NATO vs. Warsaw Pact

Metak

Metak

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Okay, alternative history scenario, It's 1973 tensions between the United States and Soviet Union sour over Vietnam and other places such as Africa, The United States threatens all out war against North Vietnam if the Soviet Union does not pull conventional military forces out of the lets say now communist Angola that they are using to spread their control over the rest of African countries, particularly the diamond rich ones. A Soviet hard-liner Politburo refuses to back down. The United States intensifies air operations against North Vietnam. Angolan communist forces with Soviet support commit raids into Botswana and the Congo. The Warsaw Pact central command gets orders to mobilize and prepare for possible war with NATO in Central Europe. The Soviet Shock Armies in the DDR are put on full alert. NATO get's satellite imagery showing Soviet Armored reserve forces moving through Poland. NATO responds with an alert of it's own. Okay excluding the use of ANY NBC weapons by BOTH sides, give me some possible outcomes and situation developements.
 
Red Army by Ralph Peters :) But what do you think would happen or how do you think the situation would unfold militarily and politically. I'm interested in hearing you'r opinion.
 
In 1973 it's really tough for NATO. The A-10 is not yet in service, the best US tank is the M-60A1, TOW is a brand new untested weapon, all US troops have at best the mediocre M-16A1, and the Russians have the T-72 in mass production.

Change the date to 1983, and the opposite is true. The M-1 is in mass production, the A-10 fleet is at it's largest ever in USAF service, the F-15, F-14, F-18, and F-16 are in sqn. service, the USN has TLAM, Harpoon, the Iowa Class BBs,it's four pre VLS Ticonderoga class Aegis guided missile destroyers, the NTU Kidd DDGs, and the LA 688 boats in fleet service.

What a difference a decade makes.
 
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Yes, i know...but the author of this thread specifically said "No NBC".

Given those conditions, the war would be extremely difficult for NATO to win. If the Russians were ever going to attack, the early 70s would've been the time.

About the only thing the US really had going for it that would help in a high intensity Central European war was it's carrier fleet, the F-4E, and The AH-1 Cobra.
 
Yes but didn't the United States have superiority over the Soviet Union at sea? What about the B-52's? I think the best thing for NATO would be to let the Warsaw Pact gain ground and make strike them whenever they were sure to win. Not really a war of attrition but something along the lines of a large guerilla war. And pund their supply and comm lines with the B-52's.
 
The B-52s of that era had no non-nuclear standoff weapons. In order for them to be used in a direct overflight role the US would need complete air supremacy.

That would've been a very difficult undertaking considering that the US top of the line fighter at the time was The F-4E Phantom armed with the substandard AIM-7C Sparrow missile.

The USN in 1973 held complete and total dominance at sea though, and even the RN was a very powerful force at that time. In 1973, the Soviet navy was not a very capable force at all.
 
M21Sniper said:
Yes, i know...but the author of this thread specifically said "No NBC".

Given those conditions, the war would be extremely difficult for NATO to win. If the Russians were ever going to attack, the early 70s would've been the time.

About the only thing the US really had going for it that would help in a high intensity Central European war was it's carrier fleet, the F-4E, and The AH-1 Cobra.
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I cannot see it not going nuke from the get-go. All our weapons systems were nuke based or at least in support of nukes. The CF-101 VOODOO was armed with the GENIE nuke tipped AAM. The BORMAC was a nuke tip SAM. Even the HERCULES SAM batteries were nuke tipped. For something as simple as AD, a large portion of the weapons systems in place were nuke tipped. Aside from that, every division in the USArmy had tac nukes.

Even from the Soviet side, they were planning nuke strikes also. Remember that in the early 70s, they had actively planned and prepared for a nuke strike and invasion into China, specifically towards the Lop Nor (China's Los Alamos).

In fact, it was Reagan's build up that drastically reduced the need for nukes by both sides.
 
"I cannot see it not going nuke from the get-go."

Agreed, but i'm trying to stay within the original authors postulated scenario.
 
We'll wouldn't the F-4 Phantom been able to maintain air superiority, they seemed to do pretty well against North Vietnamese Mig-21's. Althought I beleive the Soviets had the Flogger by then. Althought I'm not sure how it the Phantom would do against the Flogger.
 
Yes, the F-4E could be rightly expected to dominate the Mig-21 and Mig-23, however, the Soviets had MASSIVE amounts of Migs, so it got into a numbers game.

That's why the F-15 and F-14 were designed with complete overmatch in mind, to deal with the vastly superior numbers the Soviets could field.
 
yes, if you were to look at a possible war between NATO and the WARSAW PACT in central europe it would probably be a high-intensity attrition style conflict, in which technically speaking the one with the greater numbers wins. Althought would NATO have been able to launch some tactical cruise missile strikes without nuke tipped warheads?
 
No, TLAM was not yet introduced at that time. Any tactical short range missiles we had in the 70s were nuke tipped.
 
IMO

In 70's NATO would how got there butts handed to them via a T-72 and a MIG21. In Nam Air-Force Pilots were almost down to a 1-1 kill ration because of a lack of Combat training. The Navy was over 3-1 because of their new "Top Gun" program. Plus the F-4 didn't even get Cannons until the Mid 70's (I think). I see F-4 pilots getting swarmed with Mig-21's. And not having the proper training to handle it or equipment. Plus shooting a bunch of Sparrow Missile that would hit nothing. B-52 would have been blown out of the sky. Remember in the Mid 70's the B-52 was still seen as a high altitude bomber. With the lack of Air Supremacy Sam’s would of made mince meat out of the B-52. It was the B-52 experience in Vietnam that lead the Air force to make it a low altitude bomber instead.

Plus what answer would the NATO force have had for the TU-22 Backfire? I don't think the F-4 would have held up due to poor Missiles. And the NATO AA Equipment for that time frame was never really tested. I see TU-22 Hitting air fields in the UK.

A T-72 and M60 Tank are both pretty close in ability. But, if you got 5 T-72's against 1 M60, I would take the T-72 any day. That’s what would have happened on the ground.



Mid 80's.


NATO would have dominated the Warsaw Pact. At that time nobody knew (Even US) how huge the technology gap had gotten. Can you imagine T-72’s attacking entrenched M1's? It would have been a slaughter. The Air war wouldn't have been as lopsided as the ground war but NATO still would have dominated. Mainly because of NATO fighter pilot training.


Or I'm all wrong...
 
You are wrong about a lot of things...for instance, there were no TU-22Ms in 1973, the F-4E had a gun, the USAF had already instituted it's Nellis Weapons school training program, when Sparrow actually worked it worked extremely well, and the USAF used the B-52 to great effect in the face of an extremely robust SAM threat in Vietnam over Hanoi and Haiphong.

But i agree with your overall conclusion: NATO would get it's ass handed to it because the US Army at that time was really a COIN army, and not at all geared toward fighting the Soviets in Europe.

All that ended in the late 70s, early 80s, and the tables are reversed IMO.
 
M21Sniper said:
You are wrong about a lot of things...for instance, there were no TU-22Ms in 1973, the F-4E had a gun, the USAF had already instituted it's Nellis Weapons school training program, when Sparrow actually worked it worked extremely well, and the USAF used the B-52 to great effect in the face of an extremely robust SAM threat in Vietnam over Hanoi and Haiphong.

But i agree with your overall conclusion: NATO would get it's ass handed to it because the US Army at that time was really a COIN army, and not at all geared toward fighting the Soviets in Europe.

All that ended in the late 70s, early 80s, and the tables are reversed IMO.
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These sites says the TU-22 was spotted in 1969, Other says major production began in 1972. As close to sources as I got.

http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/russia/bomber/tu-22m.htm
http://www.answers.com/topic/tupolev-tu-22m


Gunpod thing you were right I though it was later than 67?


I just don't think the B-52 would of done well in a High Altitude conventional role over a WarsawPact Air Defense shield. With more Sams and better trained crews it would have been tuff.



But here is a “What if”, for you guys. If TU-22 are operational in 73 can NATO protect it self? Could you imagine TU-22 hitting the UK that would have been nuts.
 
Well I guess we can all agree that NATO would have been fairly easily overrun by the WARSAW PACT forces on the ground. How far do you think they would push. France? Spain? Maybe even England?
 
France

France

Metak said:
Well I guess we can all agree that NATO would have been fairly easily overrun by the WARSAW PACT forces on the ground. How far do you think they would push. France? Spain? Maybe even England?
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Not to far, somebody would have started thorwing nuks around. I think if the Warsaw Pact did start to overun Europe the world would have seen the first tactical nucular war. Remember France has its own nukes. They would of strarted shooting them off at anytime. I don't think France would have let it get that far...
 
"These sites says the TU-22 was spotted in 1969, Other says major production began in 1972. As close to sources as I got."

The TU-22 is the Blinder, the TU-22M is the Backfire. COMPLETELY different aircraft bro.

PS: FAS is a terrible source for information. Globalsecurity.org is far superior.

"I just don't think the B-52 would of done well in a High Altitude conventional role over a WarsawPact Air Defense shield. With more Sams and better trained crews it would have been tuff."

The SA-2's used by the North Vietnamese are basicly the same models the Soviets were using in 1973, and most N.Vietnamese operators were trained by Soviet 'adivsors', and in many cases the 'advisors' themselves were the ones actually manning the radar stations.

"But here is a “What if”, for you guys. If TU-22 are operational in 73 can NATO protect it self? Could you imagine TU-22 hitting the UK that would have been nuts."

The USN Talos missile system was fully capable of dealing with any threat of that time. In some ways, the Talos is still superior to the US Standard missile series in use by the USN today(from a purely performance standpoint). SM-1, in both MR and ER variants was also in service in 1973.

The USN also had several Nuclear powered CGNs of the Longbeach and California class in service in 1973.

Using Metaks timeline and dismissal of nuclear weaponry, the USN will possess absolute command of the world's oceans.
 
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"Not to far, somebody would have started thorwing nuks around. I think if the Warsaw Pact did start to overun Europe the world would have seen the first tactical nucular war. Remember France has its own nukes. They would of strarted shooting them off at anytime. I don't think France would have let it get that far..."

For the purposes of this discussion we must analyze this scenario just as metak proposed it...no nukes whatsover.

The real questions on the ground are(to me):

1) Is the US Army AH-1G TOW armed Cobra attack helicopter enough to stop the Soviet avalanche of mechanized columns? Will they be able to operate effectively in such a high intensity threat environment?

2) Can the all-weather A-7D Corsair II perform effectively in the CAS role against the threat of that day?

3) Are the M-60A1s,Centurians, and Leopard 1A1s(at the time state of the art)in hull down defilade positions enough to deal with the overmatch killing power of the 125mm gun of the T-72?

4) Can US III and VII corps plus the European NATO armies hold long enough for REFORGER elements to arrive in force?

5) Can the USN protect the troop transports and cargo ships carrying the REFORGER assets across the Atlantic?

6) Can the deep strike F-111 Aardvark effectively perform it's all weather attack role?(in 1973 the F-111 was by far the best all weather low altitude strike platform ever devised by man).

IMO opinion the US would be able to sufficiently reinforce England enough to make ANY invasion attempt of the UK completely impossible, but Continental Europe ends up in Soviet hands.

The really interesting part of the Scenario is what do the NATO allies do to take Europe back again...
 
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TU-22 Blinder:

tu-22_3.gif


TU-22 Blinder Specifications:

Powerplant
two 16000-kg (35,273-lb) afterburning thrust Koliesov VD-7M turbojets
Dimensions
Length: 132 ft 11.7 in (40.53 m)
Wingspan: 77 ft 11 in (23.75 m)
Height: 35 ft 0 in (10.67 m)
Weights
Empty: 88,185 lb (40,000 kg)
Maximum Takeoff: 185,188 lb (84,000 kg)
Performance
Speed: 924 mph (802 kt)
Ceiling: 60,040 ft (18300 m) -- Blinder-A
Range: 1,926 miles (3100 km)
Armament
one 23-mm NR-23 cannon in radar-controlled tail turret, plus one AS-4 'Kitchen' stand-off missile recessed into the weapons bay

TU-22M Backfire:

8201.gif


Tu-22M Backfire Specifications:

Primary Function: Bomber / maritime strike aircraft
Contractor: Tupolev Design Bureau
Crew: N/A
Unit Cost: N/A
Powerplant
Two Kuznetsov NK-25 afterburning turbofans, 55,115 lb thrust each
Dimensions
Length: 139 ft 4 in (42.46 m)
Wingspan: 112 ft 6 in (34.28 m) -- Fully spread
76 ft 6 in (23.3 m) -- Fully swept
Height: 36 ft 3 in (11.05 m)
Weights
Empty: 119,048 lb
Maximum Takeoff: 278,660 lb
Performance
Speed: 1,242 mph (2,000 km/h) -- high altitude
652 mph (1,050 km/h) -- low altitude
Ceiling: 43,635 ft
Range: 7,456 miles (12,000 km)
Armament
One GSh-23 23mm twin-barrel cannon, plus 52,910 lb including Kh-15P SRAMs, Kh-22/27 ASMs, bombs, and sea mines
 
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The more i look at this, the more i'm thinking it won't be quite so easy for the Soviets as i'd initially though.

The Leopard 1 and 1A1 were available in large numbers in 1973, the all weather A-7D Corsair II and F-111E were state of the art at the time, the F-4E was in service in the thousands, and almost all US TAC, USMC, and USN pilots of that era had extensive combat experience, the US had a massive attack helicopter fleet, and NATO would enjoy absolute control of the seas and shipping lanes.

The more i look at it, this is shaping up to be one hell of a serious fight...
 
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What about the Shilka's. I think they would have been able to deal with the AH-1 Cobra's. Not to mention the SA-9 and SA-6 SAMS that formed the forward echeleon air-defense umbrella of advancing Red Army units. Also on the ground side the Russians already had the pretty sophisticated T-64 for a while. Also large Spetznaz Airborne formations which probably would have been dropped behind NATO lines to reak havoc on NATO communications and supply, command centres and probably even some unit garrisons. Although they probably would have cause more panic and confusion then real damage.
 
NATO rules the seas. They gain a 'contested' air superiority over the battlefield, which isn't enough to stop the Warsaw Pact conventional ground forces edge. Warsaw Pact drives to the Rhine, and the French let it be known that they will use nukes to stop any crossing of the Rhine (author's stipulation notwithstanding).
 
Okay let's say there is an temporary cease-fire now. With the Warsaw Pact on the Rhine. It's refueling and re-arming it's forces and is bringing up reserves. It is also working very quickly to build an AAA and SAM net over it's now occupied territory. Let's say this is accomplished fairly well within an week to two weeks, the coverage mostly being around it's important communication, supply and regional HQ's. Most of NATO's surviving forces have pulled back into France where they are doing the same. Now begins an air war in which masses of Soviet Mig's coming from East German and some captured West German airfields (those that were not destroyed) taken on smaller numbers of bit more sophisticated NATO aircraft. And let's say NATO doesn't operate to close to the WARSAWPACT front line because of the fear of longer range sams that have now been move up. The Red Army is moving up large amounts of heavy artillery, but that this is taking time, and it also wants to stock up enough shells and rockets before continuing it's planned offensive into France. What happens next?
 
Metak said:
Okay let's say there is an temporary cease-fire now. With the Warsaw Pact on the Rhine. It's refueling and re-arming it's forces and is bringing up reserves. It is also working very quickly to build an AAA and SAM net over it's now occupied territory. Let's say this is accomplished fairly well within an week to two weeks, the coverage mostly being around it's important communication, supply and regional HQ's. Most of NATO's surviving forces have pulled back into France where they are doing the same. Now begins an air war in which masses of Soviet Mig's coming from East German and some captured West German airfields (those that were not destroyed) taken on smaller numbers of bit more sophisticated NATO aircraft. And let's say NATO doesn't operate to close to the WARSAWPACT front line because of the fear of longer range sams that have now been move up. The Red Army is moving up large amounts of heavy artillery, but that this is taking time, and it also wants to stock up enough shells and rockets before continuing it's planned offensive into France. What happens next?
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I forget, had Nixon gone to China yet? Would we deal with China to pressure the Sovs from the South?

-dale
 
Regarding China, not sure they would have had much offensive potential back in '73. Yes, the 'China card' had been played at that point. However, it probably would only have matter if the Russians had attacked in that direction. Plus the Russians would not have been reluctant to use nukes against a China unable to effectively respond.

Regarding the Rhine situation - what happens next depends alot on what the motivation is / objectives are for the Warsaw Pact. They might make some moves on the flanks - Norway, Denmark, Turkey, Greece. I don't see any realistic scenario where the French go down without using their nukes, so NATO prepares a conventional defense of the Rhine line with full French participation. Once the Russians successfully cross they get nuked by the French. Not sure I see why the Warsaw Pact keeps going at that point. If their aim is to dominate Central Europe, I would say they would hold the Rhine then go through Austria into Italy and / or the flank moves mentioned previously. Perhaps into Holland as well - Belgium starts to get touchy for the French as well.
 
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I doubt the Shilka and SAMs would be able to defend Soviet formations from air attacks by Cobras and NATO TACAIR.

They'd attrit the NATO air forces somewhat, but would probably shoot down almost as many of their own aircraft as ours(WP IFF was severely lacking back then).
 
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