While the population is being trained in the use of this equipment, radiation meters are to be issued only to civil defense personnel. It is believed that there is no need to provide the general population with such instruments since most people will be in public shelters, under the supervision of civil defense shelter teams and will not be allowed to leave them without permission. Since persons in apartment house basement shelters cannot stay in them for the 2 or more weeks necessary in highly contaminated areas, it is planned to evacuate them through partly decontaminated passages to radiation free areas nearby. The feasibility of the Soviet postattack plans will, of course, largely depend on the scale and character of the attack. SOVIET PROGRAM PROGRESSING The available evidence leaves no doubt that the Soviet authorities are serious about civil defense and that they have been trying over a period of years to develop within the limits of available financial, technical, and material resources a significant civil defense capability. It is not a mere paper program. At the same time it appears to be far from complete although it has made considerable progress. One thing, they have no hearings on it. Its implementation has, of course, been considerably facilitated by the totalitarian character of the Soviet system. Nevertheless, the Soviet civil defense system appears to contain some obsolete or even irrational features and there has been some lag in adapting it to meet new requirements imposed by weapon developments. Whether these shortcomings are due to budgetary and technical limitations or to bureaucratic inertia is not certain, but constant efforts are being made to improve the effectiveness of the system and its ability to deal with new threats. LIMITED AND FAVORABLE CIRCUMSTANCES ASSUMED It is quite evident that the Soviet leaders have been unwilling or unable to invest in a civil defense system which would be effective for the entire range of possible attacks. Instead, the system is designed to provide different degrees of protection for various elements of the population and its effectiveness is largely dependent on the receipt of adequate advanced warning. This does not mean that the Soviet leaders have not considered other forms of war initiation or attacks (which they have) or that the civil defense program is merely intended to reassure the population (which it does not). Nor does it necessarily indicate a lack of coordination between the thinking of the civil defense and military authorities. Not only is the program far too complex and costly to serve merely the purpose of boosting popular morale, but there is considerable evidence that the Soviet political as well as military leaders also believe in the possibility of receiving early indications and warning of enemy intentions. At least they appear to think that the growth of Soviet military and retaliatory power reduces the likelihood that any enemy would choose to launch an unprovoked surprise attack on the Soviet Union. t These expectations appear to justify the investment in a civil defense system which is essentially designed to perform most effectively under a limited and rather favorable range of circumstances. It also provides the leadership with the opportunity to use civil defense readiness in some situations for political and deterrent purposes. It is difficult to predict the further course of the Soviet civil defense efforts, or of the similar ones in the satellite countries. It is evident and significant, however, that despite the growing destructiveness of weapons and the necessarily limited effectiveness of their civil defense system, the Soviet leaders believe the program to be worth further efforts and continued investments. Mr. HOLIFIELD. Thank you, Mr. Gouré. Would you give us some idea of the source of your material here to assure us that you have reliable background support for your presentation? Mr. GOURÉ. Well, sir, my presentation here, is based entirely on Soviet sources and publications, plus traveler reports which are available in unclassified form. I have, of course, in the course of my work looked at all of the available sources, both classified and unclassified. Mr. HOLIFIELD. Mrs. Griffiths, any questions? SOVIET EMPHASIS ON BIOLOGICAL WARFARE AND CHEMICAL WARFARE Mrs. GRIFFITHS. Why would they spend so much time preparing against nerve gases and bacteriological warfare unless they planned on using it themselves? Mr. GOURÉ. Well, of course, they always accuse us of planning to initiate it, but they have always thought that chemical and bacteriological weapons are weapons of mass destruction like nuclear weapons, and that all these weapons would be used in case of war, since they are suitable for surprise attacks. Mrs. GRIFFITHS. Do you assume that they are prepared to use them? Mr. GOURÉ. I would say that they are seriously considering it, and whether they would or would not, would be a matter of military judgment on the effectiveness of the weapon rather than any other considerations. They have never explained, I should say, in their literature, why the West would want to use it in preference to nuclear weapons. They simply say that the West plans to do so. They also say that they would use it if they have to. They also say that the effectiveness of these weapons is constantly increasing. Mrs. GRIFFITHS. But could you make a population unable to protect itself within a matter of minutes by the use of this, or hours? Mr. GOURÉ. Yes, minutes in some cases, yes. You can, of course, if you-I mean, theoretically, if you have a sheltered population and you want to destroy certain elements of it which are regarded, at least as being sensitive, in the future, and this sheltered population is not protected against chemical and bacteriological warfare, and especially chemical, which is a quick-acting agent, it is easy to knock them out even if they are sheltered, because while they are sheltered against fallout they would not be protected against that unless proper filtration is added to the ventiliation system. The simple filter for fallout will not remove chemical agents. Mrs. GRIFFITHS. So you take over the productive capacity within their country within a relatively short time? Mr. GOURÉ. I am not really sure that anybody is quite certain how effective the chemical agents would be when used on a large scale but, in theory, at least, yes. SOVIET CIVIL DEFENSE INDOCTRINATION Mrs. GRIFFITHS. Why do you think that they do not broadcast their instructions on civil defense? Do they not have receivers or are they unwilling to tell the rest of the world what they are doing or do they keep down hysteria or do they permit the people to ask questions? Mr. GOURÉ. No, they never have done that even in the past. They have had a very protracted-I mean, this is the sixth or seventh civil defense program that they have instituted. I am talking only here about the postwar program. There is no need for it, really, because it is compulsory. There are special newspapers for it, and the people are instructed, and they simply have to attend the course. Those who have been selected to attend, attend. So there is no use to broadcast it as such, although locally it might be done on occasion or an occasional lecture. It is simply not necessary, really, in the same sense that you do not have to mobilize the population to take such a course. This is a compulsory mass program, just as many other Soviet programs are training or work compulsory mass programs. The Soviets calls them "voluntary compulsory.' You know how the Army works. "I want three volunteers, you and you and you." This is the way they operate, and they simply do not need it. Therefore, even in the past programs, it was very rare when the major newspapers, for example, would publish articles on civil defense, even during World War II or before. It was simply not neces sary. Mrs. GRIFFITHS. Of course, I would think it would be cheaper to tell them all at once. Mr. GOURÉ. Oh, they insist that the people learn it systematically; that they find out and that they go through the course. It is not just a question of lecture, because they have to learn the practical aspects of it, too. So the broadcasts are not good enough. Mrs. GRIFFITHS. They actually go through the exercise? Mr. GOURÉ. The first two courses, the first 32 hours, which were largely lecture courses, included at least training of how to wear gas masks, and protective clothing and so on. The last ones are actually carried out on training sites, not so much in the rooms, themselves, but especially in what they call training cities, which are, really, simply some areas reserved for this purpose where they can rescue people from a second story of a building and lower them down by ropes and fight fires and dig people out, and this sort of thing. Mrs. GRIFFITHS. I see. Thank you. |