NATO and Increasing Soviet Naval Pressure

Abstract

The Soviet Navy's tremendous growth and the expansion of its area of operations offer a new and growing threat to the defense plans of the NATO nations. The new Soviet naval presence in the Mediterranean is particularly significant. Since World War II, the Mediterranean has been considered an exclusively Western area of operations; however, that is no longer the case. Currently, the US Sixth Fleet is usually outnumbered by the Soviet fleet at any given time in the Mediterranean. NATO is aware of this deficiency and is moving toward a solution-possibly by the establishment of a true NATO fleet. This would do away with territorial areas and the inherrent divisiveness that exists under current naval strategic policies. The problem is large, the criticality is acute, and by the 1980's the USSR may well be the greatest naval power in existence.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Feb 28, 1972
Accession Number
AD0764791

Entities

People

  • Grady A. Cole

Organizations

  • United States Army War College

Tags

Communities of Interest

  • Ground and Sea Platforms
  • Space
  • Weapons Technologies

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Air Power
  • Aircraft Carriers
  • Ballistic Missiles
  • Boats
  • Cruise Missiles
  • Determinants (Mathematics)
  • Geography
  • Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles
  • Intermediate Range Ballistic Missiles
  • Middle East
  • Naval Vessels
  • Navy
  • Second World War
  • Submarines
  • United States
  • Ussr
  • Weapons

Readers

  • European Security and Defence Policy (ESDP).
  • Logistics and Supply Chain Management.
  • Strategic Security Studies