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 artillery units in both tank and motorized rifle divi- salvo carried on board. Poland and Czechoslovakia sions also are being expanded. For example, six-piece, now have a few 122-mm self-propelled howitzers, and 122-mm howitzer batteries in the motorized rifle Czechoslovakia has added a new artillery division. regiments in Soviet motorized rifle divisions have 18. Armored Personnel Carriers and Other grown to 18-piece battalions. Combat Vehicles. Soviet divisions in Eastern Europe 16. In addition to artillery weapon systems, the are equipped with a full complement of APCs. Short- Soviets are deploying a number of new artillery ages remain in Soviet divisions in the western USSR, support vehicles to improve their artillery fire direc- however, with some divisions lacking as much as two- tion, control, and target acquisition capabilities. Laser thirds of their APCs. One-half to two-thirds of the rangefinders, fire-control computers, and fire-control 20,500 Soviet APCs opposite NATO are now modern data transmission systems have been issued to some amphibious models. (See figure II-4). The rest are artillery units. There is also evidence that the Soviets older models with relatively poor cross-country mobil- now are producing and training with proximity fuses, ity. The Soviets continue to replace these APCs with which will make their artillery considerably more improved models-the BTR-60PB and the BMP. The effective against unarmored vehicles and troops with- BTR-60PB is an amphibious, wheeled APC which out overhead protection, provides good mobility and armor protection from small arms and shell fragments. The BMP is an 17. Modernization and some expansion are under amphibious, tracked vehicle designed to operate way in NSWP artillery units but at a much slower closely with tanks and has greater armor protection pace than in Soviet units. East Germany is replacing its than the BTR-60PB. It is equipped with a machine- BM-21 multiple rocket launchers with the Czechoslo- gun, a 73-mm gun, and the Sagger antitank guided vak RM-70 system, which can rapidly reload a second missile launcher. It also has a CBR (chemical, biologi- Modern Warsaw Pact Armored Fighting Vehicles and APCs Figure 11-4 BMP BTR-60PB BMD (Airborne) Armament 73-mm gun 14.5-mm and 7.62-mm 73-mm gun 7.62-mm machinegun machineguns Three 7.62-mm machineguns Mount for antitank guided missile Mount for antitank guided missile Weight (metric tons) 13.6 10.3 8.0 Length/height (m) 6.7/1.9 7.2/2.3 5.4/1.7 Speed(km/h) 70 80 80 Cruising range (km) 500 500 320 Crew 3 3 2 Number of passengers 8 14 6 t1- 6
Not linked to a story yet.
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.