ABSTRACT
Mikhail Sergeyevich Gorbachev appears to believe that Soviet military and political objectives in Europe may be promoted by substantive progress in conventional arms control. In April 1986, Gorbachev conceded for the first time that a European conventional arms reduction treaty could include reductions on Soviet territory, that the zone of reductions would cover “the entire European territory from the Atlantic to the Urals.” In autumn 1988, the Soviet General Staff and Ministry of Defense were allegedly trying to define the criteria of non-offensive defense for “the structure of the armed forces, the deployment of the armed forces, the character of the armed forces.” The approximate twelve percent reduction in the Soviet armed forces was announced at a time when the draft system and the terms of military service were being openly and critically debated in the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.
