In conflict, in strategy, nothing is more important than to understand "the other side". This essay is written with that concern.
On 28 February 2022 Russian President Putin declared that in view of statements by countries supporting the Ukraine government, addressed to Russia, he was putting Russia's strategic deterrent forces on high alert.
NOTE ADDED 14 MARCH. I placed here the full statement as broadcast by RT, a Russian broadcaster, for the sake of accuracy. That broadcaster has now been removed from YouTube. I leave the blank space, asking that you look again at the opening sentence above that I wrote on 11 March.
This was of course widely and sometimes excitedly reported.
There has been no attention however to the US's DEFCON status [link is to Wikipedia].. not least because it's not revealed. However there are observers in the US making estimates. DEFCON status can apply globally or locally. This group estimate that the global level must be at DEFCON 3, for Europe DEFCON 2. According to Wikipedia DEFCON 2 has only previously been declared in the Cuban Missile Crisis and the Gulf War, and then locally not globally.
Two DEFCON 3 issues arose in times of my involvement. In 1973 a short time after the Yom Kippur war, Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister Lance Barnard went to London, stopping en route at Exmouth Western Australia to visit the Northwest Cape naval communications station. Wandering through a big radio station is not exciting or so I thought at the time, but at the back of our gaggle, an alert journalist asked a US naval rating "what's this big board then" and the genial American said "that's the DEFCON board, you should have seen it during the Yom Kippur war, lit up like a Christmas tree!" This of course made hot news. As I wrote some time ago, the new Whitlam Government in Australia in 1973, breaking away from the Labor party platform, accepted the continued presence in Australia of US defence bases on the basis that they contributed to Australia's defence and that by accepting these installations Australia would be kept informed on strategic matters by the US. We had not been informed of US installations in Australia going to DEFCON 3.
In August 1976 at the time of Axe Murder Incident in the Joint Security Area, between North and South Korea, I was in Washington. Wikipedia's account at link glosses over the fact that at no time over several weeks did the North Korean/Chinese People's Volunteers side at Panmunjom agree to removal of the tree; the decision to go and cut down the tree regardless was taken by the commander US Forces Korea, who was that kind of guy. I rang the State Department, the Korea Section and then the Crisis Centre, and was able to send a full briefing back to Canberra including that US Forces had gone to DEFCON 3. Some time later a stilted memorandum arrived from Canberra grumbling that we should have been told about DEFCON 3, should not have needed to ask. I have always been of the view that for a subordinate ally, consultation is as good as you actively do. Especially when the dominant ally is preoccupied by war-related matters. Moreover you only become a worthwhile ally, alliance is only useful if you pitch in with views. Otherwise you are just a tag along, cheap meat for the IndoPacific command.
The notion of 'national means of verification' first arose with the original Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty (SALT) between the US and USSR in 1968. The SALT treaty became possible because of technological advances in the 1960s, especially with satellites, that enabled the US and USSR to know enough about the other to shift from 'balance of terror' in the 1950s to a balance of deterrence. It is a notion that applies at all levels: know, don't trust.
The Trump Administration astonishingly chose to withdraw from important arms control agreements with Russia, including for national means of verification overflights.
The present tactical situation in Ukraine is watched over not only by satellites but all other available means. From Flightradar24, this track of a recent flight of a RAF intelligence-collecting aircraft over Poland,. The fact that these aircraft every day have transponders on and are visible to other traffic, Flightradar24, and the Russians, has deterrent value.
Also over this edge of the war theatre are large NATO aerial refueling aircraft visible to Flightradar, but presumably engaged in refueling war fighting aircraft near the front. These demonstrate existence of a NATO forward posture.
Here a Dutch tanker over Poland, an American tanker over Romania. The aircraft described is in red on the map, its flight path as shown. Especially with the US aircraft over Romania, it needs to be seen on radar not only by local traffic but traffic on major flight corridors between Asia and Europe. War fighting planes do not have their transponders on but of course will be seen on military radars on both sides... except to the extent that stealth aircraft like the B-2 and F-35 should not be visible.
In studying the issue of strategic and tactical weapons in the European theatre it is important to note that through the Cold War US/NATO conventional forces were far outnumbered by Warsaw Pact conventional forces and US/NATO defence plans were dependent on intent to use theatre and medium range nuclear weapons, prepared to be the first to use these weapons. Soviet capability in this field only became significant from the late 1970s with Soviet deployment of the SS-20, NATO's plan in response to deploy the Pershing missile.produced many counter demonstrations in Western Europe. By 1987 intermediate range missiles were banned by the INF Treaty. Trump pulled the US out of the INF Treaty.
The absence of that treaty restraint provides depth (I speculate) to understanding older Russian military leaders' concern regarding nuclear options over Ukraine. The swift and firm US opposition to the harebrained Polish idea of giving their MIG-29 aircraft to the US for the US to send to the Ukraine from its Ramstein base in Germany is reassuring in conflict avoidance.
In the world of punditry where new comment is needed every day there remains some feverish apprehension that we are in 1962, the year of the Cuban missile crisis. We are not out of the woods yet, but there is infrastructure of national means of verification as well as hotline between Washington and Moscow making this a much less dramatic situation than 1962 - though the Cuban Missile Crisis remains the great illustration of a major power objecting to offensive weapons being put on its doorstep.
Elsewhere I have made comparison between the beginning of World War 1 and western actions since 9/11 in 2001.
The Russians are aware that H.R McMaster, Trump's second National Security Advisor, H.R. McMaster, was a lesser-ranking general who came to national attention by writing a book which he began with an attack on the Kennedy cabinet in 1962 running with civilian opinion and rejecting the joint chiefs' recommendation to go to war over the missiles going to Cuba. See this. In the pursuit of containment of China (including deployment of nuclear armed ships close to the China coast) and other actions of the Biden Administration there has been lack of assurance of calm decision-making on the American side. Having regard also for the involvement of Blinken, Sullivan and especially Nuland in the 2014 coup in the Ukraine. Plus advocacy on the right in the US for enhancement of hybrid war capabilities.
No comments:
Post a Comment