zraver

They would have kicked ass and taken names, it wasn't until the T-72B that the base model M-1 really started to lose its superiority. They were probably crewed by the most trained motivated soldiers of all time form about 85 onwards. Flush with funding, well led, and part of a combined doctrine that truly made war a 3 dimensional affair vs an enemy who was poorly rained and unresponsive in the tactical enviroment. There are so many factors in play and most of them do not favor the WP forces.

The myth of the T-72's armor was proven in the Bekka Valley. The 105mm was ore than capable of dealing with it.

Officer of Engineers

Extremely surprising to me was that the Warsaw Pact has viewed NATO as being an offensive force starting as early as 1960. By 1987, they have abandoned the idea of using West Germany as the battle ground and have adopted East Germany as the battle ground.

The idea was for NATO to attack East Germany while a counter-offensive was to be launched from the German-Pole-Czech borders.

In short, the WP has lost all confidence in their offensive capabilities by that time no matter what numeric superiority was touted ... unknowningly to us.

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Blademaster

That's because they realized that the US would use nuclear weapons against Warsaw Pact. They thought, "For god' sake, they dropped two nuclear bombs on an already defeated Japan, simply just to save lives, not out of desperate survival. What makes it so sure that they wouldn't do the same thing to us?"

USSR literally took Nixon's threat seriously. When they saw the US's committment during the Berlin Airlift, all bets were off. In poker parlance, they realized that the hands they were holding were not worth risking the pot that they had based on US and NATO's posture.

Stan187

I really doubt that this was the reasoning that made them loose confidence in their offensive capabilities.

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zraver

It was certainly one of the reasons. The US responce in 67 terrified the Soviets. We were not risking war to keep misisle soff our shore or to defend Europe but were risking global annihilation to save a few million Jews.

Officer of Engineers

Wasn't that 73?

Blademaster

Yes that was the Nixon's response but don't forget the Cuban Crisis Missile and to mention the fact that Douglas McArthur wanted to nuke China but was only restrained by Truman. The fact is that the Soviets saw the Americans as crazy cowboys who couldn't be predicted. That's what scared the Soviets and changed their offensive posture into a defensive posture.

Blademaster

I forgot to add one thing: The Soviets were facing dissent in their own satellites during the 60s and were afraid that if war was to break out, the greatest danger would be within. Thus they could not fight NATO while being hamstrung by internal dissent.

Stan187

The Soviets leadership had more depth in thinking than just thinking that Americans are comboys.

Officer of Engineers

Stan,

There has to be a point to this. Moscow actually believed that Reagan was preparing to start WWIII.

zraver

No, it was 67. The USSR issued alerts to paratroop divsions to save Nasser and Syria. LBJ responded by surging the 6th fleet to block any moves by the Soviet Navy. (I was wroing it wasn't kruchev but Brehznev)

heres a breif from wiki, no tthe most relaible but it is cited.

Stan187

My point is that attitudes were not everything. Capabilties must also be considered a big part of the equation Colonel, much like you advocated a few posts earlier.

zraver

Capabilites

M-48, M-60, and Centurions were trashing T-54/55 and T-62's In the Middle east (later the M-60A1 would trash the T-72)

USAF and the IAF were both blowing through Soviet designed and manned SAM nets with ease.

The B-70 Valkyrie was on the Horizon

AIM-9 Sparrow gave the USAF true BVR capability.

Honest John battle feild nuclear rocket

Pershing Theater nuclear missile

2-1+ lead in nukes

600+ warships

C-141 Star Lifter

F-4 Phantom II


Now, we know just how exhausted the army was, and how the Regulars in Gemrany were not prepared to go to war. But based on the material evidence NATO had the technology and size to be an offensive force.

Stan187

That was my point zraver, that NATO capabilities were very important in impressing the WP of their comparative offensive/defensive capabilities.

On quip however, IAF did have significant trouble in the first few days of the '73 war with the Arab SAM nets, but keep in mind, the SAM nets over the Golan and Suez were denser than ones over Moscow or Hanoi.

zraver

Ahh but we are talking the 60's and the war of attrition periods. also North Vietnam by 67 was as densly defended as any Arab nation. It had the latest models of the SA-2, radar directed guns in the valleys, greater depth of defenses and an elite airforce.