In January of 1961, American policy makers were in agreement that a nuclear war between the U.S. and the Soviet Union was highly unlikely, but it could not be ruled out completely. The experts concurred that in the unlikely event of a nuclear attack were to happen, it would be catastrophic, killing large numbers of civilians. A National Intelligence Estimates report (excerpted below) stated, “The destructive potential of modern weapons is unprecedented in human history.” The Cold War was plagued with uncertainty, ultimatums, and disagreements leading to questions for both sides that had no answers. The reality was that the fears of the destructive nature of nuclear war was the thing that was actually preventing it. The fear of the consequences were the ultimate deterrent, but the question still remained, would it be enough to prevent a nuclear holocaust? Policy makers disagreed on the deterrent effect in critical situations, how would world leaders react if they were pushed into a corner were their choices were severely limited?
According to the NIE report, “The use of nuclear weapons in almost any form would greatly complicate military and political matters”. It was therefore necessary to increase America’s ability to fight a limited war. Within six months of the report, both the Soviets and the Americans had increased their military budgets and focused on modernizing and beefing up their nonnuclear forces. The biggest fear policy makers had in regards to a nuclear war was the accidental war, one that was started as a result of miscommunication, irrational actions, or errors in judgment. New lines of communication would soon be established between the White House and the Kremlin to aid in avoiding an accidental disaster of epic proportions.
National Intelligence Estimate, "Estimates of the World Situation" January 17, 1961
Washington, January 17, 1961.
NIE 1-61
ESTIMATE OF THE WORLD SITUATION
[Here follow sections entitled “Introduction,” “The Communist World,” “The Emerging Areas,” and “Problems of the Western Alliances,” comprising approximately two-thirds of the estimate.]
V. The Military Problem
A. The Evolving Strategic Situation
60. Despite a widespread feeling that allout nuclear war is unlikely, the problem posed by the accumulation of offensive weapons of mass destruction by the great powers will remain the major problem of the 1960's. Although we have been unable to agree upon an estimate of the size of the Soviet ICBM program (estimates range from 200—or perhaps even less—to 700 on launcher for mid-1963), the Soviet capability even at the lowest estimated figure will pose a grave threat to the US. To illustrate, if one assumes the number on launcher to be 200 and applies reasonable rates of reliability to the missile, the USSR could detonate in the US in the target area some 1,000 to 1,250 megatons. The even greater delivery capability provided by shorter range missiles and nuclear weapons deliverable by aircraft or submarines and ships poses an additional threat to the US, to US bases overseas, to US allies, and indeed to most of the northern hemisphere.
61. So far as we can see now, if the USSR undertook to deliver such an attack, the US could do little to prevent enormous damage. A US pre-emptive attack—that is, an attack delivered when a Soviet attack was believed to be imminent—would not prevent such damage unless the various types of Soviet missile launchers had been precisely located, and there is doubt that a high proportion could be so located. Antiballistic missile systems of presently unproven effectiveness will probably be available about the middle of the decade, but such early systems almost certainly will not be sufficiently developed or widely-enough deployedto give assurance of destroying or neutralizing more than a small proportion of the missiles which the USSR will be capable of launching....
63. Thus it appears likely that during most of the decade ahead the strategic situation will be one in which both the US and the USSR will possess relatively invulnerable nuclear weapons systems capable of inflicting enormous destruction upon the other. The world must face the possibility that a general nuclear war—brought to pass through accident, design, or miscalculation—would kill many millions of people, destroy the capital accumulation of many decades, render large sectionsof the earth virtually uninhabitable for a time, and destroy the power of most of the modern nations of the world.
64. This strategic situation does not make general nuclear war impossible, but it does make it a highly irrational response to international disputes. As long as this situation continues, each side will be deterred by fear of the consequences (if by nothing else) from deliberately initiating general war. It is almost certain, moreover, that each side will be deterred from action or policies which involve serious risk of general war. The crucial question is: how will the risks of a given action be judged in the context of circumstances which exists when the action is contemplated? To be more specific: how far will the Soviets—or the Chinese Communists—be emboldened by judging that Western reaction to some Communist aggression will be inhibited by Western aversion to incurring serious risk of general war? To what extent will the Western reaction actually be so inhibited? Such questions as these are likely to be decisive in any sharp international crisis.
65. But apart from the calculation of risks in times of crisis, this strategic situation poses other serious problems for policymakers. How long will it persist? Can either side achieve a clear military superiority? If the situation of mutual deterrence does persist, can nuclear war be prevented from occurring by accident? Can nuclear blackmail be countered? Can nuclear armaments be reduced or eliminated without creating unfair advantage or opportunities for evasion? We do not pretend to offer answers, but only to point out in the paragraphs below some of the military and political problems which we believe this strategic situation has created and will create in the decade ahead.
B. Military and Political Implications of the Evolving Strategic Situation
66. There is much ignorance and uncertainty among military and civilian leaders throughout the world—in both Communist and non-Communist countries—about the present and future world military situation.This is due in part to security restrictions between governments and even within governments, in part to the complex technical and operational factors involved in modern military actions, and in part to the fact that the destructive potential of modern weapons is unprecedented in human history. Even among the politically and militarily sophisticated, there is considerable puzzlement and disagreement about the deterrent effect of present and future nuclear capabilities, about the probable behavior of states in critical situations, and about the most suitable and effective strategic doctrines and weapons systems to develop.
67. These problems must trouble the Soviet leaders as much as they trouble those of the West. We do not believe that the Soviet leaders conceive the ICBM to be the final answer to their military problems, and we doubt that they have formed definite ideas about their force structure ten years hence or about the precise role they will assign to military power in their campaign to establish world communism. They now see themselves as emerging from a period of strategic inferiority, and they surely consider it a prime objective not to let the US draw ahead once more. As long as the weapons race persists, they will not be content with a strategic equilibrium, or with the progress they have hitherto made in weapons development. Beyond that, they will continue to carry on scientific and weapons research and development programs with a high sense of urgency in order to find new weapons systems and defenses against existing ones. They would do this even without dream of vast military conquests, simply in the interest of defense. But if they developed a weapons system which gave promise of decided advantage over the US, they would certainly seek to gain maximum profit from it.
68. In the decade ahead some such weapons—for example, one providing defense against missiles—may achieve operational status and tend to upset the nuclear missile terror balance we have described. From what we know of Soviet ideas, however, we conclude that during the next five years—and perhaps longer—the Soviet leaders will conceive of their long-range striking capability in terms of deterrence and of employment in a heavy blow should they finally conclude that deterrence had failed, rather than in terms of the deliberate initiation of general war. In their view, a condition of mutual deterrence will provide an umbrella under which they can wage a vigorous campaign, using a wide variety of methods, throughout the non-Communist world.
69. In such a circumstance the Soviet leaders will have substantial advantages. They can create crises and issue threats over comparatively minor matters with a reasonable degree of confidence that one or more of the Western powers will give way because of the risks of general war involved in resisting. In circumstances where they judge the risk is not too great they might engage in military action, possibly with Soviet forces but more probably with other bloc forces or with local revolutionary armed groups. In any case where it appeared that the choice for resisters was one between massive nuclear destruction and compromise of principle (including even surrender of territory), large numbers of people around the world would choose the latter.
70. It is now widely held that, in order to prevent such a paralyzing choice from being presented, it is necessary to have limited war capabilities, so that comparatively minor threats can be countered with appropriate means. But in recent years limited war capabilities in the West have been declining rather than rising. There has been a trend toward the reduction of budgetary allocations for the modernization and mobility of limited-war-capable forces. Two of the US allies, for reasons of national prestige, or because they fear that the US will not always support them, have carried on strategic nuclear weapons programs of their own and have reduced their conventional forces.
71. Even if substantial limited war forces should be available, many of the principles of their political and military use in a nuclear age remain to be developed and to be accepted. It is clear, for example, that only limited objectives can be won by limited means, and that pursuit of broad objectives or extension of the conflict beyond a well defined area of combat threatens expansion into a major war and poses for both sides the question of undertaking a large-scale pre-emptive attack on the enemy's homeland. Even when both parties accept limitations upon their objectives and upon the area of combat, the rules of combat within that established area still pose problems. One of these is that of using nuclear weapons for tactical advantage. The use of nuclear weapons in almost any form would greatly complicate both the military and political problem. It would almost certainly confuse the enemy and the neutrals as to the user's real intentions—as distinct from his announced ones—and alienate large and influential sectors of world opinion from the cause of the user, however just it may have been. The Soviets would presumably regard the use of nuclear weapons in the light of the proposition which they repeatedly assert and probably believe—that limited wars would carry particularly great risks of spreading into general war if nuclear weapons were introduced....
73. A major problem during the next decade is also posed by the probability that additional nations will acquire a nuclear weapons capability.... An increase in the number of states capable of using nuclear weapons—even as a threat—will also increase the chances for irrational and desperate action. At a minimum, the spread of nuclear weapons capabilities will stir up additional political turmoil by encouraging intransigence in their possessors and by encouraging fear and counteraction among those who might consider themselves threatened....
In any case, there is likely to be considerable concern among neutrals and US allies that the US and the USSR will act in too bellicose a fashion, that both the US and the USSR might become so committed that they would be unable to back down and thus would become involved in war, or that the state of alert on one side or both will become so advanced that, fearing a surprise attack, one would take pre-emptive action against the other. As the decade advances and surprise attack against retaliatory weapons systems loses much of its advantage, compelling reasons for launching a pre-emptive attack will no longer exist. Nevertheless, fear of surprise attack will probably persist and might weigh more heavily in the minds of policymakers than would in fact be justified.
75. Another concern is that general war may come about by sheer accident. The worry here is that with an increasing number and variety of space capsules in orbit or being fired into orbit, with an increasing number of missiles nuclear-armed and on the ready, with strategic air forces airborne and armed with nuclear weapons, with a new and untested ballistic missile early warning system in operation, war could come about through communications failures or anomalies, irrational action by local crews or commanders, or errors in judgment, without either side wishing this to happen....
1. According to the report, why did the authors feel that the risk of nuclear war was relatively low?
2. Explain how the deterrent effect decreased the risk of a nuclear war. Why was the deterrent effect not considered a full proof strategy?
3. Explain the purpose of the use of limited forces as a deterrent for nuclear war.
Sources
Foreign Relations of the Unites States, 1961-1963 Volume VIII, National Security Policy, Document 2, 3-9. (1961). U.S. Department of State: Office of the Historian Retrieved from https://history.state.gov/historicaldocuments/frus1961-63v08/d2
Illingworth, L.G. (1962, October 29). [Cartoon]. The Daily Mail. Retrieved from https://www.cartoons.ac.uk/record/IL0120