XXI. Meeting of the PCC, Berlin, 28-29 May 1987
Editorial Note
The meeting marked the end of the Warsaw Pact as it had evolved since 1961 - an organization for offensive rather than defensive warfare. The change followed a shift in Soviet thinking about security under the influence of left-wing Western European notions of defensive sufficiency and structural inability to attack as well under the impact of the Reykjavik summit that had revealed a meeting of minds between Gorbachev and Reagan regarding the desirability of abolition of nuclear weapons.
The Soviet Union could claim victory by having induced NATO to accept the "zero option," namely, the dismantling of all intermediate-range nuclear missiles. The United States, though favoring the option verbally, had not believed it was acceptable to the Soviet Union and had therefore not regarded it feasible. Gorbachev and other Warsaw Pact leaders were led to believe that by retaining initiative in pursuing arms control reductions they could achieve equilibrium at a lower level of armaments while gaining the upper hand politically. This was also the reason why Honecker, politically the most conservative of Eastern European leaders, took the lead in supporting Gorbachev's quest for radical reductions of both nuclear and conventional armaments in Europe.
The Soviet Union introduced a document on the new military doctrine that provided for strictly defensive orientation. The Warsaw Pact's response to an attack was to be a defensive operation on its own territory rather than an offensive operation on the enemy's territory. And the goal was no longer to be the defeat of the enemy on his territory but the "quickest possible termination of hostilities at favorable conditions."[1]
The presentation of the document led to a lengthy discussion in which Ceauşescu urged the substitution of a common military doctrine by national doctrines. The common document was nevertheless adopted, whereupon the Romanians- in a significant departure from their traditional policies - began to urge more frequent meetings of the PCC, with a particular emphasis on discussing the internal situation within the communist bloc rather than its relations with the West.
While the PCC was in session, the Soviet Union suffered the acute embarrassment of having been unable to prevent the penetration of its air defenses by a light aircraft piloted by West German youth Matthias Rust and his subsequent landing on the Red Square in the heart of Moscow. The incident enraged Gorbachev, prompting him to purge the highest ranks of the Soviet military, which in turn lessened their resistance to the adoption of the new military doctrine. The structure of the Warsaw Pact, however, resisted the adoption, making it all but impossible to implement the doctrine without impairing the integrity of the alliance.
Commenting on the new military doctrine, Marshal Kulikov maintained that its importance "lies in the fact that it will contribute towards affirmation of the unity of views relating to the solution of the problems of maintaining parity of armed forces and armaments, and reducing the number of NATO forces in Europe down to a sufficient and reasonable level." His statement presaged last-ditch Soviet efforts to resist asymmetrical reductions of the larger Soviet forces in Central Europe on the alleged grounds that there was effective parity between the Warsaw Pact and NATO.
Vojtech Mastny
Notes
[1] Adm. Theodor Hoffmann in PHP interview, 24 October 2002.
