A chain is only as strong...

I wrote that I had rediscovered some of my old "cold war" books in boxes that haven't been opened since I moved to NEPA, and I've been reading them a lot lately. This reading has forced me to look at things from a "Monday morning quarterback" point of view, because the Cold War is over and the "good guys" won.

The quote I was making in the title is because some of the books I read and reread were written with the opinion that the Soviet forces arrayed against us in Eastern Europe would have posed a very great risk for our forces, and I think history has relegated this opinion to the "not possible" box. Our military successes since the end of the Cold War have been so overwhelming that the possibility that we could have faced real opposition against the Soviets seems highly unlikely.

Is this the case, however?

For example, in 1997, Jane's Defense Review published a study made by US and German experts who determined that the best tank ammunition of the period between 1985 and 1991 could not have penetrated the "Contact-5" explosive reactive armor (ERA) of the bulk of Soviet forces category one T-72 variant MBTs... of which there were more than 16,000 assigned to service in Eastern Europe as part of the Warsaw Pact arsenal. How quickly could we have stopped a Soviet-led advance into West Germany of we didn't have ammunition that would penetrate the armor of most of the Soviet tanks facing us?

By 1985, more than half of all our (US) front line MBTs were the new M1 designs, having replaced the older M60A3 variants. The M1 was faster, heavier and better armed and armored... but had a far more limited capacity in the field than the M60A3 did. It used nearly twice as much fuel as the Patton (which was a diesel engine machine) and required dedicated maintenance and repair facilities that the existing NATO forces did not have in place until 1990. The M60A3, being a variant of the M48 design, was custom made for both rapid armored advance tactics and infantry support roles, while the M1 was not. The M60 had indirect fire capacity (meaning it could take on a role of artillery support, if needed) and could act as infantry support and cover in an open battlefield environment. The M1 could not do either of these (and still can't).

Integration of new, more advanced designs and platforms (like the Bradley IFV in 1981) showed a problem in ensuring adequate tactical training to incorporate the new weapons and platforms into existing strategic and tactical planning (evidence of which can be seen in the 1991 actions in Kuwait). I'm not suggesting the Soviets had better "stuff"... only that the Soviets kept their designs focused on tactics and planning that didn't require major shifts in planning or training.

In fact, I'm saying the NATO forces DID have better stuff (especially in the area of air power)... but even today we know that the preponderance of numbers rested comfortably with the Soviets. They were ready and willing to see a 25% to 45% HIGHER attrition rate than the NATO forces because they knew the supply problems would work to their advantage from start to finish. American strategic reinforcement plans like REFORGER needed at least 72 hours to begin airlifting troops to pre-planned supply areas, and most Soviet plans called for major penetrations of Soviet forces into West Germany within 48 hours.

Most importantly, though, is the idea that there was a "weak link" in the European defense chain.

What if NATO itself were that weak link?

The entire scope of western European security against Soviet aggression was centered on the NATO alliance and its ability to counter any and all Soviet moves against it. It is one of the longest lived treaty organizations in history, and (by its very definition) has succeeded in protecting its member states completely since Day One.

But has it actually ever been tested?

NATO involvement in efforts like Bosnia in '95 and Greater Yugoslavia in '99 and Afghanistan in '03 (under the name ISAF) have shown a real capacity within NATO for communication, planning and cooperative breakdowns. Since the withdrawal of France as a NATO member under the Presidency of Charles de Gualle, there has been a real, measurable question about which members would and would not participate in NATO operations... and this question has never been adequately addressed since 1957. Spain, Italy, Germany, France, Norway, the Netherlands, and Iceland have all restricted participation of their military units and personnel since that time, in one way or another... with both France and Italy repeatedly looking for means by which they could secure separate "peace" in the event of a new European conflict.

In the years between 1981 and 1983, Italy refused port privileges to the US Navy because of policies and actions being carried out in Lebanon for any ship suspected of carrying "nuclear weapons" or that may be/have been involved in the effort (which amounted to the entire Mediterranean fleet). In 1986, Italy, Spain and France all denied the US overflight use of their respective air spaces and "closed" the use of continental US airbases to the bombing mission against terrorist-supporting Libya... despite the overall support that NATO command gave to the planned air strikes. Is this evidence that, even in light of a Soviet invasion of West Germany, NATO would not have been able to remain united long enough or early enough to have effectively mounted a defense and/or counter offensive?

I guess my point is this: Almost every single source on the subject of the hypothetical invasion of western Europe by the Warsaw Pact nations makes the case that a weakened NATO resolve would be enough to ensure at least initial Soviet victory... and these sources are the roots to such successful works as those made by Tom Clancy, Sir John Toland, Harold Coyle, et al.

Grand and vast unifying organizations like the League of Nations, the United Nations and NATO have all shown themselves to be less-than-perfect, and in some cases... even detrimental to the overall effort of securing peace and security for member states. Knowing what we know now, could we look at what might have been and honestly say that "victory" for the US and her allies was a forgone conclusion?