Abstract
Changing the military confrontation in Europe in the area of conventional weapons to a status where large-scale offensive operations and surprise attack are no longer possible (as the mandate of the new Vienna Negotiations on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe states)1, will certainly require numerical reductions on offence-capable land-mobile weapons systems, most notably the tanks and the self-propelled artillery. Limits on other heavy military land vehicles that are required for offensive operations, like mobile bridge-building gear, are useful too; armoured personnel carriers and infantry fighting vehicles may also be constrained. Most of the vehicles mentioned are tracked; this fact, as well as their size and mass, distinguish them clearly from civilian vehicles. In a comprehensive reduction scheme, it may be useful to include wheeled military vehicles, too; this could comprise wheeled troop transporters, multiple rocket launchers, missile transporter-erector-launchers, trucks carrying air defence systems. Since large-scale offensive operations require larger, and more mobile, logistics, than defence on the own territory, limits on transport trucks for personnel or supply (of munitions, fuel, food etc.) may also be introduced. Of course, the lighter and less specialized the truck categories become, the more complications arise about distinguishing them from civilian ones (in fact, in several countries it is planned to confiscate civilian trucks in times of crisis and war).2
Published Version
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