WARNING ASSESSMENT -- USSR

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP91B00776R000300160002-0
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 6
• Document Creation Date: December 27, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 17, 2013
• Sequence Number: 2
• Publication Date: December 2, 1986
• Content Type: MEMO

Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2013/01/17: CIA-RDP91 B00776R000300160002-0
T
e Director of Central Intelligence
Washington, D.C. 20505
National Intelligence Council
MEMORANDUM FOR: See Distribution
NIC-05445-86/1
2 December 1986
FROM: Fritz W. Ermarth
National Intelligence Officer for USSR
SUBJECT: Warning Assessment -- USSR
1. Attached is the assessment prepared following the NIO/USSR Warning
and Forecast meeting held on 25 November 1986. Any comments or corrections
are welcome.
2. The next meeting will be held on Tuesday, 16 December, at 1400 hours
in Room 7-E-62_ CIA Headquarters. Please have your clearances passed and call
with your attendance plans by COB Friday, 12
December. I solicit suggestions regarding any topics or contingencies you
feel we may be overlooking and request that such recommendations be forwarded
to me by COB Friday, 5 December.
Fri W. Ermarth
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The Director of Central Intelligence
Washington, D.C. 20505
National Intelligence Council
MEMORANDUM FOR: Director of Central Intelligence
Deputy Director of Central Intelligence
FROM: Fritz W. Ermarth
National Intelligence Officer for USSR
SUBJECT: Warning Assessment--USSR
NIC-05445-86
3 December 1986
1. US-Soviet Relations-After Reykjavik
A. Discussion:
CIA/SOVA led the discussion by noting that the bulk of our best
reporting indicates that Moscow--though disappointed over its failure
to move the President on SDI--regards Reykjavik as a success because
it isolated SDI as the issue and put the US on the defensive.
Soviet public commentary has been mixed. The Soviets have described
US proposals negatively and resumed harsh personal attacks on the
President, but this appears designed to generate pressure on the US
to moderate its positions. At the same time, the Soviets are also
saying that Iceland opened up new opportunities for reaching
agreements and hinted at additional flexibility in their positions.
For example, one Soviet participant at Reykjavik said publicly that
some testing of ABM components in space is possible; another offered
to return to the 15 January proposals for an INF accord if the US is
not prepared to deal on the basis of the Reykjavik package which
links an INF accord to progress on SDI.
Some Soviet statements can be interpreted as signifying that
Moscow has already written off the Reagan Administration and is
moving to position itself to try to shape the policies of the next
administration. However, this view does not square with Foreign
Minister Shevardnadze's behavior in Vienna--where he appeared to be
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seeking to open up some back channel for getting down to serious
business--or the comments of senior Gorbachev advisors like Arbatov
and Dobrynin who continue to publicly justify a policy of continued
engagement.
How long will the Soviets continue to link an INF agreement to an
agreement on SDI? The community thought at least for the next few
months. Moscow clearly hopes it will be an effective tool for
generating pressure on the US to compromise on SDI, but it will once
again abandon linkage if it concludes that the linkage is
counterproductive. How serious are the Soviets about the proposals
agreed to at Reykjavik; were they offered up in the knowledge that
they would certainly be rejected? There is disagreement in the
community on this issue. Some believe that the Soviets would never
agree to the abolition of all nuclear weapons and that consequently
the Reykjavik proposals were only offered up for their political
effect. Others argued that assuming a nonnuclear world could be
negotiated--admittedly a giant if--Moscow not only could live with it
but might in fact find it netly advantageous.
NIO/USSR believes that some elements of the Soviet arms control
agenda presented at Reykjavik are more serious than others; thus, the
Soviets might see zero INF in Europe as a feasible and, depending on
conditions, desirable goal, while not believing that zero nuclear
weapons or strategic forces is feasible or actually desirable. At
present Moscow's whole strategy is largely political, however, and
political circumstances don't oblige the Soviets to decide what
specific proposals they are or are not serious about. They seek, by
playing the,game of radical arms control, to encourage political
forces which kill SDI, deflect the Reagan administration from
anti-Soviet policies, discredit NATO strategies and, in the longer
run, encourage a strategic environment in which nuclear weapons are
less influential and modernized conventional forces more influential
(the Ogarkov line). Akhromeyev's presence at Reykjavik was designed
in part to reassure the Soviet military that, when and if the Soviets
are obliged to get serious about specifics, such decisions will be
made with sound military advice.
The main problem with this political strategy at the moment is that
the radical arms control agenda of Reykjavik, while "trumping" the
Reagan Administration in some sense, has alarmed European governments
and some American elites to whom Moscow wishes to appeal. That the
Soviets are playing a very political and manipulative strategy does
not mean that they always play it successfully. But they are
learning.
B. Warning
The Soviets probably have not yet fully factored in the impact on
Soviet-US relations of the current domestic crisis over Iran and the
Contras, but they do know that their window of opportunity for an
arms control agreement with the present US administration is fast
closing. Soviet objectives have not changed. They want an arms
control agreement that constrains the development of SDI and makes
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their long term defense planning process more reliable and secure,
but they do not need one before the end of the present administration
and consequently do not have to make very far reaching concessions.
They do, however, need to make some adjustments to make their
radical arms control agenda more appealing to European and other
constituencies, and therefore a more effective source of pressure on
Washington. Therefore we should look out for a) hints of Soviet
"flexibility" on constraining SDI, b) hints toward "delinking" INF
once again, c) major efforts to open dialogues with NATO and NATO
governments, d) hints that the radical aims of Reykjavik can be put
off for more modest interim steps if the Europeans successfully
pressure Washington to satisfy Moscow on SDI.
2. Gorbachev's Domestic Position
A. Discussion:
State led off by arguing that Gorbachev is pretty strong and has
considerable latitude insofar as foreign policy is concerned. His
real problems are domestic: how to reinvigorate and remotivate a fat
and lazy party apparat, especially outside Moscow. State thinks
there is a consensus at the top that this must be done; the problem
for Gorbachev is how to do it and still hang on to power. State
believes that despite the differing nuances in some of Ligachev's
speeches, he and Gorbachev agree on the need for fundamental change
in the way the party does business. State believes that Ligachev
probably would be more sensitive to the feelings of party officials
and more inclined to temper some of Gorbachev's more radical
impulses. State thinks even in the domestic arena Gorbachev has
several more years before he runs into serious trouble.
CIA argued that a case can be made that Gorbachev's policy toward
the US has gotten him in to domestic political trouble. CIA cited
the failure of the Politburo to "fully" approve Gorbachev's behavior
in Iceland as it had in Switzerland, a speech by Ligachev to the
Academy of Sciences in which he implied there was no merit in
continuina to deal with the US and called for an increase in defense
spending,
that the military is un appy over the results of
General Gachov's public statement that UK and French
Reykjavik
,
systems would have to be included in any second-phase reductions, and
the initial misstatement by Karpov about the possibility of a
separate accord on INF.
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NI0/USSR believes that 99.9% of any political trouble Gorbachev
may be facing arises from domestic/party issues -- which could be
quite severe -- not from policy toward the US. The very radicalism
of the Reykjavik performance -- with constant allusions to the Soviet
leadership and Akhromeyev's presence -- indicates that Gorbachev has
the license to play this "fast-loose" game. Ligachev has spoken
quite strongly for both Gorbachev's domestic and foreign policies.
If some of the arms control issues come to
real closure along the radical lines of Reykjavik, this could
change. Moreover, if Gorbachev's domestic policies generate a
factional challenge, the challengers will no doubt try to get him for
ill-considered or unsuccessful policies toward the US.
B. Warning:
A real test of Gorbachev's political strength will be whether he
succeeds in holding the party plenum on cadre renewal. This plenum
is to establish new criteria for party membership and tenure and
could be highly controversial. Although it was announced last
spring, and mentioned by Gorbachev and Ligachev since then, we have
not yet seen the kind of discussion such a subject should be
generating in party publications were it as imminent as some
reporting indicates. This may mean that the planning is hung up in
political controversy on issues that are truly central to the party.
Another test will be how quickly he manages to remove the Brezhnev
holdovers in the Politburo and identified footdraggers from the
regional party apparatus. Gorbachev has not really reshaped the
military high command to his purposes. State thinks he is grooming
Party Secretary Zaykov to replace Defense Minister Sokolov. DIA
believes that because he lacks ties to the military he probably will
give the nod to a military professional like General Lushev.
Finally, developments on the cultural front show a lot of tugging and
hauling -- which may be to Gorbachev's benefit at the moment; but
they do not show the stamp of his control yet.
Fr' z W. Ermarth
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