Pact real strategies is of course the real question. But certainly it makes interesting reading for an armchair historian.

 

 

What it really makes me want to know is the information that caused the West to go away from the "nuclear tripwire" strategy as opposed to the political position - ah well, maybe in another 20 years we'll find out something even stranger.

[MovinTarget]

You probably are already aware of it, but there are some excellent documents relating to the incident on the Parallel history project website.

http://www.php.isn.ethz.ch/collections/col...p;navinfo=15296

 

Thanks, that really is an excellent resource!

[67th Tigers]

Incidentally, there is an excellent new document on the PHP on 'Military planning for European theatre conflict during the cold war'. Only had a glance at it so far, but its free and it looks absolutely facinating.

 

Really? Wasn't that COSMIC not that long ago? Must go and have a look.

[Old Tanker]

I dont disagree about requiring a mixture of sources, but I think it fair to say the US generally favoured technical means (Satellites, spyplanes, radio intercepts) and Britain prefered to go with Humint (Spies, even units such as Brixmis can be included). There is much to be said for both methods, the US method gave warning of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan apparently.

 

Actually the Brit expertise in hitech snopping was an eyeopener for the U.S. during WWII. Ike was most fascinated and impressed by the Brits skills.

 

The U.S. mindset towards human intel is shakey at best and not impressive for the last 70 years.

 

Crabbe and Penkovsky had a negative influence on HUMIT. As to Aimes , yes he did significant damage that is still yielding dividends.

 

Besides hitech is easy to sell to Congress , it means jobs and money for home districts. Planes , satelites , cameras and so on. HUNIT is associated with prostitues and criminals working for us , not very puritanesque .

[DB]

There is a lot in what you say. I also think you are right about British technical means in ww2. The only reason we probably dont do it more of it is that we ran out of money to do it properly.

No, we decided to waste spend the money elsewhere.

 

David

[ShotMagnet]

...the CIAs success at technical means may have blinded them to a more balanced means of intelligence collection. I often wonder if this is part of the reason for 911.

That a second attack was allowed to happen has to be one of the biggest cock-ups in recent memory, but as I recall (going strictly off the top of my head) the CIA and the NSA both at least suggested that this was a possibility. In fact, I believe that several of those who would eventually carry out the attack were being tracked for a couple of years before the blow fell. I don't remember the details; but for some reason (interdepartmental pushing and shoving, AIR) they lost track of the baddies, and the rest is history.

 

 

Shot

[EchoFiveMike]

Really? Wasn't that COSMIC not that long ago? Must go and have a look.

 

COSMIC, as in the NATO classification level???

 

US has always liked the technical inteligence disciplines due to their greater level of certainty/confirmation. HUMINT has a high level of uncertainty, even when the subject is telling the truth, he may simply be wrong about the issue. HUMINT also bears much greater levels of human risk, which the US has had issues with. S/F....Ken M

[Jim Martin]

COSMIC, as in the NATO classification level???

 

US has always liked the technical inteligence disciplines due to their greater level of certainty/confirmation. HUMINT has a high level of uncertainty, even when the subject is telling the truth, he may simply be wrong about the issue. HUMINT also bears much greater levels of human risk, which the US has had issues with. S/F....Ken M

 

And Democratic policians don't like to have to deal with people who are possessed of icky personalities, either.

 

Well, except for their campaign fundraising.

[Ken Estes]

Actually the Brit expertise in hitech snopping was an eyeopener for the U.S. during WWII. Ike was most fascinated and impressed by the Brits skills.

 

The U.S. mindset towards human intel is shakey at best and not impressive for the last 70 years.

 

Crabbe and Penkovsky had a negative influence on HUMIT. As to Aimes , yes he did significant damage that is still yielding dividends.

 

Besides hitech is easy to sell to Congress , it means jobs and money for home districts. Planes , satelites , cameras and so on. HUNIT is associated with prostitues and criminals working for us , not very puritanesque .

Ike might have been less fascinated had he known of the Kim Filby, Burgess and McLean treasons. Aldrich Aimes may pale compared to them, but also compred to Robert Hansen. The Walkers of course did in our ASW advantage, and on it goes. Our funds are probably best spent in CI, considering how easily Aimes and Hansen could have been spotted, were we alert.

[philgollin]

...... Phil Ill have a read over it before passing serious comment. But I will say that if the Russians are claiming they had no serious warplans for the west, they may well be being very selective in their memories. Apparently the first (non serious?) offensive warplan they came up with was in 1961, as a safeguard on things going postal on the Berlin question. They may not have been serious about using it, but arguably they thought there was a serious need to make one. Which by itself says an awful lot about Khruschevs mindset.

 

 

I'd be fascinated with your (and anyonelse's) thoughts on theatre nuclear weapons. The Soviets SEEM to want things both ways, stating the ease of escalation whilst being rather free-and-easy with regards to level of issue and ease of use. (But that is only minor to the major claims of defensive strategies).

 

.

[philgollin]

....... Crabbe and Penkovsky had a negative influence on HUMIT. ........

 

 

? Crabbe ? How so ?

[jakec]

I'd be fascinated with your (and anyonelse's) thoughts on theatre nuclear weapons. The Soviets SEEM to want things both ways, stating the ease of escalation whilst being rather free-and-easy with regards to level of issue and ease of use. (But that is only minor to the major claims of defensive strategies).

 

.

I'm surprised you are surprised by these claims Phil. USSR always claimed consistently in that time period (1970s-1980s) that its strategic intent was defensive (read From Whence the Treat to Peace which in large measure the Russian general is quoting). Attacking to defend as the good Russian General describes it, although I'd suggest he is being disingenuous (How much preparation went into offensive moves as opposed to the initial defensive?). Arguably every states' strategic intent is defensive i.e. we want to protect our homeland, national interests and way of life. Its how you go about it that matters.

German generals after WW1 insisted that they were not aggressors.

 

One can easily create a scenario whereby WarPac would be "attacked" first by NATO. Cut off Berlin and wait for NATO response. Nor do the Russian generals make any mention of pre-emptive strike plans, it is left to the Pole to belatedly mention it later in the conference (page 77).

 

As regards nuclear use, the key point is made by Vitalii Tsygichko in the article, that in the 1960s-1970s they expected to use nuclear weapons and planned and wargamed that way - regardless of what common sense may have told a few officers - they would have followed orders and the way they had trained. Evidence elsewhere is that later that attitude may have changed.

 

Vojtech Mastny asks the killer question of the Russians (p116), why if the doctrine had always been defensive, was Gorbachev forced to fight through the "changes" in 1987 to make the doctrine really defensive? Why was he described as seeking to reverse something?

 

Fundamental problem in all of this is that the Soviet warplans in that time period have not been declassified and are not going to be. Even many former non-Soviet Warpac generals don't talk freely the closer to the present day they come, and they were not in on the real decisions anyway.

[philgollin]

I'm surprised you are surprised by these claims Phil. USSR always claimed consistently in that time period (1970s-1980s) that its strategic intent was defensive (read From Whence the Treat to Peace which in large measure the Russian general is quoting). Attacking to defend as the good Russian General describes it, although I'd suggest he is being disingenuous (How much preparation went into offensive moves as opposed to the initial defensive?). Arguably every states' strategic intent is defensive i.e. we want to protect our homeland, national interests and way of life. Its how you go about it that matters.

German generals after WW1 insisted that they were not aggressors.

 

One can easily create a scenario whereby WarPac would be "attacked" first by NATO. Cut off Berlin and wait for NATO response. Nor do the Russian generals make any mention of pre-emptive strike plans, it is left to the Pole to belatedly mention it later in the conference (page 77).

 

As regards nuclear use, the key point is made by Vitalii Tsygichko in the article, that in the 1960s-1970s they expected to use nuclear weapons and planned and wargamed that way - regardless of what common sense may have told a few officers - they would have followed orders and the way they had trained. Evidence elsewhere is that later that attitude may have changed.

 

Vojtech Mastny asks the killer question of the Russians (p116), why if the doctrine had always been defensive, was Gorbachev forced to fight through the "changes" in 1987 to make the doctrine really defensive? Why was he described as seeking to reverse something?

 

Fundamental problem in all of this is that the Soviet warplans in that time period have not been declassified and are not going to be. Even many former non-Soviet Warpac generals don't talk freely the closer to the present day they come, and they were not in on the real decisions anyway.

 

You may have found something more than I, but I am surprised that you read the article to agree with "Attacking to defend" as they go into quite a lot of detail in explaining how the Host Nation's troops were positioned to absorb NATO attacks and that the Soviet troops were then to attack NATO's thrust.

 

Likewise the article is, to me at least. very confusing whilst explaining the unaccepteble features of either large scale theatre useage (both due to risk of escalation and impossibility of fighting through contaminated landscapes) or just a single large scale attack on a single Soviet city, it gives theatre weapons useage to relatively low-level generals.

 

Just full of large holes, just begging answers.

[Old Tanker]

? Crabbe ? How so ?

 

It was obvious within 48 hours that the Russkis had got him and he would disappear off the face of the Earth .

 

The U.S. has a nasty dislike of bad things happening to human operatives involved in real hands on direct intel gathering.

Many have a deep concern or dislike of intel gathering by humans in as laws must be broken to do it. While electronic , air and space gathering intel is more evasive in law breaking activities.

 

We even passed a law in the '70s that those with criminal records could not be employed by the CIA. While at the same time we used and paid convicted felons to make criminal cases againist the Mafia and Drug Lords.

[philgollin]

It was obvious within 48 hours that the Russkis had got him and he would disappear off the face of the Earth .

 

The U.S. has a nasty dislike of bad things happening to human operatives involved in real hands on direct intel gathering.

Many have a deep concern or dislike of intel gathering by humans in as laws must be broken to do it. While electronic , air and space gathering intel is more evasive in law breaking activities.

 

We even passed a law in the '70s that those with criminal records could not be employed by the CIA. While at the same time we used and paid convicted felons to make criminal cases againist the Mafia and Drug Lords.

 

He was not a "spy" per se, he was merely conducting a reconnaissance - he was of no value to the Russians as a defector or for interrogation.

[A2Keltainen]

I wrote a big reply and it went down the tubes. Gahhhh!!!!

 

Tip of the day: I always write big replies in a text editor, so I can save them to disk while I write them, and the copy and paste them into my web browser.

[philgollin]

I wrote a big reply and it went down the tubes. Gahhhh!!!!

 

A couple of points (briefly, my fingers still have blisters)

1 Why not soviet graduated response? Its almost like they believed there could be absolutely no point in a coventional phase, and were happy to go to a strategic exchange, almost as if they wanted to get it over with.

2 One may explain why they had no alert for conventional units in East Germany. If they were going to a strategic exchange that early, there wouldnt have been a lot of point. Reading between the lines its like they believed that a theatre and strategic rocket attack was the only outcome.

3 Be careful of assuming that just because exercise always were on the back of a defence, that it would always have been so in real life. Im sure I recall reading in the 1964 exercise that units that participated in a defence (and been destroyed) were magically restored to undertake the counteroffensive. This tendency has been noted before, but arguably it can be a number of things. Firstly that they wanted to make sure there was adequate training in a number of possible roles. Secondly that they were playing lip service to Marxist Leninist dogma, and that they never really expected to do anything other than attack.

4 Note to self. In future post using desktop keyboard.

 

Shame, I know that annoyance when pearls of wisdom disappear (every time)

 

First let me explain that the article leaves me asking questions and not believing it is the full story, not so much "self-serving" but more just one half of what was undoubtedly a much more complex military-political inter-action.

 

re. 1 The Russian position does seem odd. ONE BOMB on a Russian city is seen as unacceptable, AND they believe theatre nuclear weapons could easily escalte to a major intercontinetal exchange BUT YET they hand out theatre weapons like candy ! It's why I asked why the two sides went away from the nuclear trip wire. At least when that was "in place" (or at least understood) there would be much more concern over even letting the first weapon go (????????). It really makes me want to go back and see what was said about the change from "trip-wire" to "graduated response" and did both sides openly (at least) buy into it ?

 

re. 2: I think IF YOU BELIEVE WHAT THEY SAID AT THE CONFERENCE - that they did not have alert for convential units because they believed the oncoming NATO attack would be blunted by the home country troops whilst their own troops would be readied for the counter-attack.

 

re. 3: Depends on the reason for the training. It obviously maximises the experience for the troops on the ground to "play" with them whilst the senior staff should have been intelligent enough to understand that the "destroyed" troops had been destroyed and that the wargame board was merely being re-set whilst the troops stayed in position.

 

 

The conference is amusing as IF I READ IT CORRECTLY, there was never really any worries about a nuclear conflagration (except for the US adventurism around Cuba) as the Soviets would not have attacked (!!!!) because they didn't plan to and, of course, NATO wouldn't have attacked either as they didn't intend to either ! Of course if either side had forgotten itself enough so as to actually attack then theatre nukes would have popped leading to limited strategic strikes and, it would seem, instant armageddon.

[philgollin]

Stuart

 

I went looking for the conference transcript again and couldn't find it - do you have a working link ?

 

Thanks.

[swerve]

...

re. 1 The Russian position does seem odd. ONE BOMB on a Russian city is seen as unacceptable, AND they believe theatre nuclear weapons could easily escalte to a major intercontinetal exchange BUT YET they hand out theatre weapons like candy ! It's why I asked why the two sides went away from the nuclear trip wire. At least when that was "in place" (or at least understood) there would be much more concern over even letting the first weapon go (????????). It really makes me want to go back and see what was said about the change from "trip-wire" to "graduated response" and did both sides openly (at least) buy into it ?...

 

Phil,

 

I find it hard to make sense of most of the nuclear weapons policy on both sides of the Iron Curtain. Back in the late 1970s, I wrote a paper (my teachers liked it ) on the then neutron bomb debate. I read some of the debate in military magazines for the purpose, & I remember some of them struck me as completely divorced from reality. Among others, I remember it being suggested that enhanced radiation/reduced blast warheads could & should be used as if they were super-conventional weapons, & that the Warsaw Pact should be expected to recognise that was the intention, & limit their response accordingly. Another proposal was that Pershing 2 gave the opportunity to decouple a limited (both in geographical extent & target type) nuclear war in Europe from a "strategic" nuclear war. This one listed suitable "non-strategic" "theatre" target types for small nuclear warheads, again with the belief that the USSR would recognise US intentions & limit its response accordingly. Preferred target types were such things as transport nodes (rail junctions, harbours, major nodes on the road network, etc) in Eastern Europe & non-Russian Soviet republics. I got a map & marked some of the prime targets - Warsaw, Minsk, Prague . . . . Assuming a Soviet response in kind, retaliation would be expected on Hamburg, Frankfurt, Rotterdam . . . . but that wasn't mentioned.

 

The authors of these airy-fairy articles were typically staff colonels. I still don't know why their obvious dangerous insanity didn't get 'em shoved straight into backward waistcoats with a nice hefty dose of sedatives.

Edited January 8, 2008 by swerve

[MovinTarget]

I've just got back from a week away on work, good to see I have some interesting material to read!

[Brian Kennedy]

Ike might have been less fascinated had he known of the Kim Filby, Burgess and McLean treasons. Aldrich Aimes may pale compared to them, but also compred to Robert Hansen. The Walkers of course did in our ASW advantage, and on it goes. Our funds are probably best spent in CI, considering how easily Aimes and Hansen could have been spotted, were we alert.

 

I earned an MA at the Security Studies program at Georgetown, a large portion of which is a recruiting program for the CIA/DIA/DHS/etc. (there were a lot of mid-career DoD types and a lot of currently-serving military as well). It's basically the top 1-3 program of its type in the US (we were neck-and-neck with MIT, SAIS, etc.).

 

One of our Top 5 students was banned from ever getting a clearance because he spent a summer helping supervise a completely non-partisan get-out-the-vote program in Afghanistan. Another was banned because he once spent a year in the Peace Corps in Mongolia. A lot of the other top students failed the polys because they got too stressed out.

 

I graduated with honors, applied for every intel program known to man and never got a call-back -- I later found out (at least it's my excuse) that there's a standing policy against granting a clearance to anyone who's ever been a journalist. Even though it's basically the same skill-set -- do research, compile it, write it up in a coherent manner, etc.

 

I have a great life and a great job now, but what pisses me off is that the people from my program who _did_ get hired by intel were by-and-large freshly scrubbed 24-year-olds from the Midwest (academically, middle of the pack at my grad school), because they're really easy to vet for security clearances.

 

And what pisses me off even more is that the criteria nowadays for granting clearances wouldn't do sh*t to stop people like Hansen; they look for arbitrary stuff like past drug use, contact with foreign nationals, etc. I know a lot of ex-potheads/people who have had one-night-stands with hot Romanians/whatever who wouldn't think for a second of betraying their country.

 

And that's why US HUMINT sucks total ass.

 

Rant over!

[philgollin]

Bizarre that they ban journalists. Yes there IS a slight risk that they might prove a security risk. However I think thats more than balanced by the kind of skill set that you rightly suggest they bring to the job. In fact there was some evidence in the 1980s that MI5 was actively recruiting by issueing adverts in that paper that made it LOOK like it was a journalism job. Which in a sense I suppose it is.

 

From open sources (i.e. could be 100%, could be 1%) - there was a completely different mindset between US and UK on "types" for HUMINT, despite the interconnection during and after WW2.

 

The UK SEEMED to like a much wider variety and believed that "weaknesses" had usefulness in understanding and minipulating contacts - of course one mostly hears only of the "failures" so what was/is successful

[Brian Kennedy]

Bizarre that they ban journalists. Yes there IS a slight risk that they might prove a security risk. However I think thats more than balanced by the kind of skill set that you rightly suggest they bring to the job. In fact there was some evidence in the 1980s that MI5 was actively recruiting by issueing adverts in that paper that made it LOOK like it was a journalism job. Which in a sense I suppose it is.

 

I obviously don't agree with their reasoning, but (again, from what I've heard from contacts) it originated with the CIA not wanting any problems with agents posing as journalists, people accusing actually journalists of being CIA, stuff like that. Same thing with the Peace Corps -- I think there were some incidents in the '70s with intel guys posing as Peace Corps volunteers. Still seems really arbitrary and stupid, though.