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Warsaw Pact Forces opposite NATO, NIE 11-14-79, Volume II, the Estimate, CIA/NFAC, 31 January 1979

Central Intelligence Agency · 201 pages · text from the file's own layer

This is Volume II of National Intelligence Estimate 11-14-79, Warsaw Pact Forces Opposite NATO, issued by the Director of Central Intelligence and dated January 1979. The National Foreign Intelligence Board concurred with it. It was the first comprehensive estimate of Pact forces facing NATO since 1971. It covers Pact doctrine, the ground, air, naval, nuclear and chemical forces, command and control, and campaign plans for war in Europe. It judges that Central Europe would be the decisive arena, and it lists Pact weaknesses in pilot training and antisubmarine warfare. The document contains no UFO material.

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District. Once these forces were mobilized, we area without timely linkup with the Maritime
estimate that they would require about a week to Front. Airborne operations in this theater would
be in position to launch an attack from Bulgaria. also have to compete for lift resources with
If they were to move before the start of a war, operations planned in the Western TVD and thus
this movement would provide warning to NATO have to await the accomplishment of these
in the Southwestern Theater and elsewhere as operations.
well. -
122. Against Greece. On the western flank of the
- The ground campaign to seize the Straits woul Maritime Front, the remaining two Bulgarian armies,
he dlifficult and time consumning and would consisting of four to six motorized rifle divisions and
provide NATO time to obstruct the Straits and three tank brigades, would essentially form the Balkan
S y t a rFront. This front could also include some Romanian
The Soviets probably would consider that the forces, although it is more likely that the Romanians
airborne division and naval infantry regiment would constitute their own national front in the TVD's
which would be available for joint amphibious second echelon. the mission of the
and airborne assaults would not be large enough Balkan Front is to break through Greek fortifications
to overcome Turkish dlefenses and secure the and to advance to the Aegean Sea and from there into
IV-26

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FOIA release, from the cia-readingroom collection. The PDF is mirrored here; the original link is above. 201 pages are in the text index: search them above, or from the library's search.