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Essential Equivalence and the Countervailing Strategy

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Democracy and Deterrence

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Abstract

The period between 1968 and 1974 may fairly be characterized as one of continuity in strategic doctrine. President Nixon renamed the doctrine he inherited, calling it ‘Strategic Sufficiency’,1 doubtless appreciating its positive contributions to fiscal restraint. Relying on the unchanged substance of the doctrine, he used it as the basis for strategic arms limitation talks, originated by Johnson but uncommenced owing to the Russian invasion of Czechoslovakia.2 Strategic doctrine of this period, as we have seen, included an important role for arms control and that doctrine also structured the treaties that then and have since emerged from the SALT process.

Io fei giubbetto a me de le mie case.

(I made a gibbet for myself of my house.)

Canto XIII, Inferno

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Notes and References

  1. Press Conference, 27 January 1969, in Public Papers of the President: Richard M. Nixon: 1969 (Washington: GPO, 1970), p.19; see also R. M. Nixon, RN: Memoirs (New York: Grosset and Dunlap, 1978), p. 415. The formal announcement actually came 18 September 1969.

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  2. T. Greenwood, Making the MIRV: A Study in Defense Decisionmaking (Cambridge, Mass.: Ballinger, 1975) pp. 70–1

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  3. E. Luttwak, Strategic Power: Military Capabilities and Political Utility (Beverly Hills: Sage, 1976), p. 22.

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  4. R. M. Nixon, A Report to the Congress: US Foreign Policy for the 1970s, A New Strategy for Peace, 18 February 1970 (Washington: GPO, 1970), p. 122.

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  5. I must not be — and my successors must not be — limited to the indiscriminate mass destruction of civilians as the sole possible response to challenges.’ R. M. Nixon, A Report to the Congress: US Foreign Policy for the 1970s, Building for Peace, 25 February 1971 (Washington: GPO, 1971), p. 170.

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  7. For a somewhat different argument supporting this conclusion, see Edward N. Luttwak, ‘The Nuclear Alternatives’, in K. A. Myers (ed.), NATO: The Next Thirty Years (Boulder, Col.: Westview, 1980), pp. 979. Luttwak argues that strategic superiority provided the material basis for Assured Destruction (i.e., for extended deterrence beyond the assured destruction capability): First, some ICBMs could be fired in small numbers, selectively, and without prejudice to the rest of the ICBM force since the Soviet Union had only a slight counterforce capability against all the ICBM silo launchers. In the same vein, the small and technically backward Soviet SLBM force of the 1960s did not effectively threaten the SAC bomber bases, thus again allowing a selective use of some bombers without prejudice to the rest of the force. Overall, the relative magnitude of the force involved allowed an extensive allocation of weapons to the tasks of extended deterrence (for attack against all Soviet targets except cities) while still [maintaining] the ultimissima ratio of simple, strike-back deterrence in protection of American soil. Second, even with immunity lost, the United States had a very great advantage in the balance of relative vulnerabilities that, other things being equal, assured it of a dominant position in any possible escalation. (Ibid. p. 98.)

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  8. Cordesman, Deterrence in the 1980s p. 19; see Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld, Annual Defense Department Report, Fiscal Year 1978 (Washington: GPO, 17 January 1977).

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  9. In September 1974, the US Department of Defense stated that it had, some information that the Soviets have achieved or will soon achieve, accuracies of 500 to 700 meters with their ICBMs. These figures may be a little optimistic, but that would represent about a fourth to a third of a nautical mile. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Briefing in Counterforce Attacks (Hearing, 11 September 1974; partly declassified and released 10 January 1975), p. 10. But by November 1977, the Soviet Union had flight-tested guidance systems on two of the ICBMs referred to (the SS 18/19) with CEPs of.1 nautical mile or 600 feet.

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  17. Secretary of Defense Harold Brown, Department of Defense Appropriations for 1981 Hearings before a Subcommittee of the Committee on Appropriations, House of Representatives, 96th Congress, Second Session, Part 1 (Washington: GPO, 1980), p. 135. In April 1979 the Commander-in-Chief of Strategic Air Command, Gen. R. H. Ellis, wrote to Secretary of Defense Harold Brown that the survivability of the US ICBM silos was declining and ‘is now under 40 per cent.’ During 1980 both William Perry, Assistant Secretary of Defense, and Harold Brown testified that a Soviet attack in the early 1980s could theoretically destroy more than 90 per cent of US ICBM. ‘This has commonly been regarded as the most important national security problem facing the US at the outset of the 1980s.’ ‘Trends in Strategic Forces’, The Military Balance 1980–1981 (London: The International Institute for Strategic Studies, 1981), p. 14. But see, John D. Steinbruner and Thomas M. Garwin, ‘Strategic Vulnerability: The Balance Between Prudence and Paranoia,’ Inter, national Security 1 (Summer 1976), pp. 138–181

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  18. and William H. Kincade, ‘Missile Vulnerability Reconsidered,’ Arms Control Today 11 (May 1981), pp. 1–8.

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  23. Lynn Davis, ‘Extended Deterrence in the 1980s and 1990s’, p. 4; see also Department of Defense Annual Report, Fiscal Year 1982 (Washington: GPO, 1981), pp. 52–9.

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  28. Senate Armed Services Committee, Department of Defense Authorization for Fiscal Year 1979 (Washington: GPO, 1978), part 8, p. 6280.

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  29. Earlier Schlesinger had appeared before Congress to explain the difference in the two strategies, Assured Destruction and Essential Equivalence. Testimony of J. R. Schlesinger, Briefing on Counterforce Attacks, September 1974 (Washington: GPO, 1974), p. 37.

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  30. Secretary of Defense James R. Schlesinger, Annual Defense Department Report, Fiscal Year 1976, 5 February 1975, 2 (Washington: GPO, 1975), p. 4.

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  31. Secretary of Defense James R. Schlesinger, Annual Defense Department Report, Fiscal Year 1975, 4 March 1974, (Washington: GPO, 1974), p. 5.

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  32. Senate Armed Services Committee, Fiscal Year 1977 Authorization for Military Procurement, Research & Development & Active Duty, Selected Reserve & Civilian Personnel Strengths 2 (Washington: GPO, 1976) p. 6422

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  33. see also House Appropriations Committee, Department of Defense Appropriations for 1977 (Washington: GPO, 1976) part 8, p. 30.

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  34. Lawrence J. Korb, ‘National Security Organization and Process in the Carter Administration’, in S. C. Sarkesian, (ed.), Defense Policy and the Presidency: Carter’s First Years (Boulder: Westview, 1979), Chapter 11.

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  35. House Armed Services Committee, Hearings on Military Posture & H. R. 1872 (1979) Book 1 of Part 3, p. 437.

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  36. Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Nuclear War Strategy (Washington: GPO, 1981), p. 16.

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  37. Comptroller General, Report to the Congress: Countervailing Strategy Demands Revision of Strategic Force Acquisition Plans (Washington: GAO, August 1981), pp. 27–33.

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  38. Christopher Makins, ‘TNF Modernization and the Countervailing Strategy’, Survival 23 (July/August 1981), pp. 157–164.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Texas, USA

    Philip Bobbitt (Professor of Law, Fellow of Nuffield College)

  2. Oxford, UK

    Philip Bobbitt (Professor of Law, Fellow of Nuffield College)

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© 1988 Philip Bobbitt

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Bobbitt, P. (1988). Essential Equivalence and the Countervailing Strategy. In: Democracy and Deterrence. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-18991-5_7

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