Documents / FOIA release
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.
Top ret Pact would initiate war from this posture only in extraordinarily time-urgent circumstances. CIA and State believe that the Pact would take such action only if it perceived the threat of an imminent NATO attack. DIA, NSA, Army, Navy, and Air Force hold that the Soviets might choose to attack with the two-front force in a variety of urgent contingencies. A broader treatment of this issue is given in NIE 4-1-78. (JV, 13-18) n. Likely Effectiveness of a Warsaw Pact Air Offensive (the "Air Operation") in Central Europe. CIA and State conclude that a massive Pact air offensive at the outset of a war would do considerable damage to NATO's air and air defense forces, but probably would not be so effective as to prevent NATO's air forces from being able to deliver nuclear weapons on a large scale. DIA and Air Force believe that no judgment with any useful level of confidence on the effectiveness of an air operation is possible at this time because we lack adequate analysis of the factors involved which apply to both NATO and the Pact and of the interaction of the forces of both sides. (IV, 85) o. Likely Effectiveness of Pact Operations To Achieve Air Superiority and Sea Control in the Baltic Sea. CIA, NSA, and State conclude that the allocation of most Pact tactical and LRA bomber aircraft to a large-scale Air Operation in West Germany and the Benelux countries would severely reduce the probability of the Pact's achieving air superiority over the Baltic in the initial stage of a war. Also, Pact ASW forces would be unable to prevent NATO submarine attacks against Pact amphibious forces. DIA and Air Force believe that there has been insufficient analysis of the factors and assumptions which would support such a conclusion. Navy believes that the achievement of air superiority is but one of a number of factors which, taken together, will determine the outcome of the Pact's Baltic campaign. (IV, 109-111) p. Augmentation of Soviet Naval Forces in the Mediterranean by Black Sea Surface Combatants During a Period of Tension Prior to Hostilities. CIA and State estimate that the Soviets would deploy few, if any, combatants to augment their Mediterranean Squadron because the ships are needed more in the Black Sea for fleet air defense and ASW in support of Pact operations against the Turkish Straits. DIA, NSA, and Navy conclude that the Soviets would augment with at least a few, and possibly up to 12, modern Black Sea surface units because they would be of greater value in the Mediterranean than in the Black Sea. (IV, 142-144) q. Number of Submarines Soviets Would Employ in the North Atlantic SLOC Interdiction Role. CIA, NSA, and State judge that about 10 submarines would be dispersed in North Atlantic shipping 20 Top ec
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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.