◆ SpookStack

counterforce posture is very much affect. ed, may prove a vital factor in disarma- ment negotiations. It cannot be seriously believed now that the U.S.S.R. has either the capabil- ity or the intention of making an all-out attack on U.S. missile sites and bomber bases. Much genuine alarm in the West might have been allayed if the U.S.S.R had been more successful in making clearer its disbelief in the military possi- bility of a successful first-counterforce strike and its intention not to plan for such a possibility. After the brutality of Soviet action in Hungary in 1956 and the technological triumph of the artifi- cial satellite the following year, there may have been legitimate grounds in the West for fearing that the U.S.S.R. might adopt the Westem policy of massive re- taliation, which, against a nuclear power, fequires a counterforce capability. In January, 1960, however, Khrushchev ex- plicitly declared the Soviet commitment to a purely retaliatory strategy. The Soviet second-strike force was strong enough, he said, “to wipe the country or countries which attack us off the face of the earth.” To his own rhetorical ques- tion, “Will they not, possibly, show per- fidy and attack us first...and thus have an advantage to achieve victory?” he replied: “No. Contemporary means of waging war do not give any country such advantages.” In addition to freeing resources for capital development, the Soviet minimum-deterrent strategy has avoided the greatest military danger: that the U.S. might attack the U.S.S.R. because of a belief that the U.S.S.R. was about to attack the U.S. Ji the analysis given here is epproxi- mately correct, what are the prospects of progress toward disarmament at the present meeting in Geneva? Both blocs are fully committed by official pro- nouncements to the goal of complete and general disarmament under strict con- trol and inspection—notably by the Brit- sh Commonwealth Prime Ministers’ statement in the spring of 1961, by President Kennedy's speech to the Gen- eral Assembly of the United Nations and by the Soviet-American joint Statement of Principles, both in September of 1961. Moreover, both sides are committed to attempting to work out first steps of the disarmament process that do not impair the present strategic balance. Clearly, conventional and nuclear dis- armament must go in parallel. The fear of the West of Soviet superiority in trained and deployed land forces must be met by a drastic reduction during the 7] penneenenneene., perenne o-oo ' MILES 1 4 GROUND BURST of a nuclear bomb would be required to neutralize 2 “hardened” (i.e. buried) missile site. Diameter of the crater dug by a 10-megaton ground burst in dry soil would be 2,600 feet; the depth of the crater would be 250 feet. Radius of the underground “plastic zone” (outer line below ground) would be 3,250 feet; the radias of the “rupture zone” (inner line below ground) would be 2,000 feet. At a distance of 1.1 miles from ground zero the blast would exert an air pressure of some 300 pounds per square inch (inner circle above ground); at a distance of 1.5 miles (outer circle above ground}, 100 pounds per equare inch. 0 10 20 wn “0 MILES PATTERN OF GROUND BURSTS would be required to neutralize a dispersed group of hardened missile sites. In this schematic drawing a “circle of probable error” of one mile is assumed for each of the attacking missiles; this implies that at least two missiles would be directed at each of the sites. There are five sites, represented by dots, The smatler of each of the 10 pairs of concentric circles represents the 2,600-foot diameter of a 10-megaton bomb crater; the larger of the circles, the L.l.mile radius at which the air pressure is 300 pounds per square inch. The total weight of the attack on the five bases is 100 megatons. The scale of the drawing is the same es that of the mup of St. Lovis ot the bottom of page 6.