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.
CHAPTER II WARSAW PACT FORCES FOR THEATER WARFARE 1 Warsaw Pact forces for operations against NATO Table II-1 can best be described in terms of major groupings: Warsaw Pact Ground Force Manpower Ground, tactical air, and air defense forces in Opposite NATO * Eastern Europe and in the military districts of January 1979 the USSR opposite NATO, and possibly these Soviet NSWP Total types of forces in the Moscow, Volga, Ural, and Turkestan Military Districts. East Germany 365,000 106,000 471,000 Poland 35,000 232,000 267,000 Czechoslovakia 68,000 143,000 211,000 -- Naval forces of the three Soviet European fleets Hungary 59,000 72,000 131,000 and the non-Soviet Warsaw Pact (NSWP) Bulgaria - 105,000 105,000 countries. Romania - 140,000 140,000 USSR 553,000 - 553,000 - Most medium- and intermediate-range and some Total 1,080,000 798,000 1,878,000 intercontinental ballistic missiles of the Soviet Strategic Rocket Forces. *Includes Soviet and East European forces in the non-Soviet Warsaw Pact countries (East Germany, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria) and Soviet forces in the Baltic, - Most interinediate-range and some long-range Belorussian, Carpathian, Leningrad, Odessa, Kiev, North Caucasus, bombers of Soviet Long Range Aviation. and Transcaucasus Military Districts of the USSR. This note applies to all the tables in chapter 1t. 2. Pact forces opposite NATO are predominantly SECET Soviet, but NSWP forces make a significant contribu- tion and indeed are critical to Soviet strategy for 4. Since the late 1960s, overall Pact ground force conflict in Europe. Since the mid-1960s both Soviet manpower has increased substantially. Pact forces in and NSWP forces have been characterized by a Central Europe-where our information is best-have growth in manpower and equipment and by modern- increased more than the forces opposite NATO's ization programs to improve their capabilities. Overall, flanks. Ground force manpower in the Soviet Groups the changes of the past decade or so have made these of Forces in Central Europe, for example, has expand- forces more balanced and operationally flexible, with ed by some 75,000 men since the late 1960s, while the improved capabilities for both nuclear and nonnuclear East German, Polish, and Czechoslovak ground forces warfare. have registered an increase of 65,000 men.' About three-fourths of this increase took place before 1973. A. Warsaw Pact Ground Forces Figure II-1 depicts several important trends in War- saw Pact ground forces in Central Europe. Manpower Equipment 3. Warsaw Pact ground forces opposite NATO number about 1.9 million men. The Soviet Union 5. Pact ground forces are well equipped with weap- accounts for roughly half of the total or just over 1 ons either of Soviet origin or patterned after Soviet million men. About half of these Soviet forces are models. The equipment inventory is being continually stationed in Eastern Europe and half in the military modernized with the introduction of new, improved districts of the USSR that are opposite NATO. The size ,The transfer of some Polish territorial forces to the active and distribution of these forces are shown in table Il-1. ground forces accounts for a portion of this increase. TI- t
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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.