THE SOVIET NAVAL PRESENCE IN THE INDIAN OCEAN

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP79R00904A001500020001-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: T
• Document Page Count: 14
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: June 29, 2005
• Sequence Number: 1
• Publication Date: December 14, 1970
• Content Type: MF

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C E N T R A L I N T E L L I G E N C E A G E N C Y
OFFICE OF NATIONAL ESTIMATES
14 December 1970
MEMORANDUM FOR THE DIRECTOR (Draft for Board Consideration)
SUBJECT: The Soviet Naval Presence in the Indian Ocean
Nature of the Presence
1. The Soviet Navy first became active in the Indian
Ocean during the International Geophysical Year, 1957-58, with
the dispatch of an oceanographic research research ship for
intelligence gathering. From then until 1965-66, activity was
maintained by the deployment of two to three ships per year on
extended oceanographic cruises. The first appearance of a
combatant came in early 1965 when the USSR sent a destroyer to
join the Ethiopian. Navy Day celebrations at Massawa. This
was done again in 1966 and 1967. In mid-sutmner 1967, the
Soviets dispatched 15 ships into the Indian Ocean in support
of space operations. Among them were space event support
ships, tankers, and auxiliaries.
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2. But the year 1968 marked the real beginnings of
increased Soviet naval deployments to the Indian Ocean. In
March of that year, three combatants, supported by two tankers,
cruised for four months, making port calls in eight countries.
Since then, surface ships and submarines from both the Pacific
Fleet and the western Fleets have deployed to the Indian Ocean.
In some cases western Fleet combatants have been transferred
to Pacific Fleet control after lengthy Indian Ocean cruises.
Combatants deployment since 1968 has included a guided missile
cruiser, a guided missile destroyer, a tank landing ship, and
one or two submarines. These ships have generally remained in
the ocean for anywhere from three to six months with approxi-
mately three months elapsing between deployments. In addition,
the Soviets usually keep at least one destroyer in the Indian
Ocean between and during major deployments. At present, the
Soviets have three surface combatants and a submarine there.
3. Until now, the Soviets appear to have relied on
accompanying auxiliaries to provide maintenance by way of
necessary fuel and dry and refrigerated stores. Typical
support for deployed combatants consists of three auxiliaries
and two tankers. As is common Soviet practice in other distant
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areas, naval units operating in the Indian Ocean use a number
of anchorages outside territorial waters as waiting positions,
refueling points, and areas for general support. We have
identified five such areas, all in the western Indian Ocean.
The Soviets have, meanwhile, made efforts to obtain ashore
support facilities of the kind now available to them in the UAR.
So far, the search has not been successful.
4. Since March of 1968, about half of the Soviet naval
units in the Indian Ocean have been oceanographic and space-
related ships. (Although naval-subordinated, these ships are
unarmed.) During the past two years there usually have been
at least one and sometimes as many as five oceanographic
ships operating there. The number of space-support ships
deployed has varied according to the tempo of the Soviet space
program. With the launching of Zond 7 in August 1969 there
was a high of nine to the Indian Ocean; in mid-1970 there was
only one.
5. The largest deployment of combatants occurred in
April 1970 in connection with the Soviet world-wide naval
exercise "Ocean", when six surface combatants and two sub-
marines were in the Indian Ocean. The presence of only four
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or five combatants is, at present, the typical pattern. The
greater number of Soviet naval vessels in the area are unarmed
auxiliaries, oceanographic research, and space-support ships
-- of questionable value for "showing the flag" or gunboat
diplomacy.
Soviet Purposes
6. Thus, Soviet naval activities in the Indian Ocean
serve a number of military or quasi-military purposes. They
support space operations. They are concerned with intelligence
gathering. The oceanographic operations undoubtedly are
connected with efforts to improve Soviet ASW techniques. By
giving crews operational experience in previously unfamiliar
waters, they assist the Soviet navy in its efforts to extend
its range and, in general, to develop further its blue-water
capability. They prepare the way, against the day when the
Suez Canal is reopened, for the establishment of a convenient
transit route between the USSR's eastern and western Fleet
operating areas. And, finally, Soviet naval units are a
potential safeguard for the USSR's civil maritime operations
in the area.
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7. But operations in the Indian Ocean are, at the same
time, part of a large pattern which is not specifically
military in conception. This pattern encompasses an array of
operations outside the traditional operating sphere of the
Soviet navy. In this sense the Indian Ocean presence does
for the USSR some of the same things as its presence in the
Mediterranean and in the Caribbean. Broadly speaking,. It
supports the USSR's image of itself as a super-power. This
image has caused it to seek something like equality with the
US across the whole spectrum of international power. This
has meant, among other things, that Moscow has set out to
establish a naval presence which is international in scope.
Moscow probably envisages a future, not too distant, when the
Soviet navy will be able to move about in all of the oceans
and seas of the world.
8. Events of recent years have undoubtedly hastened the
maturing of this ambition. The Soviet-American confrontation
over Cuba and US intervention in Vietnam revealed that the US,
by virtue of its superiority in applicable conventional mili-
tary means, had options not available to the USSR. The Arab-
Israeli war in 1967 found the Russians without a credible
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capacity for military intervention to put onto the scales and,
thereby, in a weakened diplomatic position. And these experi-
ences apart, the Soviets became convinced that their competition
with the West and China for influence in the Third World at
large would be more effective if it had some military backing.
9. There is, of course, a considerable potential for
turbulence at many points along the long littoral of the Indian
Ocean and its contiguous waterways, the Arabian Sea, the Persian
Gulf and the Red Sea. It is not difficult to conceive of
circumstances arising in which the Russians would consider a
show of force to be politically expedient and risk-free. They
showed off the coast of Ghana in 1969 that they do not disdain
the practice of gunboat diplomacy. In certain corners of the
Indian Ocean even a handful of naval units might represent a
credible intervention force. Such thoughts have probably
occurred to the Russians. But such contingencies are unfore-
seeable. For now, the Russians evidently expect their poli-
tical profits to derive simply from their increased visi-
bility. This show-the-flag policy seems intended to accomplish
several aims: to make clients and potential clients aware of
the USSR's might; to demonstrate that the USSR has political
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interests in the area; and, to warn its antagonists in this
case both the Western powers and the Chinese -- that it does
not lack military means to support its interests on the spot.
10. This instrument of influence supplements but does not
displace other instruments. Moscow will undoubtedly continue
efforts to expand its diplomatic and trade relations throughout
the area. It will not be surprising if the Russians repeat
the signal given by Brezhnev last year that they are prepared
to assist in the organization of a collective security system
for Asia. Genuine or not such a proposal, together with
other Soviet efforts, may seem to Moscow a useful way of
reminding the nations of the area that the USSR is a power to
be reckoned with and of getting them to begin to think of
friendship with the USSR as an alternative to Chinese domina-
tion or alignment with the West. The all but total withdrawal
of British military power from East of Suez and uncertainty
about the future role of the US have, indeed, already given
this line of thought some appeal.
11. Even now, for instance, the notion that the advent
of the Russians may not represent a threat but might, instead,
be desirable as a counterweight to the Chinese (and, some would
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say, the Japanese as well) finds some favor in Southeast Asia.
it is not entirely rejected even in Australia, though there
the more prevalent attitude is one of concern about the growing
Soviet presence. To some of the non-Communist governments
of the region the Russians have come, in fact, to seem almost
like an anti-revolutionary force by contrast with the Chinese.
12. The limited presence represented by current Soviet
deployments is, however, one thing. It might be quite another
if the Russians were thought to be trying to establish mili-
tary domination of the area. There would be considerable
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alarm in Australia which would look to the US for counterreaction.
It would probably revive expiring concern about Soviet
intentions among the Southeast Asian states. Such a develop-
ment would surely not be welcomed in South Asia, either by
Pakistan or India. The latter, for all its relations with the
USSR to assuage its fears of China, does not face a Chinese
naval threat. If it had its way there would be no naval
forces, Western or Soviet in the Indian Ocean. It has
refused.
13. In the western reaches of the Indian Ocean, the
political objectives to which the Soviet naval presence lends
some support lack a single focus. The show of the Soviet flag
in East Africa may give the Russians some added measure of
prestige relative to the West, and the Chinese. But it is yet
to be shown that tie political impact is significant. The
USSR's interest in the Red Sea area seems to be more a function
of its Middle East policy than of Indian Ocean policy. It is
not clear what kind of position the Soviets hope to stake out
in the Persian Gulf. Tempting as it might be to them, any
thought of their going for control over Gulf oil is likely to
be seen as impractical for some time to come. Simply a bid for
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major influence in the area would probably be sufficient to
provoke a strong reaction among the Western powers and in
Iran with whom Moscow seems to have a serious interest in
cultivating better relations. But, if only because of the
uncertain political future of the area and the possibility
that unforeseen opportunities will appear, Moscow will not
let its now established right to a presence there lapse. In
all of these areas, Soviet naval operations have, of course,
been greatly hampered by the closure of the Suez Canal. The
Russians might be able to reduce this handicap by obtaining
shore facilities at, for instance, Aden, or at Hodeida in
Yemen or Berbera in Somalia, where the Russians have helped
with the construction of deep-water ports. There is no
evidence, however, that they have applied for such facilities.
Further Development of the Soviet Presence
14. It is quite evident that the Russians are not wholly
satisfied with their present naval capability in the Indian
Ocean. Their attempts to obtain port facilities for their
naval vessels in India and Singapore means that they want at
least to ease some of the operational problems they now face.
It might mean that they are looking ahead to the enlargement
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of their force. Some enlargement seems entirely possible. But
how far and how fast they are likely to want to go in this
direction is open to question. It may be that deployment into
the area, once begun, will acquire a momentum of its own. The
reopening of Suez, by greatly facilitating the movement of
Soviet vessels into and across the Indian Ocean, would be
sure to bring some increase in Soviet naval operations there,
perhaps a substantial increase. (This would, in turn, make
the acquisition of shore facilities on the coasts of the Red
Sea and East Africa or at Aden all the more desirable from a
military point of view.) The future course of events in the
area itself might cause Moscow to expand its involvement
as it did in the Mediterranean.
15. But there is no evident reason why, until or unless
some or all of these things happen, a force not greatly larger
than the present one should not suit Moscow's political
purposes. Despite the growth of its interest in the area and
the trend toward expansion of its presence, it clearly has
more vital concerns closer to them, in Europe and on the Sino-
Soviet frontier and in the Mediterranean, which will no doubt
continue to have a higher claim on the USSR's economic and
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and military resources. It does not need to undertake a sub-
stantially larger deployment in order to keep pace with its
competitors given the negligible Western naval presence and
the non-existent Chinese one. And, it is not easy to imagine
events developing there, as the Arab-Israeli conflict caused
them to develop in the Middle East, in such a way as to draw
the USSR into considerably deeper involvement.
16. Despite political trends in the area generally
favorable to their objectives, resistance to the expansion of
their military presence, on the part of some of the littoral
states as well as of the Western powers, is not likely to
evaporate completely. To the extent that difficulty in
obtaining shore facilities obliges them to depend mainly on
at-sea support of their vessels, the expansion and improve-
ment of their operational capabilities will be impeded. Some
concern for the hazards of reliance on the hospitality of
local states and a residual regard for their anti-imperialist
image may, in any case, incline the Russians to keep the use
of shore facilities to a minimum.
17. The Soviets would probably increase their ASW
operations in the Indian Ocean if it became, or they suspected
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it was about to become, an area of regular deployment of US
missile submarines. But there is no good reason, otherwise,
to expect a precipitate increase in Soviet military interest
in the area. It can be doubted that Moscow thinks of its
present force as the nucleus of some future force endowed with
a militarily significant offensive capability. It would only
make sense for the Russians to establish such a force if they
thought it could play an effective role in a conflict between
conventional forces in conditions of general war. But, the
Russians are not likely to regard this as an advantageous
theater of major engagement because of the severe problems
of support and reinforcement which they could expect to face
in time of war. These would be owing to the fact that control
of key points on the sea routes from Soviet home bases to the
area -- the Skagerak, the Turkish Straits.. Gibraltar, the Cape
of Good Hope, the South China Sea and the Indonesian straits
is now, and is likely to remain, in unfriendly or potentially
unfriendly hands.
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