No Objection To Declassification 2008 11 11 NLC-7-52-6-4-7 MEMORANDUM TOP SECRET SENSITIVE OUTSIDE THE SYSTEM THE WHITE HOUSE WASHINGTON August 19 1978 MEMORANDUM FOR ZBIGNIEW BRZEZINSKI FROM WILLIAM ODOM SUBJECT Backg round for your SAC NORAD Trip Trip Purposes Get a personal sense for the forces equipment and command proceduresi inspire the officers arid troops by your personal attention expressed in--this visit--something not to underestimate and something you will do easily and with great impact Get a better sense for the relation between the realities of our forces structure and c3I on the one hand and a number of on-going policy issues on the other Some examples are the targeting study the secure reserve force study adequacy of our intelligence capability policy on theater nuclear forces and arms control efforts including SALT ASAT and verification The Larger Perspective for the Trip Three general questions provide a larger conceptual framework for organizing what yoµ want to learn They flow from the doctrinal differences between war fighting and deterrence They can be put this way What is different about the kinds of forces and c 3 I that one buys for a deterrence posture as opposed to the forces one would buy for a war fighting posture How would the forces and c3I for one posture interact in a conflict with the forces and c3I of the other posture What changes and improvements in our own forces are implied by answers to the above questions These questions should inspire concern with The length of a war What one targets NSC review s completed OSD Review completed No Objection To Declassification 2008 11 11 NLC-7-52-6-4-7 - No Objection To Declassification 2008 11 11 NLC-7-52-6-4-7 TOP SECRET SENSITIVE 2 Flexibility in targeting The coordination or absence of it between strategic and other forces in the campaign What the enemy will shoot at with his strategic forces Survivability of c3I forces Mobilization capabilities Soviet views forces and plans Specific Issues and Areas of Concern I Command Control communications and Tnte lligence There are two kinds of problems in c 3 I The first most serious is whether the Soviets Could attack our c3r in a way that would prevent us from retal1 at1 ng Second 1 s our c 3 I adequate for sustained war fighting Could we manage flexible planning for supporting theater campaigns Do our intelligence assets provide timely enough information to support operational needs And will they survive More specific questions you might ask on these points are bombers Where are weak links in communications with the ICBM's -SSBN's Can our communications equipment withstand the electro-magnetic impact -- MP they would receive from nuclear blasts For how long could the Soviets repeat and sustain EMP over large parts of the U S Are our satellite ground stations hard those outside the U S I What about -- Should any actions be taken to enhance connectivity amongst our critical c3I modes What Should we have mobile satellite ground stations Redundancy • No Objection To Declassification 2008 11 11 NLC-7-52-6-4-7 • No Objection To Declassification 2008 11 11 NLC-7-52-6-4-7 • TOP SECRET SENSITIVE 3 Do we have any backup reserve satellites ready to launch to replace damaged ones during a campaign Congressional oversight committees have concluded that our intelligence is adequate for peacetime only---if this is true what should be done to improve the situation strike How will SAC update its intelligence after the first Successive strikes Can the air command post do more than manage SIOP-type options How will its intelligence and force connectivity be kept up to date in the weeks and months after a war begins Where will surviving SAC bombers go after the initial strikes If public electrical power is lost can the ICBM force still launch How long can it endure without public electrical power II Planning a·nd Targeting As the PD-18 targeting study indicates our major planning effort has been on the SIOP and its MAO and SAO variants The SIOP is no small achievement but its great complexity also introduces rigidities As you recall from IVORY ITEMS once there was a search for refinements to adjust a retaliatory response to various and different situations the rigidity became apparent--e g recalling the bombers after a couple of hours That is still virtually undoable'without calling off every other part of the SIOP Another problem lies in -the integration of our strategic forces with SACEUR's theater nuclear forces The same problem also exists in Korea although it does not get the same attention Here is the problem as I understand it If SACEUR shoots his general strike plan TNF in conjunction with the SIOP things are all right If they are fired separately great gaps occur The most troublesome aspect of this seems to be the possibility of escalation in Europe which we want to hold at the theater level There are differirig views on the adequacy of our present pianning of nuclear fires for that event No Objection To Declassification 2008 11 11 NLC-7-52-6-4-7 • No Objection To Declassification 2008 11 11 NLC-7-52-6-4-7 • • TOP SECRET SENSITIVE ij 4 LNO's and RNO's are the planning devices which are meant to move us away from the SIOP rigidity The ones now planned are largely academic exercises because circumstances military and political will never be exactly as assumed in the planning phase The direction to move with LNO's is toward more speed in planning them for particular situations as they arise - -You should try to get a good sense for SAC's lack of flexibility and speed in- such planning SAC and the Air Force like to evade this issue because it shows so clearly how they are unprepared for anything but the big spastic retaliation You will want to ask about secure reserve force This topic like LNO's brings up the question of how long a war will last and how to endure for the long campaign SAC is very weak on this matter The planners don't know what they would target with the SRF and they are not sure how they will control them SRF is also a _ bone of inter-service contention The Navy likes to use SRF for justifying more SSBN's and SAC knows that creating a survivable SRF from bombers and ICBM's is not promising That is another reason SAC shows low interest f SRF planning l On targeting priorities you have read the memos from Huntington and Utgoff and you may want to discuss economic recovery versus military forces in_- targeting This topic becomes scholastic very quickly Once you move to duration of the war planning flexibility c 3 I SRF etc the targeting priori ties are · implicitly reversed The subject remains important however for the structure of the SIOP The following list of short questions may be useful in probing the briefers How long does it take to plan an LNO from scratch Who can plan LNO's campaign place JCS SAC Could SAC support SACEUR in a theater nuclear Who would control planning Where would it take How will targets be identified for LNO's How will damage be assessed after LNO's have been fired No Objection To Declassification 2008 11 11 NLC-7-52-6-4-7 No Objection To Declassification 2008 11 11 NLC-7-52-6-4-7 TOP SECRET SENSITIVE 5 Are LNO's coordinated with actions by other forces Ground offensives If so what is the planning link to the land force commander 1 Could we track target and hit a Soviet naval task force at sea with an LNO What constitutes our Secure Reserve Force we know it is secure f How do What will we target with the SRF - How will we assess SRF damage ---- _ -· Will the SRF be coordinated with theater forces Europe after a SIOP exchange Could surviving SSBN's be reloaded with SLBM's Where Would it make sense to build and store extra SLBM's Do we have any industrial mobilization for missile production in the event of a long nuclear war · •• • - 'I' _ _ _ •• - _ _ _ - -• - _ • · I ------ -- o we h - -- __ - - - 3 _ What does the increasing number of Soviet rail _ mobile command posts and airborne command posts mean for our targeting and planning Does our target list have all the Soviet c3r bunkers in the USSR In East Europe Could we launch an LNO on only Soviet theater c3I in East Europe Does SACEUR in his RNO context have the capability to destroy Warsaw Pact c3I d How f ar down t h e command line can SAC r ee acquire an target command posts Front Army Group Army Division III Interaction of u s and Soviet Forces and c3I This topic pushes up the force structure implications of planning and programming for a deterrence doctrine versus planning and programming for a war fighting doctrine No Objection To Declassification 2008 11 11 NLC-7-52-6-4-7 - No Objection To Declassification 2008 11 11 NLC-7-52-6-4-7 ' A_ ' G - _ _ j ' A -1 4 t TOP SECRET SENSITIVE ILLEGIB 6 I am attaching at Tab Ea special paper done for me by a concerned denizen in the depths of CIA His thoughts are based on close examination of several years of Soviet military exercises His most striking conclusion is the growing Soviet interest in nuclear conflicts limited in one fashion or another Bob Rosenberg's SAC NORAD trip report Tab D summarizes Intelligence Community growing evidence of a Soviet ustained war fi hting capability Flexibility use of nuclear forces in combination with other forces and scenarios allowing for slower escalation are the hallmarks cif Soviet exercise evolution Some questions in this area are Where are the weak points in the Soviet approach What changes are we making to take into account changing Soviet capabilities and exercise practices -- What should be done as opposed to what is being done What are the implications of ASAT developments both Soviets and U S 25X1 -- What is the consequence of the compromise What can be done about it Bob Rosenberg suggests ou discuss this with Bill Perry during the trip and 1n1t1ate a counters to damage assessment effort IV IVORY ITEM and NORAD At NORAD you should ask General Hill about his problems with IVORY ITEM In short the issue is this The JCS in designating an IVORY ITEM scenario assumes a sequence of enemy actions When the President asks General Hill for refinements and clarifications of the enemy action he may not have them in his JCS brief If he makes them up he risks throwing the entire scenario off base You might ask General Hill and General Ellis about trying some IVORY ITEM-drills where a war begins in Europe or Korea with conventional forces and then escalates to the nuclear level In other words can we use the IVORY ITEM format to discover more clearly our ability to control escalation and to keep things at the theater level An IVORY ITEM for an LNO scenario might also be interesting No Objection To Declassification 2008 11 11 NLC-7-52-6-4-7 25X1 - No Objection To Declassification 2008 11 11 NLC-7-52-6-4-7 TOP SECRET SENSITIVE V 7 Arms Control Force Postures and Doctrine Senator Nunn has recently declared that our arms control-negotiating requirements drive our military programs while the Soviet programs drive their negotiating requirements During the trip test this proposition Deterrence ties our arms control approach to our force developments Is dete rence an adequate paradigm for integrating arms control'1Pi -ograms Or is it encouraging us to launch program that do little to improve our military capabilities Some examples MAPS for the ICBM force while ignoring c 3 r Launch from under attack Targeting policy fixes to compensate for Soviet civil defense Targeting priority on economic recovery rather than flexibility to adapt to appropriate policy objectives during a war No Objection T_o Declassific tiof 1008 11 11 NLC-7-52-6-4-7