Throwing the Booklet at Moscow

By James Kelly

A Defense Department portrait of Soviet military might

"There is a very real and growing threat. It is not scare talk or any kind of propaganda." With that dire warning, Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger last week released a glossy, 99-page report titled Soviet Military Power. The study, illustrated with maps and photographs, describes in impressive detail the Soviet military machine and its ever growing arsenal of new weapons systems, tanks, missiles, ships, artillery and aircraft. Put together by the Defense Intelligence Agency, the report is the largest and most comprehensive release of declassified intelligence data in the Pentagon's history. Its purpose: to send a red alert to Americans and their allies that the U.S.S.R. is gaining a military edge over the West. Warned Weinberger: "We have to move very rapidly to correct the imbalances and regain our strength."

The report was released just three days before President Reagan announced his decisions on the MX missile and the B-1 bomber. Naturally, there was suspicion that the timing was designed to help the Pentagon justify the vast sums needed for the new strategic systems. Weinberger flatly denied the charge. Plans for the booklet, he said, began last April after the U.S. presentation of a top-secret "threat assessment" of Soviet military strength to NATO defense ministers in Bonn. The ministers were sufficiently impressed to urge Weinberger to make the study public so they could use it to defuse opposition in their own countries to hikes in defense spending, as well as to the planned basing of U.S. Pershing II and cruise missiles on European soil.

Weinberger agreed, and over the next few months the Pentagon wrangled with the CIA over exactly what information could and could not be made public. For example, CIA officials vetoed satellite photos and insisted on fudging statistics, lest Moscow learn too much about how well the U.S. gathers its intelligence. The final document thus features full-color artists' renderings of satellite pictures, rounded-off figures, and vague predictions about forthcoming Soviet weaponry. "Every product of the intelligence community is a compromise," explained Weinberger. "Be thankful for small favors."

Although the report contains no startling disclosures, in its breadth of detail it is convincing--and even frightening. There are illustrations--drawn in rather crude Flash Gordon style from satellite photos--of the new 25,000-ton Typhoon missile submarine, an SS-20 launch site, the experimental T-80 tank and surface-to-air laser weapons. Maps target where Soviet intercontinental ballistic missiles and intermediate-range SS-20s have been placed, chart the location of Soviet divisions, and illustrate the sweep of Soviet adventurism around the globe, complete with lists of technicians and advisers stationed abroad. To bolster its point that Moscow is forever building new weapons systems, the study cites Soviet development of a new long-range bomber and a radar warning and control plan similar to AWACS.

Among the other notable points:

> Moscow now fields some 50,000 tanks and 20,000 artillery pieces. The current Soviet edge in tanks (more than 3 to 1 in Europe) will grow even larger during the 1980s.

> In each of the past eight years, the Soviets have built more than 1,000 fighter planes, double the U.S. effort.

> All the 175 triple-headed SS-20 missiles now deployed in the western U.S.S.R. are equipped with an additional missile for re-firing, so that each launcher can actually fire six warheads.

> There are 135 major military-industrial plants in the U.S.S.R. The report contains an outline of a tank plant in Nizhni Tagil (pop. 400,000), 850 miles from Moscow. Superimposed over a map of Washington, the factory stretches from the Lincoln Memorial to Capitol Hill, a distance of more than two miles.

> The Soviets appear to be developing a space booster with six to seven times the thrust of the U.S. space shuttle.

> While the U.S. still leads the Soviet Union by two to seven years in the fields of microelectronics and computer technology, it is quickly losing its edge in electro-optical sensors, guidance and navigation systems, optics and propulsion.

> The Soviets will be able to deploy laser weapons against planes and troops by the mid-1980s.

Although the report depicts the Kremlin as trying to tip the military balance in its favor, the study lacks any systematic comparison with U.S. or allied forces. The Soviets, for example, have nothing in their naval arsenal to match the U.S. fleet of 13 aircraft carriers. While NATO is outflanked by Soviet tanks, the allies have beefed up their defenses with thousands of antitank missiles. Nevertheless, Gregory Treverton, assistant director of the International Institute for Strategic Studies, in London, complimented the report for its exhaustive detail and declared that it "does not overemphasize Soviet power." The Government Printing Office has already run off 36,000 booklets (at a cost of $40,000, with copies available to the public at $6.50 each), and there are plans to translate the booklet into five languages (German, French, Japanese, Italian and Spanish). The study, however, received a negative review from at least one interested reader. TASS, the Soviet news agency, derided the report as just a "colorful booklet" and denounced Weinberger for "gushing a barrage of irresponsible verbiage." --By James Kelly. Reported by Bruce W. Nelan/ Washington

With reporting by Bruce W. Nelan/Washington

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