Tactical Nuclear Weapons and NATO.pdf - Program on Strategic ...

centric warfare. Citing both Chinese <strong>and</strong> U.S. sources,
he addressed how the leadership of the People’s Liberation
Army (PLA) has followed <strong>and</strong> responded to
the development of network-centric warfare in the
United States. The leadership underst<strong>and</strong>s the importance
of information flow for advanced C4ISR <strong>and</strong>
has set out to develop a common picture of the entire
battlespace, which includes five dimensions (l<strong>and</strong>,
air, sea [surface <strong>and</strong> sub-surface], cosmic, <strong>and</strong> electromagnetic.
The PLA has emphasized the development
of what is called “integrated information-electronic
warfare.” Kondrat’ev concludes that the United States
<strong>and</strong> China are engaged in a high-tech arms race in information
systems <strong>and</strong> means. In China, that has led
the PLA to emphasize the human factor in employing
such systems <strong>and</strong> to promote increased professionalism
in the armed forces. What this article poses is the
real prospect that Russia will face two technologically
sophisticated potential adversaries in Eurasia. 52
As alluded to earlier, in the summer of 2010 the Russian
Ministry of Defense <strong>and</strong> General Staff conducted
a major strategic exercise against a “hypothetical opponent”
in Siberia <strong>and</strong> the Russian Far East under the
name “Vostok 2010.” The exercise underscored the existing
geo-strategic isolation of Russia in that region,
even as the Ministry of Defense <strong>and</strong> the General Staff
evaluated Russia’s “new look” conventional military.
Roger McDermott, a prominent Western commentator
on the “new look” reforms of the Russian military,
offered an excellent overview of Vostok 2010 as an
operational-strategic exercise. McDermott correctly
pointed to the role of the exercise in testing concepts
associated with the “new look” reforms of the Russian
armed forces, calling attention to the exercise’s testing
of the speed of deployment of brigades, their combat
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