Fortified Regions: What is the Operational Significance of the Employment ofFortified Regions for NATO and the United States

摘要

The background for reintroducing, fortified regions into the Soviet forcestructure of the 1990's comes from Conventional Forces Europe reduction talks. The Soviets advocate a defensive and reasonable sufficiency posture and the United States advocates a reduction based on parity. The Vistula Oder and Manchuria WWII strategic offensives in 1944-45 provide historical evidence for the operational employment of fortified regions in economy of force and operational maneuver group roles. Writings of Sun Tzu, Clausewitz, Jomini, and Soviet theorists Trianadafillov and Tukhachevskiy provide the theoretical foundation for employing economy of force and operational maneuver groups. Fortified regions are evaluated for effectiveness using the operational operating systems--operational maneuver and movement, operational fires, operational command and control, operational protection, operational intelligence and operational support. Commanders of fortified regions effectively execute the first four systems, but not the last two. The contemporary significance lies in the probable composition of Soviet forces in the 1990's. Fortified regions would replace motorized rifle corps in combined arms and shock armies of Warsaw Pact forces. The study discusses the significance of Soviet employment of fortified regions for NATO and the U.S. The Soviets will probably employ fortified regions with a stated defensive purpose; however, they can quickly convert fortified regions from defense to offense to perform the operational roles of either economy of force or operational maneuver group.