The Third World War: The Untold Story

Would this, for the USSR, be worthwhile? Even if the USA were devastated, would the Soviet Union in the aftermath be in a position to retain full control over its own people, let alone those of restless client states? This was doubtful. Heavy damage and high casualties in Warsaw Pact states would loosen ties in the socialist world rather than strengthen them, while the progress of the USSR itself would be set back so far as to open dangerous opportunities to China. Opinion in the Politburo appeared to be hardening against the option of a nuclear opening.

None the less there was a deep and manifest difference of opinion here which could not be overcome. One group, resolutely led by the Chairman of the KGB, Army General Sergei Athanasievich Aristanov, ably supported by the Minister of Defence, Marshal Alexei Alexandrovich Nastin (each a member of the Defence Council of the Politburo), maintained that the Soviet approach to war demanded the swift and violent use of the most powerful weapons available. This suggested, logically enough, a nuclear opening, in total depth, including, it went without saying, ICBM attack on the continental United States. In the strategic exchange between the central systems of the two great powers the Soviet Union would suffer grave damage which would put its progress back significantly. But it would survive and in time recover. The United States, on the other hand, would be destroyed, leaving the Soviet Union to establish progressive socialist societies in its own good time throughout the present capitalist West.

The arguments for a conventional opening were well known. There would clearly be advantage in a non-nuclear victory and this, with good timing and the correct handling of field operations, was not impossible. If, however, the advance into Western Europe were so far delayed that the Rhine could not be secured within ten days there must be no question but that the whole of the Soviet Union’s nuclear capability must be applied and quickly used. There must be no withholding of the more powerful weapons in the hope that the enemy would do the same with his, and no concession at all to the fallacious Western concept of escalation, which is not only fundamentally incorrect but wholly out of keeping with the now well-established, and even traditional, Soviet method of making war. If there were any uncertainty over the achievement of very early success by non-nuclear means, however, the whole operation should without any doubt be nuclear from the start.

The Supreme Party Ideologist, Constantin Andrievich Malinsky, who was a member of the Politburo Defence Council, supported by the leader of the Organization of the Party and State Control, Otto Yanovich Berzinsh, and Taras Kyrillovich Nalivaiko, responsible for relations with socialist countries (both being members of the Politburo but not of the Defence Council) demurred. It must be the aim of the Soviet Union to realize Lenin’s grand design of a world under communist rule. A world of which much would be charred rubble or irradiated desert would hardly be worth ruling. What was wanted was supremacy in a living world, not over a charnel house it would be death to enter. Nuclear weapons were to frighten rather than to fight with. Their use would set up a contradiction in socialist practice which should be avoided except in the very last resort and only after the deepest thought.

For the time being, at least, the majority were in favour of a non-nuclear opening and the meeting passed to consider other matters.

The position of European neutrals was discussed. Sweden, in spite of signs of restlessness in recent years, could almost certainly be cowed into maintaining its traditional stance. France was an unknown quantity. It was a member of the Atlantic Alliance but not of its military organization, NATO. France’s record of self-interest suggested that it might, and probably would, abstain from belligerence if the advantage offered were sufficient. Ireland would probably follow France’s lead, though recently improved Anglo-Irish relations raised doubts here and it would be as well to target key installations in Ireland for conventional destruction in order to deny their use to the Western allies. The chance would have to be taken that Irish facilities would become available to the enemy, which could raise problems for the Soviet Navy in the Eastern Atlantic.

To occupy France would impose a serious burden on Soviet resources and involve a significant addition to occupied territories which would certainly raise security problems of their own.