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Nuclear-Free Pacific's Hidden Price Tag
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10039 |
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CURRENT ISSUES
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4 / 1986 |
2,852 Words |
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Laura Reynolds
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Proponents of neutrality in Oceania and the island nations of the Pacific are driving U.S. ships and submarines from their ports in efforts to safeguard their vicinity from the possibility of nuclear destruction. But investigation into the real motives behind these calls for peace reveals strong evidence that rather than a nuclear-free Pacific, the result may be a democracy-free Pacific.
Soviet presence
Moscow's escalating drive to become a world power in the Pacific Ocean commenced as soon as General Giap's tanks rolled into Saigon in May 1975.
The Soviets immediately moved to take over the former U.S. base at Danang and to obtain exclusive rights to the deep-water harbor at Cam Ranh Bay. For the past four years, the Soviet Union has had a major military presence centered there including communications and intelligence collection facilities.
The Cam Ranh harbor supports more than 25 ships of the Soviet Navy on permanent duty in the South China Sea. Soviet Tu-95 BEAR D long-range reconnaissance and BEAR F antisubmarine warfare aircraft are deployed there, monitoring U.S. naval activities in the region, including the U.S. base at Subic Bay in the Philippines. Three years ago, the Soviets began to expand at Cam Ranh, adding about a dozen medium-range Tu-16 BADGERs in their strike, tanker, and electronic combat variants.
The Soviet military buildup at Vladivostok continues apace. In addition to its ballistic missile submarines, and now a carrier battle group, the nuclear battle cruiser Frunze is based there. Soviet missile and test sites on the Kamchatka Peninsula are among the most heavily defended of Soviet facilities.
Inflexible secrecy surrounding the missile tests is believed largely responsible for the Soviet decision to destroy the off-course Korean Airlines Flight 007 on September 1, 1983, only seconds before it would have left Soviet airspace. Since the Soviets routinely use their Aeroflot aircraft for intelligence purposes, the 269 people on the Korean passenger jet were killed--just to be on the safe side.
Giving them jitters
In the northern Pacific, the Soviets have been waging a war of nerves against Japan, trying to panic the Japanese people into action against Prime Minister Nakasone's support for an upgraded and credible Japanese self-defense capability. Among the flagrant Soviet shows of force was last September's rehearsal for an invasion of Japan.
The Soviet exercise involved the carrier Novorossiysk and a carrier battle group of some 20 surface ships, submarines, and support vessels, with amphibious assault troops embarking at Sakhalin Island, only 30 miles across the La Perouse Strait from Hokkaido, Japan's northernmost main island. The large-scale amphibious landing exercise in Hitokappu Bay on Etorofu Island simulated conditions of an attack on Hokkaido.
Early in February, the Japanese press reported that the Soviets had deployed two types of ground-launched cruise missiles on Etorofu and Shimushir in the Kurile
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