Moscow's Position in the Current Vietnam Situation

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP80T01719R000300130001-7
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 7
• Document Creation Date: November 9, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 21, 1998
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: April 18, 1972
• Content Type: REPORT

,Approved For Release 1999/09/08 : CIA-RQP80TO1719R000300130001-7
C - A / A I-E-nt 0Ys4 1-3
DIRECTORATE OF
INTELLIGENCE
Intelligence Memorandum
Moscow's Position in the Current Vietnam Situation
18 April 1972
No. 0856/72
Approved For Release 1999/09/08 : CIA-RDP80TO1719R000300130001-7
 Approved For Release 1999/111
~_ _~; y OT01719R000300130001-7
SENSITIVE
18 April 1972
No. 0856/72
SUBJECT: Moscow's Position in the Current Vietnam
Situation
1. Soviet military aid has been indispensable in
arming North Vietnam with the capability of mounting its
present offensive. Yet we think it wrong to conclude
from this that Moscow has conspired with Hanoi over the
last year to bring about exactly the present state of
affairs. In fact, in their strategic planning the North
Vietnamese have taken pains to keep both the Soviets and
the Chinese at arms length, fearing to be drawn into a
bargaining relationship which would invite the use'of
foreign leverage and compromise the integrity of their
national policymaking. Instead, they have relied upon
the obligations of Communist solidarity, and even more
upon the rivalry between Moscow and Peking, to assure
the necessary flow of supplies while keeping major de-
cisions about the war in their own hands.
2. The Soviets clearly have not been unwitting of
the buildup of North Vietnamese strength over the past
year. But they have long been committed to military
support of the DRV, and at least some of the aid agree-
ments covering Soviet-supplied materiel being used in
the present offensive were almost certainly made before
the Soviets arranged the Moscow summit. In the event,
the precise timing of the North Vietnamese offensive
has highlighted the contradiction in Soviet policy be-
tween the desire to support its ally and the desire to
engage the US in a summit meeting. But it would have
been extremely difficult in the second half of 1971, as
a summit began to take shape, to muster a majority of
the Soviet collective leadership behind the proposition
that North Vietnam should be pressed to stand down, par-
ticularly since there could have been no assurance that
Hanoi would comply, or that Peking would not increase
its aid to fill the gap. At the same time, the improve-
ment in Sino-US relations was increasing the Soviet
stake in its own summit policy.
S S V
Approved For Release 199 0T01719R000300130001-7
 ?Approved For Release 1999/09/ T01719R000300130001-7
Present Soviet Objectives
3. The Soviets still deem it essential to maintain,
both in posture and in reality, their support of North
Vietnam. Their commitment of prestige is heavy and long-
standing. To break ranks now would expose them to tell-
ing criticism from Peking and Hanoi, arouse contempt and
misgivings among other Communist states, and risk their
prospects for a substantial future role in Southeast Asia.
Further, they believe that, if they drew back now, the
US would conclude that it had bested the Soviet Union in
an important contest of will, and that they would in con-
sequence be at a considerable disadvantage in the summit
bargaining. All these concerns will be weighing upon
the Soviets as they canvass ways to contain thq Vietnam-
ese situation in order to permit the summit meeting to
go forward. In the process, however, they will want to
preserve the chances for eventual success of Hanoi's
cause, even though they do not wish that cause to be
pushed, at the present juncture, to limits which jeop-
ardize larger Soviet interests.
Present Soviet Options ?
4. One Soviet option is to wait--to hopeF,that the
US will forebear from further strikes in the deep north,
that the fighting will slow down in the South, and that
by mid-May Vietnam will have receded sufficiently into
the background to permit the summit to take place in
the atmosphere originally intended. This is in fact
what the Soviets are doing now, with their restrained
public statements, their protest carefully confined to
the fate of their ships in Haiphong, and their willing-
ness to continue ongoing bilateral talks. But this is
probably no more than a holding action as the Soviet
leaders debate their future course; they probably do not
expect that either Hanoi or Washington will back down
of its own volition. Thus they will be considering how
they might work on both parties to bring the situation
under control.
5. With respect to Hanoi, interrupting military
shipments is not a realistic Soviet option. Moscow
knows that even an immediate and total cut-off would not
affect North Vietnamese capabilities on the southern
battlefields during the next five weeks. It almost cer-
tainly calculates that Hanoi would fight on, and that
Moscow would have to suffer all the consequences
SENSITIVE
Approved For Release 1999/l'AST01719R000300130001-7
 -Approved For Release 1999/0 0T01 719R000300130001-7
SENSITIVE
----- -~ ~-- emu-- ? - i?= rut Qyl uvll J. 111 iacz, Hanoi may choose
the present occasion to ask for additional assistance, in
part intending to put Soviet support to the test, and the
USSR would probably feel compelled to meet the request.
6. From the viewpoint of its relations with Hanoi,
the USSR's best option is to encourage any interest which
might appear in a new start on negotiations. This is a
delicate matter. Moscow will be acutely aware that pres-
sure on North Vietnam to alter its negotiating position
is likely to be both dangerous and futile. While the Sov-
iets might try delicately to put any proposals passing
from Washington to Hanoi in a positive light, we do not
believe that they would press their ally to accept terms
which the North Vietnamese considered a compromise of
their basic position.
7. With respect to the US, the USSR will not have
similar inhibitions about commending DRV negotiating pro-
posals. But it will not have much expectation that any
proposals from either side will resolve the crisis soon.
It will therefore be searching for ways to generate addi-
tional pressures on the US to de-escalate its attacks
upon the North within a negotiating framework acceptable
to Hanoi.
8. The means of pressure available to them are lim-
ited. They could quickly insert limited air or naval
forces into the area, thereby posing the threat of a
Soviet-US military confrontation. But this would be a
highly risky move, leaving to the US the initiative of
whether to engage inferior Soviet forces. We think that
these risks would, in the Soviet view, exceed their
stakes. Thus they would probably choose instead to create
a political linkage between Vietnam and other problems of
priority interest to the US, threatening that the US will
suffer in other ways if it persists in unacceptable at-
tacks upon North Vietnam. Moscow would calculate that
this course would have the advantage of mobilizing
domestic US opinion against the President's Vietnam pol-
icy.
9. At some point, therefore, we expect the Soviets
to begin to intimate to the US that bilateral US-USSR
relations will be deeply affected by further such US at-
tacks. They will start to do this when they conclude
that the US intends, not merely to make a limited mani-
festation of its willingness to bomb the populated north,
but to persist in this course. They have a variety of
-3-
SENSITIVE
Approved For Release 199 80T01719R000300130001-7
 Approved For Release 1999/09/8 OTO1719ROOO3OO13OOO1-7
SENSITIVE
ways to pursue this tactic. They might gradually intro-
duce a more threatening tenor into their public state-
ments; they might pass private statements through
intelligence or other channels; they might begin to
drag their feet in SALT or other negotiating forums;
they might make a blunt, high-level approach. Whatever
the tactics, the message they would be seeking to con-
vey would be that, if deep bombing raids on North
Vietnam were to continue, the USSR could not receive
the US President on 22 May.
10. In our judgment, this would be a serious mes-
sage, not a bluff. We believe that in fact the collect-
ive leadership would find it both easier and preferable
not to receive the President while the US is attacking
the DRV on the scale of the past weekend.
11. If matters came to this pass, there would
probably be considerable debate among the Soviet
leaders as to whether they should confine themselves to
postponing the summit (and other bilateral talks,, in
order to limit the damage, or convert their frusLtration
into a general recasting of their policy toward the US
in the direction of invective and hostility. Proponents
of the former course would argue that Soviet interests
of real import--primarily arms control and increased
trade--were worth salvaging, and that it would be fruit-
less as well as demeaning to defer to anticipated
Chinese criticism. Opponents of this view, perhaps in-
cluding some who harbored earlier reservations about
summitry, would argue for a sharp reversal on the
grounds that this would fortify the USSR's position in
the Communist world, would not seriously damage the
Soviet position in Europe, and might even improve it in
the Middle East and South Asia. They would further argue
that this course would strengthen domestic US criticism
of an American Vietnam policy which could be represented
as having sabotaged the summit. We are inclined to think
that the former view would prevail, but the issue might
become entwined in factional struggle, with unpredictable
results.
A Special Contingency
12. A US attempt to close the port of Haiphong,
by mining or blockade, would pose an issue of a differ-
ent order. The Soviets would perceive this as a direct
challenge to themselves. To the rest of the world, it
Approved For Release I 99910 J T01719ROO0300130001-7
 Approved For Release 1999/O~nx~,ra npstnT01719R000300130001-7
would appear in much the same light (during the missile
crisis of 1962, once the US announced a naval quarantine,
Cuba became incidental).
13. We see little likelihood that the Soviets
would contest such a measure with force, say, by provid-
ing naval escorts for their Haiphong-bound ships. The
local military balance overwhelmingly favors the US.
The issue would not be so grave as to lead the Soviets
to run the risks of provoking a military counter-
confrontation elsewhere in the world. Instead, we be-
lieve that they would withdraw the invitation to the
President, probably in a hostile and acrimonious manner.
Thereafter, they would take other retaliatory steps,
perhaps including a controlled testing of any blockade.
Whatever the specific measures they attempted, the
Soviets would almost certainly issue grave warnings and
attempt to create the impression that a major world
crisis could soon result from the US action.
Conclusions
14. In sum, we believe that the USSR will continue
its political support to North Vietnam in the present
situation. It will probably feel compelled to meet new
requests for military aid. It will wish to contain
tensions so that the May summit can take place, and to
this end it will want to facilitate any US-North Viet-
namese negotiations which might promise an early resolu-
tion. But it will not push Hanoi to alter its negotiat-
ing position substantially, fearing to forfeit its
position in Vietnam in a futile effort. If US bombing
continues deep inside North Vietnam, the Soviets will
warn that they cannot hold the summit meeting as
scheduled. If the bombing continues in the face of
these warnings, they are likely to postpone the summit
and might turn to a hostile line vis-a-vis the US across
the board. If Haiphong is mined or blockaded, the more
extreme of these reactions is likely, and a major Soviet-
American crisis would be at hand.
-5-
SENSITIVE
Approved For Release 1999/ OT01719R000300130001-7
 Approved For Release 1999/09/08 : CIA-RDP80TO1719R000300130001-7
Approved For Release 1999/09/08 : CIA-RDP80TO1719R000300130001-7