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things besides. There is a strong element of “educating the fleet’ and “laying down 
the line.” And he makes many points in a debate of which we are only partially 
aware. But the dominant tone of the articles is that the advocacy and of justification, 
and not that of an announcement. 
There is also concrete evidence indicating that there was opposition to the publication 
of the Gorshkov series. Morskoj sbornik is a monthly journal, which has to be cleared 
by the censor before it is released to the printing press, usually some 2-10 days 
before the first day of the month of publication. Robert Weinland has plotted out 
these dates for a 7-year period (1967-73), and shows that after the fifth article in 
the Gorshkov series there were significant deviations from the publication norm.? The 
issues containing the remaining six articles were, on average, all released to the press 
some 7 days after the first day of the month, and this continued for 4 months after 
the last article appeared; 11 issues in a row were delayed in this way (August 1972—June 
1973),®> and this compares to a total of only 8 delays, scattered among the remaining 
72 issues of the 7-year sample. 
This run of delays was unprecedented. The fact that they were applied to the. navy’s 
professional journal at the very time that the commander in chief of the navy was 
himself using the journal to make an unprecedented exposition of the navy’s case, 
argues for some kind of cause and effect. And it may not be coincidental that in 
the issue following the last article of the series, there was an article by Admiral 
Sergeev in which he stressed that Morskoj sbornik must be allowed to discuss matters 
of current controversy.* 
The Gorshkov series are best understood as part of a much wider policy debate 
about military matters in general. John Erickson refers to ‘‘somewhat substantial 
evidence of a significant struggle within the Soviet military establishment for ‘‘missions”’ 
(and hence resources).’* There are the indications of a change in policy concerning 
the utility of a Soviet military presence in Egypt, between 1970 and 1972.° And 
finally, in June 1973 we have the unexplained cancellation of a series of theoretical 
articles by senior army officers, which have circumstantial links with Gorshkov’s articles. 
In April 1973, Krasnaya zvezda announced the publication of a series of articles on 
military-theoretical problems under the general heading ‘‘The Defense of Socialism. 
Questions of Theory.’ In fact, only two articles appeared. Although neither of them 
referred to Gorshkov or addressed his arguments directly, both took issue with some 
aspect of what he said. Zavyalov stressed the primacy of political factors and the 
fundamental position of the political content of military doctrine.* And Milovidov 
emphasized that you can’t take examples from one historical period to support argu- 
ments in the contemporary period, which is of course what Gorshkov does.® 
The abrupt cancellation of the projected series on military theory assumes added 
significance when we note that it coincides with the ending of the delay in clearing 
Morskoj sbornik to the press. This was the period following the Central Committee 
Plenum in April 1973, when Grechko and Gromyko were brought on to the Politbureau, 
and it seems possible that some kind of compromise was achieved and a decision 
was reached to close off the debate. 
2R. G. Weinland, ‘‘Analysis of Admiral Gorshkov’s Navies in War and Peace,” in Soviet Naval Pol- 
icy, pp. 547-572. Also published as Centre for Naval Analyses, Professional Paper No. 131. 
3 Eleven articles were printed over 13 months; July 1972 and January 1973 did not carry the series. 
4N. Sergeev (Chief of Naval Staff) “Drug i Sovetchik Ofitserov Flota’’ Msb. 73/3/17/3 & 19/4-5. 
The article was on the 125th anniversary of the founding of Morskoj sbornik. 
5 John Erickson “Soviet Defense Policy and Naval Interests,” Soviet Naval Policy, p.60. 
®See “The Wider Political Context” in Part II of main text. 
™Krasnaya zvezda Apr. 19, 1973 p. 2. Only two articles were published, Apr. 19 and May 17. No 
article of this type was published in June, but on the 4th of July a new but unrelated series began, 
without any form of announcement, under the series title ‘Theory, Politics, Ideology.” 
®Lt. Gen. I. Zavyalov ‘‘The Creative Nature of Soviet Military Doctrine,’ Krasnaya zvezda April 
19, 1975. In the early part of Gorshkov'’s introductory section, he quotes Lenin’s dictum that 
‘Politics is the reason, and war is the instrument, and not the other way round. Consequently it only 
remains to subordinate the military point of view to the political." But Gorshkov goes on to say that 
in the past, the outcome of foreign policy negotiations has depended on relative military power 
(72/2/20/5), which is not the standard formula. Gorshkov returns to stress this point in the course of 
his historical review (72/4/13/10, 14/4, 15/7). In contrast, Zavyalov is at pains to emphasize the 
primacy of political factors. He also stresses that while military-technical aspects of doctrine will 
change, as long as the social system remains unchanged (as it has in the Soviet Union), then “the 
basic fundamental political content of military doctrine remains unchanged.” This runs counter to 
one strand of Gorshkoj's thesis. 
® Maj. Gen. A. Milovidov “A Philosophical Analysis of Military Thought’’ Krasnaya zvezda May 17, 
1973. 
