ABSTRACT
During the mid-1980s a wide range of factors emerged to influence significantly Soviet military strategy. A wide variety of internal and external political, economic, and social factors have coalesced to produce striking change in the Soviet Union and its former satellites. The Soviets also realized that advantage accrued to that force which could quickly close with the enemy, thus rendering high-precision weapons less effective. Soviet strategy in the early 1960s focused on denying any opposing state or alliance a first-strike capability, and in the 1970s and 1980s the Soviet concept of the theater-strategic offensive was designed to counter variants 3 and 4 in both a nuclear and a conventional sense. The Soviet view of future war, potential threats, and possible threat scenarios generates a series of strategic requirements which must be satisfied by future Soviet military policy and doctrine.
