WARSAW PACT ARMS CONTROL POLICYMAKING

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP05S00365R000100650001-3
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 21
• Document Creation Date: December 27, 2016
• Document Release Date: April 3, 2013
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: January 1, 1989
• Content Type: REPORT

Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Directorate of ""Seeret-
Intelligence
Warsaw Pact Arms Control
Policymaking
An Executive Summary
---getret_
SOV 89-10006X
January 1989
Copy 255
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
25X1
25X1
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
25X1
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Directorate of Secret
Intelligence
Warsaw Pact Arms Control
Policymaking
An Executive Summary
?Mee of Soviet Analysis. Comments and queries are
welcome and may be directed to the Chief,
Regional Policy Division
Reverse Blank
Secret
SOV 89-10006X
January 1989
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03 : CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Secret
Key Judgments
Information available
as of 10 January 1989
was used in this report.
Warsaw Pact Arms Control
Policymaking
The Soviets have lessened their traditional monopoly of Warsaw Pact arms
control policymaking over the last several years, with the East European
regimes accorded a greater voice and allowed to play a more independent
role. Revived Soviet interest in European conventional arms control
probably was the major cause of these changes. They are potentially
significant both for the USSR's ability to determine Pact arms control
positions in multilateral negotiations and for NATO's ability to exploit
differences among Pact members. These changes appear to be a genuine
evolution of the alliance, rather than just Soviet-inspired ploys to make the
Pact appear more attractive as a negotiating partner
The changes seem to be driven by the need to balance Soviet and East Eu-
ropean interests in future negotiations on conventional armed forces in
Europe. Specifically, in the absence of Soviet diktat, the Pact's members
will have to reach a consensus on apportioning conventional force reduc-
tions in any future agreement with NATO. Soviet efforts to monopolize the
financial benefits of arms cuts?which the unilateral reductions and
withdrawals Gorbachev announced in December 1988 appeared to pre-
sage?almost certainly will lead to further East European resistance to
military modernization and attempts to reduce contributions to the Pact's
defense effort. Hungary and Poland have already signaled that they intend
to use the Soviet cuts to justify reductions of their own in military spending
and personnel. Other East European regimes may follow suit, further
exacerbating existing alliance management problems.
Gorbachev's consultations with his Warsaw Pact allies during the planning
of the unilateral withdrawal of Soviet troops and tanks from Eastern
Europe also illustrate the increased role the Pact members play. The
Hungarians carried out a concerted lobbying effort that apparently led to a
tentative agreement to withdraw Soviet troops from Hungary. This plan,
however, reportedly was opposed by East European conservatives at the
July 1988 Pact summit. Once Gorbachev overcame his domestic adversar-
ies, he put forward a new plan that spread the withdrawal among three of
the four groups of Soviet forces in Eastern Europe. While East European
views were not decisive, they were not ignored
The most visible change in Pact policymaking has been the creation of two
new bodies charged with formulating the alliance's arms control positions:
a "Working Group on Conventional Reductions" and a "Special Commis-
sion on Disarmament." Although the new arrangements are not as
iii
Secret
soV 89-10006X
January 1989
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Secret
extensive as NATO's policy-coordinating machinery, they provide venues
for the East Europeans to defend their interests. The East Europeans have
taken advantage of their new leeway to make a variety of proposals for re-
gional disarmament that reflect both their particular security concerns and
the desire of several Bloc leaders to play the role of international
statesman. East European diplomats and negotiators are also now willing
to acknowledge differences with the USSR. The Hungarians in particular
have occasionally sided with the West at the Vienna Conference on
Security and Cooperation in Europe (CSCE) and conventional mandate
talks. In the fall of 1988, Hungarian and other East European criticism
may have helped to persuade Moscow to abandon its demand for the
exclusion of fighter aviation from future conventional arms negotiations.
Romania, on the other hand, has exploited this new environment to
obstruct progress on human rights issues at CSCE
The Soviets have not, however, relinquished their determining role in
Warsaw Pact arms control policymaking. East European disarmament
proposals continue to be offered to Moscow for scrutiny before public
presentation. The "Jaruzelski Plan," for example, was significantly modi-
fied at Soviet insistence. The Soviets continue to negotiate key issues
privately with the more important members of NATO in the expectation
that the rest of the Pact will go along. East European negotiators in Vienna
have complained that key Soviet initiatives were not coordinated within the
Pact before presentation to NATO governments, demonstrating both the
persistence of old Soviet habits and rising East European expectations that
they have a right to be consulted
The implications for the West of a greater East European role in the
formulation of Warsaw Pact policy are mixed. Greater independence may
allow those so inclined, like Hungary, to play a genuine mediating role.
There may also be increased opportunities for the West to exploit
differences within the Pact. As Romanian obstructionism on human rights
issues at Vienna demonstrated, however, a greater East European role can
also complicate multilateral talks. Instances of one or more East European
states balking at concessions the Soviets have already accepted will
probably become increasingly serious in future negotiations. Failure of the
Soviets and their allies to agree on apportioning Pact conventional force
reductions could lead to deadlock. At a minimum, it would make it even
more difficult for the members of NATO and the Warsaw Pact to reach
agreement on inherently complex arms control issues.
Secret iv
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Secret
Contents
25X1
Page
Key Judgments
hi
Scope Note
vii
A New Style in Bloc Relations
1
Institutional Arrangements
2
Warsaw Pact Leadership Meetings
2
Foreign Ministers Committee
4
Defense Ministers Committee
5
New Coordinating and Consulting Bodies
5
Pact Policymaking in Action: Four Major Negotiations
6
Mutual and Balanced Force Reduction Talks
6
Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe
7
Conference on Confidence- and Security-Building Measures
and Disarmament in Europe
7
Conventional Mandate Negotiations
8
Implications
8
Appendixes
A. The Warsaw Pact and Unilateral Soviet Troop Withdrawals
11
B. The Jaruzelski Plan?Polish Authors, Soviet Editors
13
Reverse Blank
Secret
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Secret
25X1
Scope Note
Reverse Blank
This paper summarizes a Research Study ' that examines in detail how the
Warsaw Pact formulates policy for multilateral international negotiations,
and assesses recent changes instituted by President Gorbachev in the
alliance's internal relations. The primary focus is on Pact policymaking for
the major European conferences on security, cooperation, and arms control
over the past two decades: the Mutual and Balanced Force Reduction
(MBFR) talks; the Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe
(CSCE); the Conference on Confidence- and Security-Building Measures
and Disarmament in Europe (CDE); and the discussions between members
of NATO and the Warsaw Pact on a mandate for the new negotiations on
Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CAFE).
vii
Secret
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03 : CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Secret
Warsaw Pact Arms Control
Policymaking
The Soviet Union has traditionally dominated War-
saw Pact policymaking for international negotiations.
The Soviets exploited the alliance's lack of multilater-
al policymaking institutions to ensure their domina-
tion. They used the Pact's high-level political and
foreign policy bodies to promulgate general policy
guidelines and to issue public appeals, but not to
discuss substantive issues with their allies. They relied
largely on bilateral consultations with individual Pact
allies, and used caucuses among Pact members at
multilateral negotiations merel to transmit Moscow's
unilateral decision
A New Style in Bloc Relations
As the Soviets prepare for the new talks on Conven-
tional Armed Forces in Europe (CAFE), however,
they are taking more seriously the problems of formu-
lating arms control policy in an alliance context.
Heightened Soviet interest in conventional arms con-
trol stems directly from President Gorbachev's efforts
to reduce the Soviet defense burden and improve
relations with the West. Preparations for the new
CAFE talks come at a time when Gorbachev has
sought to breathe new life into the Warsaw Pact by
encouraging the USSR's East European allies to play
a more active international role
In this new environment, the Soviets face alliance
management problems that are in some measure akin
to, albeit less complex than, those facing the United
States with respect to NATO. The non-Soviet War-
saw Pact (NSWP) states confront the same economic
and demographic problems as the Soviet Union. They
traditionally devote a smaller share of their resources
to the military than the USSR and, if anything, are
even more inclined than the Soviets to see disarma-
ment as a means of achieving savings on defense. The
Soviets thus will want to develop Warsaw Pact negoti-
ating positions that accommodate their own prefer-
ences while mollifying their allies in the potentially
contentious area of apportioning force reductions
1
among the seven Pact states. Moscow's advocacy of
substantial conventional disarmament measures, and
even more so, the unilateral Soviet troop reductions
and withdrawals announced in December 1988, very
likely will foster even greater East European foot-
dragging in modernizing their armed forces and in-
spire several East Euro. -. . - ? .. - a - - k troop
reductions of their own
A variety of evidence indicates that Gorbachev has
promoted new approaches to Warsaw Pact policymak-
ing in an effort to overcome the damage done by the
confrontationist policies of his predecessors and to
forge new relations within the Bloc based on consen-
sus. The frequency of high-level meetings has in-
creased; consultations at lower levels have expanded;
and additional coordinating bodies have been created.
Gorbachev has publicly emphasized the importance of
multilateralism in the formulation of Pact policies.
Concomitantly he directed Soviet Foreign Ministry
officials in May 1986 to show greater respect for the
experience of their allies; to involve them more in the
formulation of Pact initiatives; and to share with them
the role of public authorship of major arms control
proposals
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
There clearly is a self-serving aspect to the reports
from Soviet and East European sources that Gorba- 25X1
chev has granted his Pact allies a greater voice in
alliance policymaking. The NSWP regimes have their
own reasons for wanting Western governments to take
them more seriously as actors in international negoti-
ations. Nor can the possibility be dismissed that the
ostensible increase in the independence of East Euro-
pean delegations at such negotiations is at least in
part a Soviet-inspired tactical ploy. The Soviets them-
selves want to undercut the traditional Western per-
ception that Pact policymaking is merely a matter of
Soviet diktat. Portraying the Warsaw Pact as an
alliance in which each of the members has an equal
Secret
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Secret
say enhances Soviet negotiating flexibility by allowing
the USSR to point to one or another ally as the source
of a particular impasse. Nonetheless, the breadth and
variety of the evidence indicate that these changes in
Pact policymaking are not simply a facade, but
represent a genuine evolution in alliance dynamics.
Institutional Arrangements
Soviet domination of Warsaw Pact policymaking dur-
ing the alliance's first three decades meant that the
Pact did not develop multilateral bodies where de-
tailed Eastern positions could be hammered out.
Although Gorbachev is moving to change this, the
Pact still lacks an institutional infrastructure on a par
with NATO's (see figures 1 and 2). Meetings of Bloc
leaders and of Pact foreign ministers provided only
general statements of Eastern positions at multilateral
talks. The Soviets traditionally relied on Pact caucus-
es at negotiations to impart instructions that were
determined unilaterally in Moscow. Until the mid-
1980s, no standing committee existed within the Pact
to develop alliance policies or issue agreed-upon guid-
ance to the negotiators
Gorbachev has recently moved to deal with this void
through the creation of three new Pact bodies respon-
sible for formulating arms control proposals and
exchanging views on foreign policy questions. These
bodies meet only sporadically, however; there is no
Pact counterpart to the weekly meetings of the perma-
nent representatives to the North Atlantic Council.
The Warsaw Pact also does not have a political?as
opposed to military?alliance headquarters nor an
international staff to provide day-to-day support. Re-
sponsibility for chairing the Pact's relatively weak
multilateral institutions, moreover, rotates to a new
member state each year where it is vested on a part-
time basis in a deputy foreign minister who still
carries a substantial load of national responsibilities.
The post is thus not comparable in stature or author-
ity to NATO's Secretary General.
Warsaw Pact Leadership Meetings
The Political Consultative Committee (PCC) is the
Warsaw Pact's highest level body, composed of the
party, government, military, and foreign ministry
Secret
Figure 1
Warsaw Pact Conventional Arms Control
Policymaking Institutions
Political
Consultative
Committee
PCC
General
Secretary
Foreign
Ministers
Committee
Special
Commission on
Disarmament
Working Group
on Conventional
Arms Reductions
in Europe
320262 1-89
leaders of the seven member states. Historically it had
met every other year, but under Gorbachev it has met
annually, usually in the late spring or early summer,
with the meeting site rotating as in the past among
Pact capitals. Each session issues an official commu-
nique assessing the international situation and sup-
porting Bloc positions on arms control questions and
East-West relations. These assessments routinely en-
dorse Pact policies at important multilateral negotia-
tions, but are not generally used to introduce nuances
into Pact positions.
2
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Secret
Figure 2
NATO Conventional Arms Control
Policymaking Institutions
Secretary
General
North Atlantic Council
International
Staff
Semiannual Sessions
Foreign
Ministers
Defense
Ministers
Weekly/Regular Sessions
Permanent
Representative
to NAC
Defense
Planning
Committee
Senior
Political
Committee
Ad Hoc Working
Group at MBFR
Trilateral
Group ,
MBFR Delagations
in Vienna
High-Level
Task Force
Red j White L Blue
Teams
Quint
National Delegations
at Vienna Conventional
Mandate Talks
Military
Committee
International
Military
Staff
PCC sessions do, however, serve as the primary
vehicle for advancing major Eastern initiatives that
relate to European security issues and may now
provide a forum for the discussion of these questions.
The March 1969 PCC meeting in Budapest, for
example, issued an official Warsaw Pact "appeal" to
convoke an all-European security conference, which
eventually bore fruit in the establishment of the
Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe
(CSCE) and culminated in the signing of the Helsinki
Final Act in 1975. The three most recent sessions of
3
320263 1-89
the PCC have focused on European conventional arms
control, issuing in each case a separate public state-
ment on this topic (see inset). The most recent PCC
session reportedly also discussed but did not endorse a
proposal for unilateral Soviet troop withdrawals from
Hungary. Gorbachev apparently then withdrew the
proposal, modified it significantly, and unveiled it at
the United Nations General Assembly five months
later (see appendix A)
Secret
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
25X1
25X1
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Secret
Conventional Arms Control on the Warsaw Pact
Agenda
European conventional arms control has provided the
focus for the three most recent sessions of the Pact's
Political Consultative Committee:
? The Budapest Appeal issued in June 1986 called for
new European-wide negotiations on the reduction of
ground forces and tactical aviation, including tacti-
cal nuclear weapons. It proposed initial NATO and
Warsaw Pact reductions of 100,000 to 150,000
troops, to be followed by second-stage cuts of 25
percent from existing levels, with total reductions
East and West of] million men by the early 1990s.
The Budapest Appeal also urged priority reductions
in tactical air forces in order to lessen the danger of
surprise attack and increase stability in Europe.
While suggesting the new negotiations be conducted
in the CSCE framework, the Pact indicated willing-
ness to consider other forums as well.
? A Statement on Military Doctrine issued in May
1987 proclaimed that the Pact's doctrine is "strict-
ly defensive" and gives priority to preventing both
nuclear and conventional war. It viewed "the exist-
ing military-strategic parity" as "the decisive factor
preventing war." It proposed consultations between
NATO and the Pact on their respective doctrines,
in order to reduce mutual suspicion and distrust.
The statement additionally expressed the Pact's
readiness in such consultations to consider elimi-
nating existing imbalances and asymmetries in
individual types of weapons and armed forces.
? A Statement on Conventional Arms Control in
Europe issued in July 1988 asserted the Pact's
desire to conclude the mandate talks and begin new
negotiations that year. It proposed as priority ob-
jectives for the new talks the achievement of equal,
lower levels in alliance armed forces and arma-
ments; the prevention of surprise attack through
removal of particularly destabilizing weapons from
the zone of contact between the two alliances; and
an early exchange of data on the armed forces of
the two alliances, to be verified by on-site inspec-
tion. The statement also urged separate talks on
reducing and removing tactical nuclear weapons
from Europe, and a second phase of the Conference
on Confidence- and Security-Building Measures in
Europe
Foreign Ministers Committee
Warsaw Pact foreign ministers began to meet regular-
ly in the late 1960s to promote the Soviet proposal for
a European security conference. The Pact's Foreign
Ministers Committee (FMC), formally chartered at
the November 1976 PCC meeting, serves as a forum
for exchanging views but lacks the power to adopt
policies binding on the member states. It meets twice
a year, rotating its sessions among the Pact capitals.
The Foreign Ministers Committee appears to have
taken on particular responsibility for coordinating
Pact arms control policy formulation in recent years.
The FMC reportedly played a central role in estab-
lishing the Pact's Special Commission on Disarma-
ment in 1987, and it may exercise supervision over its
work. Discussion of arms control and CSCE issues at
recent meetings of Pact foreign ministers has included
Secret
considerable give-and-take. During an unannounced
informal meeting of Pact foreign ministers in conjunc-
tion with the July 1988 PCC session, for example, the
Soviet Foreign Minister reportedly told Warsaw Pact
members to do nothing that would allow them to be
blamed for failure of the Vienna CSCE meeting and
the parallel negotiations on a mandate for new con-
ventional arms talks
4
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Secret
Defense Ministers Committee
The Pact Defense Ministers Committee (DMC) was
established in 1969 to direct the development and
activities of the alliance's Combined Armed Forces.
During at least its first decade, the annual DMC
sessions did not discuss MBFR ? 'lie or other arms
control issues
Renewed Soviet interest in conventional
arms control and stress on multilateral alliance policy-
making may have changed this. Pact defense minis-
ters met on three occasions in 1988, with arms control
issues apparently on the agenda in each instance.
Their first-ever midsummer meeting, held in Moscow
on 5-8 July 1988, coincided with the 5 July meeting
between Gorbachev and visiting Hungarian party
leader Grosz that reportedly culminated in an agree-
ment in principle to withdraw Soviet forces from
Hungary. The PCC met just 10 days later to discuss
this tentative Soviet-Hungarian agreement and to
adopt a new Pact statement on conventional arms
control. The DMC next met in Prague in October
1988, amid rumors that they were preparing the
East's opening position for the new European conven-
tional arms talks
New Coordinating and Consulting Bodies
The Warsaw Pact has publicly identified two new
organs below the ministerial level charged with devel-
oping alliance positions on arms control issues and a
third new body that has discussed CSCE-related
issues on several occasions
The Working Group on Conventional Force Reduc-
tions was created in November 1986?some six
months after NATO foreign ministers established the
alliance's High-Level Task Force on conventional
arms control?with the initial purpose of establishing
contact and opening a dialogue with the NATO task
force as its ostensible opposite number. Following the
5
establishment of informal talks among NATO and
Pact members on the mandate for new talks on
Conventional Armed Forces in Europe in February
1987, the Working Group met on at least eight
occasions, alternating between Sofia and Budapest. It
issued no substantive proposals of its own, other than
to renew its call for direct contacts with the NATO
task force. The level of attendees is not known, and it
is possible, given the lack of announced meetings since
mid-1988, that it has been disbanded or subordinated
to the Pact's Special Commission on Disarmament.
The Special Commission on Disarmament (SCD),
officially established at the May 1987 session of the
Political Consultative Committee, consists of repre-
sentatives of the members' foreign and defense minis-
tries. It meets under the de facto chairmanship of the
PCC General Secretary, a deputy foreign minister
from the state scheduled to host the Pact summit,
with the result that the first two sessions were held in
Warsaw and the next two in Bucharest. The partici-
pants exchange views and information on arms reduc-
tion questions, discuss arms control initiatives of the
individual Pact states, and develop joint proposals in
this sphere. The initial SCD meeting in February
1988 was held at the deputy foreign minister level, but
subsequent sessions reportedly have involved "perma-
nent representatives." The Soviets have indicated that
the deputy chief of their Foreign Ministry's arms
control directorate heads their delegation to SCD
meetings. The level of military representation is not
clear. Press releases issued following the SCD's four
meetings indicated that negotiations on conventional
armed forces and confidence-building measures had
been discussed.
The Multilateral Group for Current Information
Exchange was established in May 1987 to provide a
regular forum for sharing views on key international
issues. Like the SCD, its meetings are chaired by the
PCC General Secretary and are held in the Pact
capital that will host the next PCC session. Meetings
are attended by local Pact ambassadors and/or equiv-
alent foreign ministry officials. It has no authority to
Secret
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Secret
adopt or announce Pact policies, and the dozen meet-
ings held during its first year and a half of operation
issued only brief press releases stating that "topical
international questions" had been discussed
Pact Policymaking in Action: Four Major
Negotiations
Mutual and Balanced Force Reduction Talks
The greater leeway Gorbachev has allowed the East
Europeans in foreign affairs had some modest impact
on Warsaw Pact MBFR negotiating style, if not on
the substance of policy. The US MBFR delegation in
early 1988 noted that NSWP officials at the negotia-
tions had adopted a degree of outspokenness that
would have been unthinkable just a few years earlier.
wen the deadlocked state of
ese a s, owever, such distancing from the Soviet
position has had little negotiating significance
The Soviets ran the Warsaw Pact's conduct of the
MBFR talks through a two-tiered system geared more
toward restricting sensitive information on Eastern
military forces in Central Europe than coordinating
policy and negotiating strategy. The negotiations were
nominally in civilian hands, and the delegation chiefs
were drawn from the respective Pact foreign minis-
tripe
Major European Negotiations
MBFR. Began in Vienna in October 1973 . . . partici-
pants include all Warsaw Pact states and all NATO
members except France and Spain . . . USSR, East
Germany, Czechoslovakia, and Poland form core
Eastern group. . . deadlocked since early 1986.
CSCE. First session convened in Helsinki in July
1973, culminated in signing of "Final Act" in July
1975. . . followup review conferences held in Bel-
grade (1977-78), Madrid (1980-83), and Vienna
(1986-89) . . . involves 33 European states-(all but
Albania) plus United States and Canada . . . has
mandated a variety of specialized experts' meetings
and conferences.
CDE. Most important of CSCE-mandated fo-
rums. . . first session held in Stockholm, 1984-86 . . .
resulted in agreement to notify major military exer-
cises and invite observers to larger ones . . . East
accepted principle of on-site inspection on demand as
verification measure . . . Vienna CSCE meeting to
mandate resumption of talks on confidence-building
measures.
Conventional Mandate Talks. Begun in Vienna in
February 1987 . . . all 23 NATO and Pact members
participating. . . agreement reached that new negotia-
tions on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe
(CAFE) will involve only alliance members, will be
autonomous but within CSCE framework. . West
insisted on exclusion of nuelear wennans and n val
forces from CAFE talks
Secret
Throughout the 15-year history of the negoti-
ations there has been no evidence of a Pact delibera-
tive body?civilian or military?to formulate common
6
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
25X1
25X1
25)(1
25X1
25X1
25X1
2:JAI
25)(1
25X1
/OA I
25X1
25X1
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Secret
policy or to provide guidance to the delegations in
Vienna
Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe
The seven members of the Warsaw Pact nominally
are equal participants at all CSCE meetings, but
there is little doubt that the Soviets have consistently
exercised the determining role over Eastern positions.
The establishment of the Pact FMC in 1976 was
intended in part to provide a mechanism for adopting
Eastern positions for the CSCE
As noted earlier, more recent
FMC meetings have involved somewhat greater give-
and-take on CSCE issues. Although multilateral Pact
consultations on CSCE and its spinoffs have expand-
ed, reliable reporting indicates that this has not ended
g role in these deliberations.
Discussions of CSCE issues among Pact members
have taken place since 1987 in the "Multilateral
Group for Current Information Exchange" and in ad
hoc consultations at and below the deputy foreign
minister level. As part of a general expansion of Pact
foreign policy consultations, the Foreign Ministers
Committee agreed in October 1986 to establish a
working group on human rights questions that would
also act as a forum for discussing Pact positions at the
7
Vienna CSCE review meetin
Conference on Confidence- and Security-Building
Measures and Disarmament in Europe
Consistent with Gorbachev's reported loosening of
discipline within the Bloc in the mid-1980s, the East
Europeans gradually became somewhat more inclined
to express independent views, bot
?)c)(1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
Secret
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05S00365R000100650001-3
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Secret
ploy. Rather it reflected, in the view of the US
delegation, growing NSWP disenchantment with So-
viet stalling tactics at that time
Conventional Mandate Negotiations
Representatives of the 16 members of NATO and the
seven Warsaw Pact states began informal discussions
in Vienna in February 1987 to draft a mandate for
new negotiations on Conventional Armed Forces in
Europe. Reporting by the US delegation to the man-
date discussions indicates that Soviet leadership of the
Pact at these talks was routinely accepted by all the
East Europeans except Romania. The standard Sovi-
et-directed Eastern caucus was used to impart in-
structions on negotiating tactics and transmitted with
little advance warning any policy shifts decided by
Moscow
Only
after the Soviets had made their demarche to the
United States was it officially incorporated into Pact
policy at the July 1988 PCC meeting
The mandate talks have provided perhaps the clearest
case to date of East European disagreement with a
Soviet negotiating position, a case that illustrates as
well the rising expectations of NSWP governments
that they should be consulted before new initiatives
are broached in the name of the Pact. In early
September 1988, the Soviets officially proposed that
"fighter" aircraft (interceptors) be excluded from the
future CAFE talks. Although some Pact delegations
routinely backed the Soviet move
that fighter
aircraft also are used to support ground attack air-
craft over the battlefield, effectively undercutting the
Soviet argument that fighters are purely defensive
aircraft
The Soviets quickly dropped the fighter exclusion
Secret
proposal during Foreign Minister Shevardnadze's visit
in late September 1988 to Washington. While US and
NATO rejection presumably was the primary factor
in the rapid Soviet retreat, East European disagree-
ment may also have played a significant part
Implications
Changes in the way the Warsaw Pact formulates
arms control policy over the last several years indicate
that the USSR is granting the East Europeans a more
genuine?and somewhat independent?role. This in
turn has allowed the East Europeans to consider and
more openly surface their differences with Soviet-
preferred positions. An East German diplomat has
claimed, for example, that the needs of the smaller
Pact members will have to be considered in future
Bloc disarmament proposals and that this will require
expanded consultations between Soviet and East Eu-
ropean leaders. US participants in unofficial East-
West conferences on European security have noted
that East Europeans?and especially East Germans?
are far more supportive than the Soviets of "thinning-
out" zones along the line of contact between the two
military allianPec
his is a point of real disagreement
with the Soviets who, they claim, see the situation in
much broader geographic terms
Gorbachev's encouragement of greater East European
activism has had mixed results, with the Soviets'
achieving some propaganda advantages but at the
same time incurring certain costs. The most direct
consequence of the new leeway granted the East
Europeans has been a proliferation of national
schemes for partial disarmament in various regions of
Europe that are promoted at virtually any available
international forum. The Soviets can still insist on
modifications of such proposals as the "Jaruzelski
Plan" in the drafting stage (see appendix B). The
multiplicity of such initiatives, nonetheless, projects
an impression that Pact members care more for their
pet disarmament schemes than for agreed-upon Bloc
positions. These proposals distract public attention
8
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Secret
from the growing list of Soviet initiatives for Europe-
an arms control, while the inability of national spon-
sors to spell out precisely what their initiatives entail
casts a shadow over Soviet and other Warsaw Pact
proposals
Although the Soviets are willing to run such risks as
part of the price of forging a Pact arms control
consensus, it is still an open question whether the
USSR will in fact allow the East Europeans to have a
significant impact on Bloc positions in arms control
negotiations. Soviet behavior in Vienna and in bilater-
al dealings with members of NATO suggests that
Moscow intends to retain control over key issues in
any future negotiations on conventional forces in
Europe. In the short term this need not lead to major
problems within the Pact. Despite the signs of inde-
pendent thinking on the part of the East Europeans,
the habit of following Moscow's lead is deeply in-
grained in most NSWP capitals. Soviet espousal of
conventional disarmament plays well with East Euro-
pean publics and provides a convenient
East European regimes to rally around
1988 announcement of plans for unilateral withdraw-
als from Eastern uro and reductions in the Soviet
armed forces
From a burdensharing perspective, however, this
move probably will exacerbate longstanding alliance
management problems. Most if not all of the East
European regimes are at least as anxious as the USSR
to reduce their defense burdens. None of the NSWP
armies is as well equipped, trained, or combat ready
as the Soviet forces stationed in Eastern Europe, and
most of their governments traditionally have dragged
their feet in response to Soviet pressure to modernize.
The East Europeans, therefore, can be expected to
resist Soviet efforts to monopolize the benefits of arms
cuts, and will likely refuse to spend more on defense to
compensate for the Soviet reductions and withdraw-
als. The Hungarians, while openly lobbying for with-
drawal of Soviet forces stationed on their territory, at
the same time have signaled their desire to reduce
their own armed forces. Budapest has indicated plans
to decrease real defense spending just as the Soviets
25X1
25X1
Nonetheless, the Soviets will need to hold meaningful
consultations with the other members of the Warsaw
Pact to build the necessary consensus for successful
arms control negotiations with NATO. This means
coping in a new way with major problems in alliance
management that the Soviets have traditionally han-
dled by fiat. The most serious of these involves
apportioning the benefits of prospective reductions in
conventional forces among the Soviet and East Euro-
pean armies. Gorbachev's quest for savings in military
expenditures through reductions in conventional
forces is probably the most important factor underly-
ing revived Soviet interest in European conventional
arms negotiations. The USSR doubtless is aware that
Western public opinion will be more impressed with
cuts in Soviet forces stationed in Eastern Europe than
with reductions in East European armies. From Mos-
cow's perspective, then, the most attractive conven-
tional disarmament option allows the Soviets to take
the bulk, or perhaps even all, of the Eastern reduc-
tions, while the NSWP states pick up at least some of
the slack by spending more on defense. These consid-
erations probably underlay Gorbachev's December
9
25X1
The Soviets presumably see increased multilateral
consultations as essential to forging a Pact consensus
on arms control positions while maintaining NSWP
contributions to the Bloc's defense effort. Moscow's
confrontational policies during the 1983-84 INF
"crisis" led to conflict within the Warsaw Pact and
sensitized the East Europeans to the fact that they
have security interests distinct from those of the
USSR. Gorbachev's loosening of the reins has fos-
tered already existing tendencies among several
Secret
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05S00365R000100650001-3
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Secret
NSWP delegations at major European negotiations to
distance themselves from the USSR, or at least to
distinguish their views from Moscow's. Soviet accep-
tance of greater pluralism in Warsaw Pact arms
control policymaking is thus a matter of alliance
management tactics and damage control
The implications of such trends, from the Western
viewpoint, are mixed. Greater latitude for the East
Europeans at international negotiations may allow
some?particularly Hungary?to become useful inde-
pendent actors. Senior Hungarian foreign policy
spokesmen, such as party secretary Matyas Szuros,
have publicly advocated such a mediating role for
Budapest, and both Hungarian and Polish delegations
have in a modest way sought to do this in the past.
There may also be opportunities for the West to steal
a page from the Soviet playbook and exploit differ-
ences within the Pact. Western proposals that could
inhibit potential Soviet military pressure on East
European states by requiring forecasts of troop move-
ments and concentrations well in advance could also
have natural appeal to the NSWP regimes
Secret
Romanian behavior at the CSCE review conference in
Vienna, however, shows the dangers inherent in the
trend toward increased East European independence.
Success has been achieved in major multilateral as
well as bilateral negotiations?for example, the
Stockholm CDE agreement and the INF Treaty?
partly because the Soviets have been able to force
their own concessions onto their East European allies.
As Moscow has become less rigid on human rights
issues, lack of automatic discipline within the Pact
caucus has allowed stonewalling by one of its weaker
members, perhaps with encouragement from some
other Bloc conservatives. Instances of one or more
NSWP states balking at concessions the Soviets have
already accepted, moreover, will probably become
recurrent and increasingly serious in future multilat-
eral negotiations. Failure of the Soviets and East
Europeans to agree on apportioning conventional
force reductions among themselves could conceivably
lead to deadlock within the Pact. At a minimum, it
would make it even more difficult to achieve an
inherently complex arms control agreement between
the members of NATO and the Warsaw Pact
10
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
25X1
225X1
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03 : CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Secret
Appendix A
The Warsaw Pact and
Unilateral Soviet Troop
Withdrawals
What is known of the decision to withdraw 50,000
Soviet troops and 5,000 Soviet tanks unilaterally from
Eastern Europe illustrates both the greater role the
East Europeans now play in Warsaw Pact policymak-
ing and the limits to their influence on Soviet deci-
sionmaking when the stakes are high. We have not
been able with full confidence to reconstruct how the
decision was made, but it is clear that a move along
these lines was being considered for a year or more
and that the USSR's Warsaw Pact allies were con-
sulted both individually and collectively
Hungarian lobbying apparently bore fruit when Gor-
bachev and Hungarian party chief Grosz agreed in
principle in early July to withdraw at least some
Soviet forces from Hungary. This tentative agreement
may have been discussed at an out-of-cycle summer
session of the Pact's Defense Ministers Committee
held in Moscow at the same time. The agreement
apparently was to be presented privately?and possi-
bly to be announced publicly?at the Pact PCC
session in Warsaw in mid-July. Western press reports
anticipating such a move may have helped scuttle this
timetable.
Hungarian officials continued to lobby publicly for
Soviet troop withdrawals even though Soviet spokes-
men, both civilian and military, repeatedly denied
that plans for unilateral reductions were under consid-
eration. Gorbachev meanwhile achieved a signal vic-
tory over his domestic opponents at the CPSU Central
Committee plenum in late September?a victory that
in retrospect probably paved the way for putting
unilateral cuts back at the top of his foreign policy
agenda. It is not known whether the Pact's defense
ministers or foreign ministers discussed such cuts at
their October meetings. In view of the earlier experi-
ence with Western press leaks, a much tighter circle
of Soviet and East European leaders may have been
consulted the second time around
Gorbachev's new withdrawal plan sought to enhance
its political appeal by focusing on Soviet tank forces in
Eastern Europe, which in turn necessitated spreading
the withdrawal among three of the four countries
where these forces are stationed. Abandonment of the
tentative agreement to focus the withdrawal on Soviet
forces in Hungary may also be linked to Budapest's
failure to commit itself to increasing its defense
spending
11
Following Gorbachev's 7 December UN speech, Hun-
garian Defense Minister Karpati told the Defense
Secret
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X11
25X1
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Secret
Committee of the National Assembly that only one-
fourth of Soviet troops in Hungary would be with-
drawn, but that Hungary would not increase the size
of its army, while its defense spending would drop in
real terms. Within a day of Gorbachev's speech, a
senior Hungarian Foreign Ministry official indicated
to the US Ambassador displeasure that the cuts
would take two years to carry out and expressed hope
that the United States and NATO would respond in
such a way as to facilitate the withdrawal of all
remaining Soviet forces from his country
It appears in retrospect that overcoming Soviet do-
mestic?particularly military?opposition to unilater-
al reductions and withdrawals was far more important
than handling objections from conservative East Eu-
ropean regimes. Nonetheless, Gorbachev had consult-
ed his Warsaw Pact allies on the initial proposal
focusing on withdrawals from Hungary, apparently
changed his tentative plan to announce this initiative
at the Pact summit, and subsequently modified the
original plan in light of East European reactions. The
lack of public enthusiasm with which some East
European regimes?especially Czechoslovakia?
greeted the move suggests that consent in some cases
may have been grudging at bes
Secret
12
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
25X1
25X1
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Secret
Appendix B
The Jaruzelski Plan?
Polish Authors, Soviet Editors
Poland traditionally has been accorded the honor of
proposing Eastern initiatives for denuclearizing Cen-
tral Europe. The "Rapacki Plan" in the 1950s, the
"Gomulka Plan" in the 1960s, and the "Jaruzelski
Plan," fir 'n May 1987, are all variants of
this idea.
he Jaru-
zelski Plan was conceived primarily with an eye to
returning Poland to an active role in international
affairs. The Soviets reacted with disdain when it was
first presented to them in September 1986?one
Soviet diplomat described the initial Polish proposal
as "a mess"?and the Soviet Foreign Ministr a.. ? r-
ently tried to kill the fro ? osal through neglec
Polish demarches made it clear that Warsaw would
accept suggestions from any quarter to concretize the
proposal.
Reverse Blank 13
Secret
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
25X1
')v -I
25xi
-25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
25X1
Al
25X1
25X1
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3
Secret
Secret
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/04/03: CIA-RDP05500365R000100650001-3