ABSTRACT
The Soviet effort has been to build up its sea power and nuclear weapons of all categories, both ground and air nonnuclear forces have received an ample flow of resources. Instead of focusing on European-based nuclear weapons themselves, comparing them directly and unstrategically with those of the Soviet Union, their role is defined in terms of the broad needs of deterrence and defense at all levels of conflict. The intellectual foundations of main proposal were established long ago by Bernard Brodie, and it was his simple contention that a war in central Europe would be quite catastrophic even if entirely nonnuclear. Given the basic geographic asymmetry between North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the Warsaw Pact countries and also the fundamental imbalance in nonnuclear capabilities, the proposed force could do little to improve the relative strength of NATO's defense, assuming a reciprocal exchange.
