Henry A. Kissinger

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CHAPTER VI

THE NUCLEAR PROBLEM - WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?

The debate about the MLF will have served some useful purpose if it could be returned to fundamentals: What is it that members of the Alliance really want in the nuclear field?

A.

Strategic Nuclear War

Each member of the Alliance has two somewhat contradictory aims in its NATO nuclear policy: It wants to prevent being forced into nuclear war against its will, and it wants to be sure of the nuclear support of its allies when its vital interests are at stake. What is understood by nuclear support is less clear. All allies want the appearance of nuclear support so that the Soviets never challenge their vital interests. Whether they are actually prepared to face the consequences of nuclear war is ambiguous.

The tendency to put everything on deterrence suggests that if it actually came to nuclear war, many allies would be (above all) concerned with their lives. They may be more interested with not being forced into nuclear war than with their lives. Even the national nuclear forces may have basically this function to discourage nuclear attack on the home territory and to enable our nuclear allies to stay out of a nuclear war rather than enter it.

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Whatever the real motives of our allies, their two contradictory goals highlight the dilemma of a coalition of sovereign states. If no conflict of interests were conceivable, the concern with either veto or <u>triggering ability not existing.</u> reassurance would be less pressing. But as a sovereign state is the final judge of its interests, absolute reassurance is unobtainable. No one can predict with certainty how hard-pressed leaders will react under <u>not only with respect to the decision to enter into nuclear war, but also with respect to the many means of bargaining</u> <u>and thereby avoiding</u> <u>the unprecedented stresses of imminent nuclear war. The jealousy with which the United States has heretofore guarded its freedom of decision is as significant a symptom of this dilemma as the excessive claims to independence, of France.</u>

American proposals--including the MLF--have largely avoided this problem. The United States, starting from the technically unexceptionable premise that <u>nuclear strategy was invisible</u>, has striven to create a structure in NATO which makes it physically impossible for other nations to act independently. We have been less ready to face the inevitable rejoinder: Those nations which are being asked to entrust their nuclear

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defense to the United States will insist, in return, on a common
world-wide diplomacy and a voice in the management of the _entire_
strategic forces of the United States. This has been the thrust of
the proposals of the British Labor Party.¹

1. Patrick Gordon-Walker, "The Labor Party's Defense and Foreign Policy," *Foreign Affairs*, Vol. 42, No. 3 (April 1964), pp. 391-398. The proposals of the new British Labor government tend in the same direction.

France, on the other hand, has expressed clearly and correctly, a sovereignty well but it has neglected the technical requirements of nuclear strategy. In the face of the risks of a nuclear holocaust, no country can have complete freedom of decision--least of all a nation with a nuclear force strong enough to start a nuclear war but far too weak to finish it. Where the United States has overemphasized the technical aspects of central command and control, France and those Europeans agreeing with her have pushed the legal implications of sovereignty to a point where it clashes with the technical realities of the nuclear age.

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For this limited task, the British and French nuclear forces are not so ineffective as we sometimes insist. The ratio of the combined British and French forces to those of the Soviet Union is more favorable than was that of the Soviet Union vis-à-vis the United States in the Fifties. Despite the overwhelming strategic superiority of the United States, no one would maintain that the Soviet strategic force had no deterrent value.

Of course, the Soviets could launch a pre-emptive blow at the bases of European nuclear forces. However, such a course would be extraordinarily risky. As long as the NATO treaty retains any validity, it would be extremely foolhardy for the Soviets to make a full-scale nuclear attack on Europe without taking into account the high probability of American involvement, ~~only if the Americans were in fact making~~

When the inter-allied debate ceases to emphasize the theoretical question of who has a right to possess nuclear weapons, it is likely ~~an allies'~~ item that their relative weakness will convince our nuclear allies of the importance of a coordinated strategy. All the realities of technology, strategy and policy would seem to favor such a course. Our allies--if they understand

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weapons program depends on a unilateral German decision. Before major departures in the weapons field are made a full examination of methods for improving the process of political consultation would seem to be in order.³ And the Federal Republic owes it to itself to

³See below Chapter VI

examine the relationship of any of these measures to the eventual goal of reunification.⁴

⁴ See below Chapter VII

In the process of consultation outlined here, if in the course of such an examination it appears that the ownership of nuclear weapons has been so stimulated as to become不必要的 German desire for access to nuclear weapons is genuine, we are honorably encouraged to press our commitments to us of human leaders bound by the nature of our commitments and our pressures to proceed

with the MLF in some form. However, though we are bound to go forward in that case, the MLF should be one instrument for a strong nuclear force, with the MLF scheme, we can at least after its context. The MLF should purpose should become a device to give an access to nuclear weapons to those allies which--partly as a result of our proselytizing--have become convinced that they will not have adequate influence in the Alliance otherwise to participate in the exercises of nuclear weapons.

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desire for access to nuclear weapons survives this re-examination, a mixed-manned element. The longer range nuclear weapons now in Europe, such as the Pershing missiles and the F-104 airplanes, which are now under the double veto system, should also be assigned to this force.

Such a strategic force could be placed under SACEUR. However, it seems wiser to have SACEUR concentrate on the land battle and to create a distinct NATO strategic command, for deep interdiction and counterforce operations. This would provide a "firebreak" in the command structure and closer political control of the decision to engage in deep penetration of hostile territory. The purpose would be to group all the weapons--European and American--relevant to the European portion of general nuclear war, into one command. Tactical nuclear weapons of ranges up to three hundred miles would remain under SACEUR.

In bringing such a force into being the United States has in some emerging claims obvious interests with respect to its European components which it is in our interest to promote. The following United States interests seem

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As long as the Alliance is composed of sovereign states, the major countries cannot be forced into nuclear war against their will. But this situation would not be changed if the original version of the MLF had prevailed. It would still have been possible for each major ally to veto the use of the entire force. Indeed, the possibility of withdrawal has the advantage of an insurance policy. In the inconceivable case that one of the existing nuclear countries would feel that the Alliance so neglects its vital interests that it would be prepared to go to nuclear war alone it could do so. But in that case the Alliance would already have collapsed. No arrangement of nuclear forces could protect against this contingency.

Within the frame-work of a newly created NATO Strategic Command, the Alliance could finally address itself to the tasks to be performed

rather than spend energy on scholastic debates about who has a right to do what in contingencies that no one can describe. With some insurance available for the *unlikely* contingency that the United States might interpret its interests differently from those of Europe, our allies are likely to come to conclusions very similar to ours about the desirability

[Y]

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for the indivisibility of Atlantic interests than an MLF whose strategic
role would be, at best, marginal. The Alliance could then turn from
the essentially technical issue of nuclear control to what is the
heart of the problem for the vitality of the Alliance: the development
of machinery for the management of crises and for the elaboration of
common policies.

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B. <u>Tactical Nuclear War</u>

One of the consequences of the obsession with the MLF has been that many key problems requiring urgent attention have been swept under the rug in order to maintain the momentum behind the multilateral force. One of these problems concerns the role and control of tactical nuclear weapons.

Tactical nuclear weapons have had a checkered history in NATO strategy. They were first introduced into the NATO arsenal in the middle Fifties in order to offset what was then believed to be a numerical superiority of Soviet manpower, a permanent inferiority of NATO manpower. As a result, thousands of nuclear weapons were shipped into Europe. They included artillery pieces with ranges of about fifteen miles to Pershing missiles with up to 700 miles (in the improved versions). The term tactical was defined to include all weapons placed under the authority of SACEUR, the consequences of some of the long-range weapons even though the range of some of these weapons would make their use indistinguishable from an attack by the weapons controlled by SAC. From its beginning the tactical nuclear establishment on the

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Continent raised formidable problems of coordination which were obscured only because the dominant American strategic doctrine predicted that any nuclear war was likely to be massive and all-out.

In these terms, control of the nuclear establishment on the Continent

The advent of the Kennedy Administration in 1961 changed this state of affairs.

Committed to a strategy of multiple options, the new Administration began to look at the nuclear establishment on the Continent from the point of view of its suitability for discriminating military operations.

Their conclusions were jaundiced: Early in the Kennedy Administration, Deputy Secretary of Defense Gilpatric rejected the notion of tactical nuclear war with the argument that it was impossible to build any limit into a nuclear war.⁵ Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Alain

⁵ Press Conference, June 6, 1964, *New York Times*, June 7, 1964

Enthoven has insisted that once the dividing line between conventional and nuclear weapons was crossed, no obvious "firebreak" exists short

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of large-scale thermonuclear war.⁶ Secretary McNamara has spoken

⁶ Alain Enthoven, "American Deterrent Policy," *Survival*, V, 3 (May-June 1963), p. 96.

deprecatingly of a limited nuclear war short of some "ill-defined threshold of strategic exchange."⁷

⁷ Robert S. McNamara, "Major National Security Problems Confronting the United States," *DOES*, XLIX, 127 (December 16, 1963), p. 917.

In terms of prevailing strategic doctrine and deployment, this view was justified. It was given added color by the problem of how exercising political control over the nuclear weapons on the Continent, Controlling a few hundred strategic weapons during military operations is difficult but soluble. Controlling thousands of weapons of many different ranges and characteristics in the confusion of combat is another matter. No communication system is likely to be able to withstand possible nuclear attack while stand the pressures of instructing close to ten thousand weapons while nuclear

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McNamara's announcements. Thus the thousands of nuclear weapons on the Continent exist in a shadow land, between the fact that they have become a touchstone of the American commitment to our allies while American planners regard them with extraordinary ambivalence. To build up the tactical nuclear establishment on the Continent without clarifying its mission would seem to combine the worst feature of all available options.

The question whether so much reliance should have been placed on tactical nuclear weapons in the first place must not prevent efforts to deal with a situation dominated by the following facts: (1) There exists a large and growing nuclear establishment on the Continent without a clearly defined, agreed mission. The United States is solemnly committed to maintain this arsenal in Europe. (2) The Soviet army is equipped with tactical nuclear weapons, so that the decision whether to use or not nuclear weapons is no longer entirely up to the West.

(3) NATO ground forces are inadequate to withstand a full-scale Soviet onslaught. History is replete with examples where numerically inferior forces defeated larger ones, especially if the larger force grows out

[Y]

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of a coalition. And the thirty division level would leave the West numerically inferior to a fully mobilized U.S.S.R. If NATO still numerically inferior to a fully mobilized U.S.S.R. If NATO doctrine leaves a gap between strategic and conventional war, European uneasiness is likely to grow and the issue of nuclear control will reappear with respect to tactical nuclear weapons. (4) The tactical nuclear establishment in Europe is extremely vulnerable. The dangers of escalation in the category of strategic weapons are generally exaggerated, since their relative invulnerability provides little incentive for a disarming blow. But with respect to tactical nuclear weapons in Europe, the classic pre-emptive situation obtains. The tactical nuclear arsenal is now deployed and is capable of inflicting severe damage; it is highly vulnerable to a first strike. This may well add to the deterrence; at the same time, it increases the probability of escalation should war occur.

In fact, there is an inconsistency between our military deployment and our strategic doctrine, in yet another way. Pentagon officials have indicated a clear preference for trying to resist even

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There is no question but today our strategic retaliatory forces of bombers, missiles and Polaris are fully capable of destroying Soviet targets, even after absorbing an initial nuclear surprise attack. Allowing for losses from an initial enemy attack we calculate that our forces would destroy virtually all Soviet targets without any help from deployed tactical air units or carrier task forces which, of course, have the capability of attacking these targets with nuclear weapons.⁸

⁸ Robert S. McNamara, Speech on February 17, 1962 to the Fellows of the American Bar Foundation, Chicago, *New York Times*, February 18, 1962.

In a way, of course, *discussion of the subject in these terms* -
*its* academic. In view of the *evolution* of NATO doctrine and *over* 92
*United States* commitments, any attempt to abandon the tactical nuclear
establishment on the Continent altogether would have drastic political
consequences. Moreover, there *are at least three reasons* to question the view that all
tactical missions can be performed by *strategic forces*, *on at least* 93
*three grounders*: the probability of escalation if battlefield weapons
*are used*; the suitability of strategic forces for tactical operations;
and the feasibility of conducting nuclear operations confined to a
battlefield.

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The problem of escalation has two aspects: escalation within the theater of operations and escalation into general war. As long as NATO's tactical nuclear establishment is so vulnerable, the danger of escalation of any military operations within Europe is enormous even if military operations begin with conventional weapons. The precondition of any effective use of tactical nuclear weapons--as of strategic weapons--is to enhance their invulnerability.⁹

⁹ See below p. ___

The probability of escalation to general war depends on the vulnerability of the opposing retaliatory forces. If the strategic forces are extremely vulnerable, any use of nuclear weapons is likely to escalate very rapidly. In that case, any large-scale military operation--even a conventional one--in an area as vital to both sides as Europe would involve risks out of proportion to any conceivable gain.

In short, the original basis for the doctrine of massive retaliation will exist. Under the conditions of increasing invulnerability of retaliatory

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the opposite course is suicidal. But current NATO deployment tends in that direction. Units are concentrated as if the likely attack would

be conventional. But the very concentration of units coupled with the ambiguity of NATO doctrine and the vulnerability of its nuclear weapons supplies an incentive to an aggressor to use nuclear weapons first.

It has become abundantly clear that NATO will not raise sufficient troops for a purely conventional defense of Europe--all trends, in fact, are in the opposite direction. It is therefore crucial that deployment on the Continent take into account the realities of NATO in the next decade. NATO's conventional forces are suitable for two major roles:

(a) To act as a screening force designed to identify that a full-scale attack is in fact, taking place and to discourage sudden attacks of NATO territory. (b) To furnish a reserve to resist aggression on the flanks of NATO or in areas outside of Europe where NATO might agree on joint action.

NATO deployment should reflect this. There should be a screen of conventional forces deployed forward and organized for purely conventional

[4]

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combat. These units do not require nuclear weapons. The size of this screen would depend on the total NATO forces available and a military 110 estimate about what will be required to force a substantial Soviet concentration before an attack is launched. Behind this screen should be the remainder of NATO's divisions (except for the strategic reserve) deployed equipped, organized and deployed for nuclear war. It would be obvious to any aggressor that once operations reached a certain magnitude nuclear war would be inevitable. At the same time, NATO deployment and weapons design would reduce the incentives for pre-emption. Within these "nuclear" units the control over nuclear operations should be no lower than the corps level and weapons should be released only by an appropriate political authority (preferably the NATO Security Committee of the NATO Council described below).

In addition, there should be a strategic reserve capable of conducting either conventional or tactical nuclear war and organized to intervene rapidly either in a land-battle in Europe or in distant theaters.

The military organization of the Alliance would then appear as follows: (1) There would be an Allied Nuclear Force, containing all

1 See Chapter III

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existing NATO weapons above a range of, say, three hundred miles, and major
from Great Britain and the
units from the British, United States and ultimately French nuclear
contributions.

forces together with a small mixed-manned element. If this proposal
could be included
It would have a separate commander and be under the control
of a political body in which the Federal Republic has equal represent-
tion. This body could be constituted as an executive committee of
the NATO Council and should also have responsibility for developing
common political programs and an agreed strategic doctrine. ¹⁰

10 See below Chapter VIII

(2) SACEUR would retain tactical nuclear weapons up to a range
of, say, three hundred miles. However, their deployment would be altered in order
to create real conventional and nuclear options. This measure would be
related to the existing mission.

(3) The deployment of conventional forces would clearly reflect
their primary mission of acting as a screening force and furnishing a
strategic reserve.

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However, the military problem is a symptom and not a cause
of the difficulties of the Alliance. The ultimate challenge lies in
the political field. It is whether NATO can develop common purposes,
whether it can devise a structure which combines community with
flexibility, whether it can act on the proposition that before men
must have a vision of it.
they require a