Documents / FOIA release

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.

  • p. 114 …recently halted Soviet air operations from Conakry. These developments will obviously force the 257. Many officers…
  • p. 115 …order to keep other in establishing effective air cover over supporting lines units operational. of communication…
  • p. 185 …The Soviets could elect to provide combat forces scale commitment of manpower and materiel which to…
  • p. 187 …This force is occasionally aug- forces could not be safely transported by sea or air to…
  • p. 188 …a war, but they couldsome naval and air force weapons (including a few recently introduced Flogger…
-T _P.3_re4'
few, if any, large combatants from the Black Sea the Straits as more important than a modest augmenta-
before the outbreak of hostilities. The difference in tion of the Mediterranean Squadron.
judgment turns on whether the main purpose of the
Black Sea Fleet is to provide air and ASW defense for C. The Initial Campaign in the Northwestern
operations against the Turkish Straits, or whether it is Theater of Military Operations
to augment the Mediterranean Squadron.
144. The holders of the first view believe the Fleet 145. Initial Soviet objectives in the Northwestern
is in excess of requirements for the defense of local TVD center on ensuring freedom of action and unin-
waters in the Black Sea and for offensive operations hibited access to the open ocean for the Soviet naval
against Turkey and judge that, in any event, augmen- ships and aircraft and maintaining the forward de-
tation of the Mediterranean Squadron would not fense of the extensive complex of naval bases and
jeopardize an assault on the Straits. They argue that strategic installations located on the Kola Peninsula.
the time required to seize and clear the Straits and (See figure IV-6.) Initial operations by Soviet land
general uncertainty attending such an operation mili- forces probably would be limited to northern Norway.
tate against the Pact's holding its forces in the Black We have no evidence indicating that the Soviets plan
Sea, risking their exclusion from use in the Mediterra- for a general offensive against Finland or Sweden
nean. The holders of the second view, on the other early in a war. The Leningrad Military District-with
hand, point out that naval units sortied during periods its wartime front organization-is intended to defend
of tension could be trapped in the Mediterranean, the city of Leningrad and related areas in the Baltic, in
where they would be highly vulnerable to attack. addition to the operations in the north discussed in this
They judge that Pact planners would view seizure of section.
Illustrative Soviet Operations in the Northwestern TVD Figure IV-6
Probable area for amphibious assaults
a Barents Sea
Norwegian Sea
Possible airborne
or amphibious raids r 4 ARK
and air attacks Pechei
N RWAY .:Ground,
. operations~,
TROMS7 Murmansk
PFEN)NSUL A
rvik U.S.S.R.
LENINGRAD 9
Bod FINLAND .
SWEDEN MILITARY Kandalaksha
DISTRICTS
(543933)
577641 1-79 CIA
IV-31
T66-eeret

Not linked to a story yet.

About this file

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.