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Strategic Parity and Beyond: Soviet Perspectives

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 July 2011

Roman Kolkowicz
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Extract

The strategic relations between the two superpowers have for a long time been influenced by the strategically superior position of the United States. This strategic imbalance has recently been rectified through a massive Soviet program of developing weapons systems that in effect created superpower parity. However, the concepts of strategic superiority and parity in the nuclear context are rather ambiguous. It is the purpose of this study to examine the influence of strategic parity as well as several related factors that have in the past shaped Soviet strategic doctrine and policy, and that are likely to continue to do so in the future.

Type
Research Article
Information
World Politics , Volume 23 , Issue 3 , April 1971 , pp. 431 - 451
Copyright
Copyright © Trustees of Princeton University 1971

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References

1 “One may think that Lenin … left us a heritage of guiding theses on the military question… . Such a statement is incorrect, since in reality no such ‘theses’ of Lenin exist.” Stalin, J. V., “Comrade Stalin's Answer to a Letter from Comrade Razin,” Bol-shevikj in (February 1947Google Scholar).

2 “The nervousness and hysteria of Stalin demonstrated that interfering with actual military operations, caused our army serious damage.” From Khrushchev's “secret speech” at the XX Party Congress, February, 1956.

3 Korotkow, Colonel I., “O razvitii sovetskoi voennoi teorii v poslevonnye gody” [The Development of Soviet Military Theory in Postwar Years], Voenno-istoricheskii zhumal, iv (April 1964Google Scholar).

4 For details, see Kolkowicz, R., The Soviet Military and Communist Party (Princeton 1967), 150Google Scholar–73.

5 Pravda, June 13, 1954.

6 Pravda, March 27, 1955.

7 TASS, February 14, 1956.

8 Radio Budapest, April 3, 1958.

9 The following is a typical Khrushchev view on limited war “with which the imperialists want to suppress the national liberation movements and do away with governments that do not suit them… . Should such wars break out, they could soon grow into a world war.” TASS, December 5, 1967.

10 See Kolkowicz, , “Die Position der Sowjetarmee vor und nach dem Sturz Chrusch-tschows,” Osteuropa, x (October 1966), 671Google Scholar–84.

11 Brezhnev, L., Pravda, September 30, 1965Google Scholar.

12 In an editorial in the Party's main theoretical journal, Kommunist, xn (August 1965).

13 Ibid.

14 See Kolkowicz, R. and others, The Soviet Union and Arms Control (Baltimore 1970Google Scholar), Appendix.

15 See, for example, Wolf's, T. W.Soviet Strategy at the Crossroads (Cambridge, Mass. 1964CrossRefGoogle Scholar).

16 Pravda, March 13, 1954.

17 See Kolkowicz, The Soviet Military, 105–13.

18 Kommunist, iv (April 1965), 16–17Google Scholar.

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21 For details, see Kolkowicz, The Soviet Military, 105–50.

22 Ibid., Appendix G, 383–85.

23 Ibid.

24 Ibid.

25 Ibid.

26 Ibid.

27 Ibid., 150–73.

28 Ibid.

29 Ibid., 282–306.

30 Ibid., Appendix G.

31 Kommunist, vn (May 1956).

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44 Speech at the U.N. Assembly, October 3, 1968.

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46 The Washington Post, September 19, 1967Google Scholar.