THE SOVIET CHEMICAL WARFARE POSTURE

German nerve gas plant was dismantled and removed (with personnel) to the Soviet Union where it was reassembled (one such plant was relocated in the Volgograd chemical combine). As the United States enjoyed nuclear superiority from the end of the War until the 1970s, the Soviets may have regarded chemical weapons as a means, however limited in scope, of offsetting this nuclear domination. 

Soviet investment in chemical warfare expanded considerably in the post-war period. The Military Chemical Forces (VKhV) are a separate arm of the military establishment. Commanded by a three-star general (Colonel-General V. K. Pikalov), these specialist troops consist of units and subunits with responsibilities for chemical defence, radiation and chemical reconnaissance, the operation of flame throwers and smoke generators, the identification of enemy chemical weapon sites and other targets for Soviet chemical strikes, and for the decontamination and deactivation of personnel, weapons, equipment, structures and terrain exposed to radioactive and chemical agents. Apart from the employment of smoke and flame equipment, these chemical troops are trained and equipped for defensive purposes they are not responsible for the delivery of chemical munitions.  

Chemical Troops course (twenty-eight months) and an advance course for chemical service officers (thirty months). Chemical noncommissioned officers are trained in six month courses at chemical training battalions.  

All Soviet Air Force units from headquarters down to company level have chemical warfare officers. A Chemical Biological and Radiological (CBR) section is attached to air bases. It is responsible for detecting CBR agents at airfields, for the decontamination of aircraft, runways, personnel and equipment and for training. The airfield technical services, under the administrative command of the Rear Services, provide personnel and material support for the CBR defence section. The office of the regimental Chief of Chemical Services, subordinate to the Chief of Chemical Troops, provides technical and training support for the CBR defence section.  

Each of the four Soviet fleets has its own chemical service which advises the fleet commander on CBR matters, trains chemical officers and sailors, maintains CBR material and depots, and supervises naval CBR units. Each warship, submarine and naval squadron has a chemical officer assigned to it, and most if not all surface ships, from small patrol boats to the largest surface ships, contain some degree of CBR protection. Naval collective protection systems include citadels 

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Fiscal Year 1991 Arms Control Impact Statements, pp. 109-10,119-22. Ibid, A.M. Hoeber, The Chemistry of Defeat Asymmetries in US and Soviet Chemical Warfare Postures (Cambridge, Mass. Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis, 1981), pp.42-3. 

The Report of the Chemical Warfare Review Commission (June 1985 Chairman Walter J. Stoessel Jr) gave details of the types of chemical munition and delivery system in the US inventory. More generally, the US has published sufficient data to enable expert analysts to estimate US holdings of chemical weapons. See in particular Julian Perry Robinson, NATO Chemical Weapons Policy and Posture, p. 26. Andrew Cockbum, The Threat Inside the Soviet Military Machine,... 

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