Disengagement Zones: A Step Towards Meaningful Defence?
| Published date | 01 March 1983 |
| DOI | 10.1177/002234338302000102 |
| Author | Per Berg,Sverre Lodgaard |
| Date | 01 March 1983 |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
Disengagement
Zones:
A
Step
Towards
Meaningful
Defence?
PER
BERG
and
SVERRE
LODGAARD
Stockholm
International
Peace
Research
Institute,
SIPRI
To
raise
the
nuclear
threshold
in
Europe,
several
suggestions
have
been
made
to
remove
battlefield
nuclear
weapons
a
certain
distance
east
and
west
of
the
dividing
line
in
Central
Europe.
Concurrent
conventional
arrangements
are
envisaged:
linking
the
withdrawal
of
nuclear
weapons
to
an
agreement
on
mutual
(balanced)
force
reductions
(M(B)FR);
unilateral
action
to
compensate
for
Western
conventional
inferiority,
as
is
often
argued
in
the
West;
or
withdrawing
major
conventional
weapons
suited
for
offensive
uses
from
the
zone,
as
is
argued
in
this
paper.
A
combined
nuclear
and
conventional
disengagement
may
not
only
raise
the
nuclear
threshold
but
also,
at
the
same
time,
enhance
the
effectiveness
of
conventional
defence.
Possible
restrictions
are
discussed
in
some
detail,
and
related
to
new
concepts
of
conventional
defence
which
have
attracted
increasing
attention
and
support
in
recent
years:
the
concept
of
territorial
defence,
primarily
developed
in
the
Federal
Republic
and
in
Austria
under
the
common
designation
of
"Raumverteidigung",
and
the
Airland
concept,
epitomi-
zed
in
a
new
Field
Manual
for the
US
Army.
1.
On
the
rationale
for
withdrawal
of
battle-
field
nuclear
weapons
There
is
wide
agreement
that
in
the
military
contingency
planning
for
Europe,
too
much
emphasis
is
paid
to
early
use
of
nuclear
wea-
pons.
Measures
to
raise
the
nuclear
threshold
are
therefore
in
high
demand.
Proposals
to
that
effect
are
sometimes
criti-
cized
with
reference
to
the
devastating
effects
of
modern
conventional
weapons,
on
the
basis
that
any
war
in
such
a
dense
military
field
as
Central
Europe
would
be
an
unprecedented
ca-
tastrophy.
In
a
sense,
this
is
true:
if
used
in
a
ruthless
manner,
cluster/fragmentation
muni-
tions,
fuel
air
explosives
and
incendiary
wea-
pons
can
cause
destruction
of
such
a
high
order
that,
to
some,
the
difference
between
nuclear
and
conventional
war
would
seem
to
be
a
dif-
ference
in
killing
mode,
not
in
killing
magni-
tude.
However,
while
conventional
technolog-
ies
have
great
destructive
potential,
a
main
trend
in
the
development
of
these
technologies
is
higher
precision
in
delivery,
and
vehicles
homing
in
on
military
targets
have
high
kill
capabilities
while
causing
relatively
low
collat-
eral
damage.
For
instance,
precision
guided
munitions
substantially
reduce
the
need
for
&dquo;area
coverage&dquo;
to
stop
armoured
units.
Therefore,
new
conventional
technologies
do
not
necessarily
make
future
conventional
wars
more
devastating
for
the
civilian
environment.
1
However,
the
claim
that
use
of
nuclear
wea-
pons
does
not
make
much
of
a
difference
when
it
comes
on
top
of
intense
conventional
war-
fare
-
and
that
prevention
of
nuclear
war
is
therefore
an
insignificant
matter
in
comparison
with
the
prevention
of
war
in
general
-
is
a
psychological
deception.
When
confronted
with
violence
beyond
some
high
level,
people
often
fail
to
recognise,
or
fully
comprehend,
even
order
of
magnitude
differences
in
the
da-
mage
actually
inflicted.
This
is
but
one
exam-
ple
of
a
general
tendency
to
be
blind
to
pheno-
mena
that
appear
on
unusual
scales.
In
reality,
the
effects
of
nuclear
weapons
re-
main
different
from
those
of
conventional
,ones,
and
it
is
vitally
important
that
the
distinc-
tion
between
them
is
clearly
recognised,
i.e.
that
the
threshold
continues
to
be
salient.
To
raise
the
nuclear
threshold,
several
sug-
gestions
have
been
made
for
the
removal
of
battlefield
nuclear
weapons
a
certain
distance
East
and
West
of
the
dividing
line
in
Central
Europe.
These
suggestions
may
be
linked
to
the
proposals
for
nuclear
weapon-free
zones
in
Northern
and
Southern
Europe,
forming
a
zone
free
from
nuclear
weapons
running
all
the
way
from
the
Northern
to
the
Southern
edge
of
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