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WEEKLY NEWSLETTER
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Soviet Union
Index
The belief that history was on the side of socialism and that
Marxism-Leninism was a basis for discovering "objective" laws
governing social and economic change has caused a proliferation of
laws and principles in Soviet military thought. On the most general
level, the laws of war were factors determining the course and
outcome of wars. These laws expressed the political philosophy of
the CPSU in the military sphere. These laws, however, were not
immutable and could change with the emergence of new military
technologies and new operational concepts.
Joseph V. Stalin, general secretary of the party between 1922
and 1953, believed in the existence of five "permanently operating
factors": the stability of the rear, the morale of the army, the
quantity and quality of divisions, the armaments of the armed
forces, and the organizational ability of the commanders. These
factors served as forerunners of the laws of war that were in force
in 1989. Because Stalin's permanently operating factors did not
take nuclear weapons into account, by the 1960s Soviet military
political writers had largely discounted them. A new set of laws,
taking into account new weapons, the new strategic environment, and
the probability that future war would be mainly nuclear, did not
appear until l972, with the publication of Colonel Vasilii E.
Savkin's The Basic Principles of Operational Art and
Tactics. Savkin's four laws of war in the nuclear era specified
four factors upon which the course and outcome of a war waged with
unlimited use of all means of conflict depended. First, he said it
depended on the correlation of available military forces; second,
on the correlation of the overall military potential of each side;
third, on the political content of the war; and fourth, on the
correlation of the
moral-political capabilities (see Glossary) and
the psychological capabilities of the people and armies of the
combatants.
In l977 the Soviet Military Encyclopedia refined and
augmented Savkin's laws and listed six laws of war that the l984
edition of Marxist-Leninist Teaching on War and the Army
reiterated almost verbatim. According to the most recent set of
laws, the course and outcome of war depended on the following
factors: the political goals of the war, which had to be just and
revolutionary; and the correlation of the economic forces,
scientific potentials, moral-political forces, and military forces
of the warring sides. Yet another law, added in the 1984 edition of
Marxist-Leninist Teaching on War and the Army, stressed the
"dependence of the development and changes in the methods of
warfare on quantitative and qualitative changes in military
technology and on the moral and combat qualities of the military
personnel."
Since Savkin first formulated his laws of war in l972, a
reordering of priorities has occurred. Savkin put the strictly
military, primarily nuclear capabilities in first place. In l977
and l984, however, they occupied last place, with political goals
in first place. The l984 edition reflected the realization that new
weapons and new strategies could revolutionize future warfare and
that high standards of training and combat readiness of military
personnel would assume more importance than before.
In addition to the laws of war just listed, which mainly
influenced the course of war, Marxist-Leninist thought ostensibly
has discovered the "law of objective victory," which predetermined
the outcome of war and expressed the "historical inevitability of
the triumph of the new over the old." That is, victory would go to
the side that represented the new, more progressive socioeconomic
system and that used the country's potential more effectively.
Soviet military-political writers often cited Soviet victory in
World War II as historic proof that no force in the world was
capable of stopping the progress of a socialist society. Soviet
military theorists also have invoked the experience of World War II
to prove the superiority of a socialist economy in supplying
weapons and war matériel. They have stressed Soviet ability to
produce sophisticated military technology. "Victory will be with
the countries of the world socialist system," Soviet military
writers announced confidently in l968, because "they have the
latest weapons." In l984 Colonel General Dmitrii A. Volkogonov,
chief editor of the 1984 edition of Marxist-Leninist Teaching on
War and the Army, made the relationship between weapons and
victory even more specific when he wrote that "the attainment of
victory is directly dependent on the availability [of] and
sufficient quantity of modern means of warfare."
Data as of May 1989
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