SOME IMPLICATIONS OF KHRUSHCHEV'S SPEECH TO THE SUPREME SOVIET

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP79R00904A000500020118-7
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 6
• Document Creation Date: December 19, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 23, 2005
• Sequence Number: 118
• Publication Date: January 21, 1960
• Content Type: MF

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WOW
C E N T R P, L I N T E L L I G E N C E A G E N C Y
21 January 1960
SUBJECT: Some Itsplicati.ons of Khrushchev's Speech to the Supreme
Soviet
1. For the first tine, a Soviet leader has publicly announced
the personnel strength of the Soviet armed forces. Khrushchev's
figure is 3,623,000; our most recent estimate in NIE 11-4-59 was
4,265,000 (security forces are excluded from our figure and almost
certainly from Khrushchev's as well). We believe that Khrushchev's
figure should be accepted as substantially correct. Moreover,
assuming no domestic or international crises of serious proportions,
we believe that Khrushchev will probably carry out the plans he
proposes for further reductions in strength and alterations in the
structure of Soviet armed forces. Reduction in forces seems to
make good military sense; the massive size of Soviet forces in being
has appeared ut~necessarily large. And the plans certainly make
economic sense, in that a considerable proportion of the sources
released and a great deal of badly needed manpower will become
available to assist in the fulfillment or overfulfiliment of the
Soviet Seven-Year Plan.
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M1.1itarf Policy and Strategy
2. The Khrushchev speech is the clearest statement to date of
Soviet acceptance of the proposition that both sides in the world
struggle are deterred from resort to general wars and that the con-
test must therefore be conducted in a manner which avoids serious
risk of a nuclear holocaust. In Khrushchev's image of future war,
even with surprise missile attack neither great power could prevent
devastating retaliation by the other side. He refers to Soviet
development of an intercontinental missile structure in this de-
terrent and retaliatory context. He promises that the USSR will
have an assured second strike capability with missiles duplicated,
tripilicated, dispersed and concealed. And in this connection he
recognizes, more clearly than in any other authoritative Soviet
pronouncement, that future war would "little resemble previous wars"
and would be characterized from the very start by massive nuclear
strikes into the homelands of both sides.
3. Khrushchev (and still more markedly Malinovsky on the next
day), stress that while nuclear-armed missile forces, are becoming
there remains a need for balanced and varied capabilities, even in
general war. While the precise nature of this balance in the new,
projected force structure is not revealed, Khrushchev does declare
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that the ground forces are being reduced in size, that in the future
the surface naval force "will no longer play its foxrccer role,"
and that "almcot the whole of the air forces is being replaced by
missiles." T"'.o the weapons systems which can be replace' by ro~:kets
-- bombers, fighters, surface warships, and some artillery -- are
increasingly to be superseded by.'Uissiles. her combat components
will be reduced, but their effectiveness will be enhanced by
modernization of equipment and increased firepower. Moreover, the
mobilization potential will still remain very high, as Khrushchev
pointed out in his speech.
1. We do not believe that soviet capabilities for limited
military action in peripheral areas will be impaired. For such
purposes, the reduction in numbers will be offset by the continuing
emphasis on firepower and mobility -? among other things, by the
improvement in Soviet airlift capabilities.
Economic Implications
5. Khrushchev derided the notion, that the USSR was compelled
by economic consideration to reduce its armed forces. Re asserted
that the Seven-Year Plan could have been fulfilled without trot,
reductions, and that the USSR was proceeding from economic strength,
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not from budgetary weakness. In our Judgment, the USSR would prob-
ably have fulfilled the industrial Goals of the Seven-Year Ilan
even without these cutbacks. Nevertheless, the force reductions
will have marked and favorable economic implications for the USSR,
and it is clear that Khrushchev views these as important.
6. Transfer of 1.2 million men from the military establishment
to the civilian labor force, together with other measures presently
underway, would virtually solve the manpower shortage which was
estimated in NIE 11-4-59 to be one of the main probleris in ful-
filling the Seven-Year Plan. Moreover, rough calculation indicates
that if (as Khrushchev says) the Soviets have 600,000 fewer r;er: under
arms that we estiraated, the cost of their military establishment the fug re may
be of the order of 20 billion: rubies less than our estimate. /if
Khrushchev's plans are carried out, total military costs will still
probably increase slightly, since the savings occasioned by re-
ductions in personnel strength will be more than offset by rising
costs cf new weapons syystems. The greater availability of resources,
particularly labor, for Plan fulfillment makes virtually certain
that the basic industrial gcals of the Plan will not only be met
but to some extent overfulfi]-led.
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~Tnternal T~oliticel Tc~,plicatiors
7. The shifts in military policy proposed by Khrushchev have
aroused considerable discussion, and probably some disagreement,
in the upper ranks of the Soviet hierarchy. A number of private
statements by k'hruahchev have indicated that his ideas on the re-
duction and .eorganization of the armed forces have net with
opposition from military leaders. Much of Mirushchev's speech was
devoted to reassuring his Soviet audience that the security of the
USSR will no z be impaired. The unusual attention which Khrushchev
paid in his speech to the attitude of military personnel, and the
promises he made for their future employment when demobilized,
suggest that he was particularly eager to quiet apprehensions among
then. But Khrushchev's plans almost certainly will not arouse
opposition on a scale :Likely to prevent him from carrying them out.
Foreign Psi y
8. Khrushchev's speech was exuberant with confidence in the
strength and destiny of the USSR. "Never before," he declared,
"has the influence of the Soviet Union in international affairs,
its prestige as a stronghold of peace, been so great as today."
Once again he proclaimed that a fundamental shift has taken piace
in the balance of power between the "socialist" and "capitalist"
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states, and that realization ,:)f this was increasingly spreadin?; in
the Western countries. The speech appeared in nany ways to be
especially designed to indicate Soviet strenC h vis-a-vis the US
on the eve of the summit conference. We do not consider, however,
that the speech was ;,