‘New Climate’ Hasn’t Frozen Soviet Military Machine

As the dates for the Washington summit meeting draw near, the American public has been treated to a ceaseless barrage of confusing commentary on the meaning of Mikhail S. Gorbachev’s glasnost , including exhortations from some Western observers to reward the Soviet reformist spirit with economic cooperation and support.

Central to their argument is the claim that Gorbachev, glasnost and Soviet economic reform are inherently good for the West because they will lead to a reduced Soviet military threat. There is, however, no evidence that restructuring the Soviet economy or broadening citizen participation in exclusively local affairs will constrain the Soviet state in its long-term effort to dominate the Eurasian continent. Meanwhile, in the name of openness, the American mind is being closed to the reality of Soviet politics.

Military power has always been the Soviet state’s primary claim to international prestige, and it is within the Soviet military that Gorbachev’s reinvigorating influence may ultimately have its greatest effect. Consider Gorbachev’s elevation this year of Army Gen. Dimitri T. Yazov to the top position in the Soviet military Establishment.

The appointment of the relatively unknown Yazov to be the minister of defense surprised virtually everyone in the Western world. He projects the image of a leader in the Gorbachev mold. He brings energy, integrity and intelligence to the Soviet armed forces in a manner that has not been seen since the 1920s. Unlike most of his predecessors, the younger Yazov avoids ideological harangues in favor of practical emphasis on tightening military discipline, developing new training techniques and fighting corruption in the ranks of the officer corps. He stresses intellect, modern technology and military history in the education of officers, and he exalts the “dynamic, thinking man” as the model of the modern Soviet military professional. This approach appeals to many Western observers who are taken with the “Gorbachev style.”

But none of Yazov’s rhetoric suggests that an era of resource stringency will cause the type of organizational contraction that reduced the size of the Soviet Union’s conventional forces in the 1950s. In fact, the Soviet state’s investment in military-force development continues at a dizzying pace; new weapons are reaching the field more rapidly than at any time in recent Soviet history. Moreover, if Yazov succeeds in his drive to reform the Soviet armed forces, the West will face a more, not less, potent Soviet military threat.

Then there is Marshal Nikolai V. Ogarkov, who was removed from the Soviet general staff in 1984 for insisting that global war with the United States could be fought without the widespread use of nuclear weapons. Ogarkov appears to have been resurrected, and the “new political thinking” in Moscow has not discouraged him from pressing ahead with a new offensive military doctrine and strategy for the 1990s that emphasize theaterwide, “high-tech” conventional military operations against the West.

Ogarkov has been given operational control of the Warsaw Pact’s most important concentration of forces: the Western Theater of Military Operations, which includes the western Soviet Union, Poland, Czechoslovakia and East Germany. He has been working to develop his Central European command into a cohesive and responsive offensive-force structure under Soviet control that can rapidly mobilize and attack the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Western analysts should be careful not to underestimate the extent to which Ogarkov’s innovative strategy conforms to Gorbachev’s broader commitment to reinvigorate the Soviet state.

Frankly, a tremendous amount of ink has been wasted on speculation about the possible future effect of Gorbachev’s proposals for limited reform, which may yet be scrapped by a party apparatus that abhors change in any form. In the meantime, Gorbachev’s reform-oriented approach appears to be reinvigorating Soviet military strength, but it has done nothing to change the traditional objectives of Soviet power and influence.

Despite Gorbachev’s pronouncements, it is clear that there will be no reduced emphasis on Soviet military power. If there are any reductions in the size of the Soviet armed forces, these reductions will doubtlessly be followed, as in the past, by structural changes to increase the striking power of the Soviet military. The hasty embrace in the West of a “new Gorbachev climate” actually raises the risk that a more robust Soviet economy, buttressed by Western credits and technology, will provide the basis for even greater Soviet military strength. Those who expect Soviet military power to be buried in the wake of glasnost are in for a rude awakening.