Tank-Free Zone for NATO's Central Region?

<p>This monograph examines the concept of a mutual tank-free zone for the European Central Region and tests its validity as a possible operational concept for NATO. The discussion assesses the military implications of the concept and its usefulness as a mechanism of applying military means to achieve political ends. This issue is important because NATO leaders are looking for ways to strengthen deterrence and conventional defense at relatively low economic and political costs to their governments. The tank-free zone concept may be recommended as a serious proposal for future arms control talks as a method to reconfigure and realign conventional force asymmetries. The discussion begins with a contemporary perspective of the current NATO defensive capability and orientation. The political demands of deterrence are compared with the military requirements for defense. In turn these are contrasted against the essential requirements for strong defense as expressed by Clausewitz and U.S. Army doctrine to identify the weaknesses in the NATO approach. The capability of a tank-free zone to redress these deficiencies constitutes the analysis. The monograph concludes with an assessment of how well the tankfree zone concept contributes to enhancing and strengthening the conventional defense of NATO and recommends the beat courses of action to pursue. The study suggests that the tank-free zone is not militarily supportable until significant technological improvements in NATO antitank weaponry are realized.</p><p>This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore you will see the original copyright references library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world) and other notations in the work.</p><p>This work is in the public domain in the United States of America and possibly other nations. Within the United States you may freely copy and distribute this work as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.</p><p>As a reproduction of a historical artifact this work may contain missing or blurred pages poor pictures errant marks etc. Scholars believe and we concur that this work is important enough to be preserved reproduced and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.</p>