GAO . .“.. _ ..-__._ _..._._.. -- __.-_-.-. -.--..---_-_~-_- ._._-_-- __.____.____i_-___--_- April 1992 NATIONAL SECURITY Papers Prepared~fbr GAO Conference on Worldwide Threats 146306 '\. _. -. -..__.....-..I._... .- __---_- . .._. _~.._l._.,_--”_-l._l.. _ ._...II__^_ ..__. l”.,_,_~ _--__“-------_------~-~--~- --_----~ (;AO/NSIAl)-!)2-lOilS United States General Accounting Office GAO Washington, D.C. 20548 National Security and International Affairs Division B-247586 April 16,’ 1992 The Honorable Sam Nunn Chairman, Committee on Armed Services United States Senate The Honorable Les Aspin Chairman, Committee on Armed Services House of Representatives This supplement includes papers we commissioned from participants in our conference on the worldwide threats to national security and the implications of those threats for U.S. forces. The papers served as a basis for discussion at the conference. We have included abstracts of the papers in our report on the conference (National Security: Perspective on the- Worldwide Threats and Imnlications for U.S. Forces. GAO/NSIAD-92-104. Apr. 1992). Frank C. Conahan Assistant Comptroller General Contents Appendix Europe and the Appendix I: Future Options for the Soviet Nuclear Arsenal: 6 Two Scenarios U.S.S.R. Appendix II: The Absence of a Defining Soviet Threat: the 22 Effect on Conventional Force Structure Appendix III: The New Security Environment in Europe and 41 the Soviet Union Near East and South Appendix IV: The Middle East: Political Trends and Their 53 Implications for U.S. Force Structure Asia Appendix V: Worldwide Threats and Implications for the U.S. 67 Force Structure: the Middle East and South Asia East Asia and the Appendix VI: The United States and SecuriQ Issues in East 88 Pacific Asia Appendix VII: East Asia and the Pacific: the North Korean 104 Military Threat and U.S. Responses Low Intensity Conflict Appendix VIII: Low Intensity Confiict in a Changed and 125 Changing World Appendix IX: Intelligence for Low-intensity Conflicts: U.S. 141 Problems and Options Tables Table V. 1: Middle East and Persian Gulf 86 4 Table V. 2 : South Asia/China 87 Table VII. 1: The Military Balance: North and South Korea 106 Figure IX. 1: U.S. LIC Community 145 Figure M-2: U.S. Intelligence Community 146 Figure IX.3: Covert and Clandestine Ceils 148 Page 2 GAO/NSlALI-92.1049 Paper@ on Worldwide Threats Abbreviations ASD Assistant Secretary of Defense ASEAN Association of Southeast Asian Nations ATBM Anti-tactical ballistic missile CSCE Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe DLP Democratic Liberal Party EC European Community CCC Gulf Cooperation Council HUMINT Human Intelligence INF Intermediate Nuclear Force JMNA Joint Military Net Assessment LAN Local Area Network LIC Low Intensity Conflict MEB Marine Expeditionary Brigade NCA National Command Authority NSC National Security Council PLA People’s Liberation Army PRC People’s Republic of China REFORGER Return of Forces to Germany ROK Republic of Korea SC1 Sensitive Compartmented Information SOCRATES Special Operations Research, Analysis, and Threat Evaluation System sot Special Operations Command SOF Special Operations Forces soFPARs Special Operations Forces Planning and Rehearsal System WEXJ Western European Union USCENTCOM U.S. Central Command USSOCOM U.S. Special Operations Command Page 3 GAO/IUSIAD-92-104s Papers on Worldwide Threats Preface On October 30, 199 1, GAOsponsored a conference designed to provide insight into potential military threats to U.S. national security interests and necessary modifications to current and planned U.S. forces to meet those threats. Conference participants, including defense analysts and retired military officers, discussed and analyzed the possibility of U.S. and allied involvement in various regional contingencies in Europe and the Soviet Union, the Near East and South Asia, and East Asia. Topics ranged from the possibility of nuclear war to a general discussion of low-intensity conflict. We commissioned the papers in this supplement prior to the conference to serve as the starting point for discussion. They represent a wide range of perspectives and do not necessarily represent GAO'Sviews and opinions. Page 4 GAO/NSIAD-92-104s Papers on Worldwide Threats Y Page 5 GAO/NSLAD-92-104s Papers on Worldwide Threats Appendix I F’uture Options for the Soviet Nuclear Arsenal: Two Scenarios by Rose Gottemoeller When a chaotic situation began to develop in the Soviet Union and the threat of national disintegration became real, the dramatic picture of Soviet strategic and tactical nuclear weapons falling into irresponsible hands was raised repeatedly. Even before the August events, Soviet commentators had stressed that the republics’ leaders might seize nuclear weapons deployed on their territories for their own dangerous purposes. Often, hints of this threat came from supporters of a continued strong central government for the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (U.S.S.R.). The shifting of the balance of power between the republics and the center will have powerful implications for the deployment and character of the Soviet nuclear forces. Two basic scenarios have appeared: The scenario that leapt to the fore after the coup attempt involves the retention of nuclear weapons on the territory of republics that are declaring their independence. An earlier scenario, consistent with previous political declarations emerging from the republics, involves the gradual denuclearization of the non-Russian republics. This paper examines each of these scenarios in turn and offers a judgment on them. Examining these scenarios will have to proceed from the basic fact that most Soviet nuclear weapons are deployed on the territory of the Russian republic. Thus, once the central government admitted the republics to the nuclear decision-making process, the Russian president and his government would acquire a stronger say in that process than the other republics. Even without the coup and the revolution, therefore, the process of implementing the Union Treaty would have generated powerful incentives for the leaders of other republics where nuclear weapons are located to retain those systems. In other words, for some period of time after Union Treaty signature, the Soviet Union would have been embarked on a process of sorting out A relationships between the center and Russia and Russia and the other republics. During this process, republic presidents would have needed leverage in their negotiations with the center and with Russia over basic defense, security, and economic arrangements. The revolutionary events in Moscow have accelerated this sorting-out process, which is currently unfolding as a rush for independence from the Union. This acceleration does not affect the basic requirement that the republics negotiate; it simply removes the center as a negotiating partner. Even if the union completely dissolves, a continued system of economic Page 0 GAO/NSIAD-92-104s Papers on Worldwide Threats Appendix I Future Options for the Soviet Nuclear Arsenal: Two Scenarios interaction will be required. (Soviets and others call this a “common economic space.“) Continued cooperation on defense and security arrangements also makes sense, despite the near-term political imperatives that are a barrier to it. The virtual eclipse of the central government has sharply increased the importance of the Russian republic as an opponent to be reckoned with in the negotiations. While the agenda of what is possible is being devised, all of the republic leaders will keep hold of the greatest amount of negotiating leverage that they can muster. Nuclear weapons, like other defense assets, are a key aspect of that leverage. In examining various scenarios, therefore, this analysis proceeds from the assumption that bargaining for necessities in the short- or medium-term will not necessarily have a particularly long-term result. When the central government, Mikhail Gorbachev and his allies, decided to set course toward a Union Treaty that took power from the center and gave it to the republics, the U.S.S.R. was already embarked on a profound transition to a state in which republic leaders would have a much more important role in defense and security decisions. Independence for these republics might or might not result in a radical change, particularly a complete severing of ties among the republics. This scenario deserves close examination, however, because of the radical effect it could have in splitting the Soviet nuclear arsenal. Over the weekend of August 23 to 26, as coup reaction set in, the 91 The Independence process fell apart in the Soviet Union. The nine republics that had carefully Scenario negotiated the Union Treaty over a 6-month period beginning in March 199 1 walked away from their negotiating partner, the Soviet central A government, and began declaring their intentions to become independent states. The three non-Russian republics where strategic nuclear weapons are deployed, Ukraine, Byelorussia, and Kazakhstan, were prominent in this process. Indeed, Ukraine quickly declared not only its intent to become independent, but its intent to retain control over the military assets (including, presumably, nuclear weapons) located on its territory. These declarations, a radical departure from the somewhat orderly process by which power would have devolved from the center to the republics under the Union Treaty, set off alarm bells in Moscow as well as abroad. The specter of 15 republics, each likely to have some kind of tactical Page 7 GAO/NSIAJJ-92-104s