Enhancing Conventional Stability in Europe

Abstract

Militarily speaking, conventional stability (CS) in Europe would be achieved if each side possessed military forces capable of defending their territory without posing a credible threat to the other side. In other words, the defensive capabilities of both sides would have to exceed the offensive capabilities of their antagonists even under worst-case assumptions. From the NATO viewpoint, its member countries must feel secure, especially against the possibilities of surprise attack and large-scale offensive operations stemming from the WTO’s numerically superior conventional forces. From the WTO perspective, the territories of its member countries must be protected, even against merely limited objectives of the opponent, as well as in the case of adverse domestic conditions.

The author made his presentation in lieu of Albrecht von Müller from the same institute and has incorporated von Midler’s ideas at central places throughout this paper