The Encirclement and Destruction of the Enemy During Combat Operations Not Involving the Use of Nuclear Weapons

Modern global war undoubtedly will be nuclear, according to General Shtrik. During an encirclement operation there is the constant threat of either side's launching a nuclear strike. Throughout the encirclement and destruction operation, each side will maintain its own nuclear weapons in a combat-ready status, prepared for the possibility that the other side may risk a first strike. Soviet military strategists have a somewhat different concept of the use of nuclear weapons in theater war than do their North Atlantic Treaty Organization counterparts. The complexity of encirclement will be in the fact that the defense, occupying a comparatively large territory and possessing high troop mobility, can offer most decisive resistance to attempts to encircle its major groupings. For carrying out an encirclement with the use of conventional weapons alone, it is obvious that a certain superiority over the enemy is required but this is not always achieved under the conditions being considered.