Job Name:2180884 Date:15-03-11 PDF Page:2180884pbc.p1.pdf Color: Cyan Magenta Yellow Black THE STRATEGIC BALANCE IN THE MEDITERRANEAN Distributed to the Trade by National Book Network, 15200 NBN Way, Blue Ridge Summit, PA 17214. To order call toll free 1-800-462-6420 or 1-717-794-3800. For all other inquiries please contact the AEI Press, 1150 Seventeenth Street, N.W., Washington, D.C. 20036 or call 1-800-862-5801. Jesse W. Lewis, Jr., is political/military affairs officer at the American Embassy in Saudi Arabia. ISBN 0-8447-3197-8 Foreign Affairs Study 29, March 1976 Library of Congress Catalog Card No. 75-37446 © 1976 by American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, Washington, D. C. Permission to quote from or to reproduce materials in this publication is granted when due acknowledgment is made. Printed in the United States of America To my mother, to the memory of my father, and to all who have gone to sea in the Mediterranean CONTENTS FOREWORD, Elmo R. Zumwalt, Jr. PREFACE 1 INTRODUCTION 1 THE SEA AND THE IMPORTANCE OF 2 NAVAL POWER 5 Geography of the Mediterranean 5 The Role of Naval Power 14 THE UNITED STATES PRESENCE IN 3 THE MEDITERRANEAN 17 Overview and Background 17 The Base System 18 The Sixth Fleet 33 Political Uses of the Sixth Fleet 43 4 THE SOVIET PRESENCE 55 Overview and Background 55 The Fifth Escadra 59 Political Uses of the Fifth Escadra 72 The Outlook 78 5 SCENARIOS FOR CRISIS AND CONFLICT 87 An Overview 87 Outstanding Disputes and Political-Military Problems 89 Other Power Elements 111 6 TOWARD A MEDITERRANEAN CONSCIOUSNESS 117 Mediterranean Outlook 119 Conclusion 121 APPENDIX A: Weapons in the Mediterranean 125 APPENDIX B: The Montreux Convention 155 LIST OF TABLES 1. Coastline Measurements and Territorial Sea Limits of Mediterranean Countries 6 2. Mediterranean Population Figures 13 3. Characteristics of Major U.S. Carrier-Based Aircraft 38 4. Characteristics of P-3 Orion ASW Aircraft 41 5. Sixth Fleet Visits in the Mediterranean, 1964 and 1974 45 6. Soviet Navy Anchorages, 1974 68 7. Fifth Escadra Visits in the Mediterranean, 1964 and 1974 69 8. British Navy Visits in the Mediterranean, 1964 and 1974 114 A-I. Naval Strengths of Mediterranean Countries 127 A-2. Naval Surface-to-Surface Missiles in the Mediterranean 131 A-3. Characteristics of Naval Surface-to-Surface and Sub-Surface Missiles 132 A-4. Major Advanced Combat Aircraft in the Mediterranean 134 A-5. Characteristics of Major Advanced Aircraft in the Mediterranean 138 A-6. Characteristics of Major Air-to-Surface Missiles 140 A-7. Major Surface-to-Air Guided Missiles and Radar-Directed Guns in the Mediterranean 143 A-8. Characteristics of Surface-to-Air Missiles and Other Major Anti-Aircraft Weapons 144 A-9. Current Army Strengths in the Mediterranean 147 A-I0. Armored Vehicles in the Mediterranean 148 A-II. Major Anti-Tank Weapons in the Mediterranean 151 A-12. Ground Surface-to-Surface Missiles in the Mediterranean 153 A-13. Characteristics of Ground Surface-to-Surface Missiles 154 LIST OF MAPS 1. The Mediterranean Basin, after page 10 2. Soviet Naval Exercise, 1969 74 3. Deployment of u.S. Sixth Fleet and Soviet Fifth Escadra,l November 1973 82 FOREWORD I commend highly to any student of political/military affairs or to any party interested in the strategic balance around the world this fine piece of research by Jesse W. Lewis, Jr. While neither I nor any other person would agree with everything written in any treatise regarding such a complicated subject as this, it is my view, as one who has also studied and written on the subject, that Mr. Lewis has made a major contribution with this scholarly work. No one who reads this treatise can fail to be impressed by the dramatic growth both of Soviet naval capability and of the total power the Soviet Union can bring to bear in the Mediterranean, directly and through allies. No one who reads it can fail to be concerned by the deteriorating capabilities of the United States to influence events in the Mediterranean, partly as a result of the reduction in its own military capabilities and partly as a result of the weakening of alliance ties in that area. It is an important challenge to all thoughtful students of this work to seek to go beyond it in the important task of guiding the destiny of the United States in this area in the years ahead. ELMO R. ZUMWALT, JR. Admiral, USN (Retired) PREFACE This is essentially a survey, a kind of annotated catalogue of the military presence in the Mediterranean Basin, combined with an outline of the active and dormant disputes that could alter the balance of power in the Mediterranean and cause the weapons listed here to be used. The focus of this study is on the superpower presence-that of the United States and Soviet Union-though the armed strengths of the Mediterranean's fifteen continental and two island countries, and the British presence, which has made a significant contribution to Western security interests in the Mediterranean, are also considered. However, no meaningful examination of these subjects can exclude a discussion of the Mediterranean Sea itself and some of the basic elements of sea power in the twentieth century. First a definition of terms: the continental countries that comprise the strictly geographical Mediterranean world are, starting at Gibraltar and moving clockwise, Spain, France, Italy, Yugoslavia, Albania, Greece, Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Egypt, Libya, Tunisia, Algeria, and Morocco. The two island countries are Malta and ~rus. There is also what might be called the geopolitical Mediterran~n, which includes a number of Middle Eastern countries that do not have Mediterranean coastlines but are inextricably linked to the area by geography, oil, and politics; they are Jordan, the Sudan, the two Yemens, Iraq, Iran, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and the smaller Arab states of the Persian Gulf. Portugal is also part of this expanded Mediter­ ranean world. A word on sources. Most of the statistical data and other infor­ mation on arms was taken from the 1974-75 and 1975-76 Military Balance published by the International Institute for Strategic Studies and the authoritative lane's volumes, Fighting Ships, All the World's Aircraft, and Weapon Systems. I am greatly indebted to these publi­ cations and their editors, particularly Captain John E. Moore, RN (Ret.), of lane's Fighting Ships. This study could not have been undertaken or completed without the generous assistance of the American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, which awarded me a research fellowship in 1972. I also want to thank the Washington Post for which I was working as Middle East correspondent when this study was conceived, and to express gratitude for a sabbatical leave of absence that allowed me to begin the work. During the past six years, as a journalist or researcher I have visited every Mediterranean country except Albania. During my trips I interviewed several hundred people whose employment brings them into daily contact with the Mediterranean. They included gov­ ernment officials, naval officers, ship captains and shipping execu­ tives, historians, and journalists. All provided me with invaluable information and advice. They are too numerous to mention indi­ vidually, and many who helped did so with the understanding that they would remain anonymous. They know who they are and they also know that they have my gratitude. However, I want to individually thank John W. Warner, who was secretary of the navy when I started .this study and who was instrumental in arranging for me to visit U.S. Navy units at sea and ashore in the Mediterranean. My sincere thanks go also to several former Sixth Fleet commanders: Admiral Isaac C. Kidd, Jr., Vice Admiral Daniel J. Murphy, and Vice Admiral Gerald E. Miller (Ret.), and to Vice Admiral Pierre N. Charbonnet, Jr., who was CTF-67 during much of my research. I also want to thank Norman Polmar, the editor of the United States section of lane's Fighting Ships, for reading my manuscript and making constructive comments. My colleagues at AEI also deserve special mention, particularly Robert J. Pranger and Dale R. Tahtinen, respectively the director and assistant director of foreign and defense policy studies; researchers John Lenczowski, Peter Chaffetz, Larry Kahn, and Craig N. Moore; and typists Iris McPherson, Lynn Balthaser, Madelyn Jones, and Karyn Pritchard. I, of course, am responsible for all the conclusions and errors. Washington, D. C. June 1975 1 INTRODUCTION The Mediterranean is the Helen among oceans. Like her it was desired by all who saw it ... fought over not for ten, but for two thousand years, and captured by the boldest. Today before our eyes it is fought over anew.1 In many ways the Mediterranean is a barometer of the world's political climate. This is more true today than at any other time in modern history because developments in the seventeen Mediterranean countries and the state of relations among them often mirror the state of relations between the two superpowers, if only because the super­ powers have an overwhelming strategic stake in the Mediterranean. The energy crisis illustrates this point. The price and availa­ bility of petroleum is affected by the Arab-Israeli conflict whose major protagonists, Israel, Egypt, and Syria, are Mediterranean countries and whose major arms suppliers are the United States and the Soviet Union. The opening of the Suez Canal is another example of this equation in operation. It is almost as if the United States and the Soviet Union had chosen the Mediterranean as an arena for contest: as a testing plat­ form for their political ideologies, their economics, and their weapons.