ABSTRACT
The Soviet Union appears to be relatively far along in specifying the architecture of its strategic defense system, in developing the technologies that will undergird that system, and in deploying some of its elements. This chapter highlights the general parameters of Soviet thinking about military space and strategic defense systems so that a conceptual basis can be established for considering future systems. The differences in the two strategic defensive systems, US and USSR, derives from fundamentally different philosophies. “In the Soviet system military doctrine drives technology, while in the US, it’s the other way around.” The Soviet penchant for dialectical thinking led military thinkers in a natural way to begin early consideration of ways to defend against ballistic missiles. In considering the evolution of the Soviet strategic defense system, there are some other parameters that will influence its architecture, factors that have appeared in the Soviet military literature.
