------- activists
Organizations in the Abolition 2000 Network
1,432 organizations in 90 countries as of Jan. 13, 2000
http://www.napf.org/abolition2000/organizs_all.html
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Letter from Plowshares Prisoner
Just received this from Daniel (Jan18) He asked me to send it out to my e-mail list. Bill Sulzman.
UPDATE LETTER Jan. 2000
Daniel Sicken, #28360-013
We are all deeply affected by the violent extent to which our nation will go in waging war. The varieties seem endless. Our faith shudders under the load. I will explain my thoughts about this. Recently I watched a television segment showing the city of Hiroshima, Japan hours after the U.S. atomic bomb was dropped. Years ago, I was astounded by this destructive scene. Mile upon mile of waste and rubble, 75,000 men, women and children instantly dead. Another 125,000 lingering deaths. Then another bomb dropped on Nagasaki 3 days later. Exactly 53 years after Hiroshima, Sachio Ko-Yin and I were standing with our sledgehammers directly above a Minuteman III missile in Colorado. It is on hair-trigger "launch on warning" alert status. During our trial a launch control officer testified for the prosecution. This is the person who turns the key that launches the missiles. He angrily pointed at me from the witness box and shouted "I'm doing this for you" Thus the threat of nuclear genocide, masked under the well- known euphemism of "deterrence" is protected under the law and led to our convictions.
Right now, all 500 Minuteman III ICBMs are undergoing guidance system renovations costing $2.7 billion. This will be completed in 2001 and will bring these first-strike weapons to super-accurate levels. All rocket motors will be replaced by 2001 for compatibility with the latest solid fuel propellent. Recently completed, the 50 launch control centers(one for each ten missiles) have been equipped with "Rapid Execution and Combat Targeting". This allows retargeting of each missile within minutes to preset coordinates. It also becomes possible to "stand down" the missiles, yet retain the ability to go instantly to alert and launch. Third world nations without nuclear weapons are among those now targeted. Our nation continues to trust in violence that is unimaginable.
In my somewhat monastic prison life, there has been plenty of time to reflect on matters of importance. While walking during early mornings on the outside track, I am always struck by the beauty of creation as the sun begins to rise. Ducks, geese, deer - all frequent these rolling hills and fields. Friendly skunks come here to eat food scraps right from the hand of an inmate. In the distance I can see a church steeple and occasionally its bells are heard.
The center of devotion in this church is the One who said "Love your enemies". This is not an open-ended question or suggestion. but a command. It is included in the Sermon on the Mount, the heart of the Gospels upon which this church and countless others were founded. Ignored, selectively obeyed, sentimentalized, or trivialized because of national security priorities, these words are still a reason why people put one foot in front of the other to enter the church doors. In so entering, people put themselves in the presence of nonviolence and forgiveness. This is alien to national security machinery, which operates by means of threats and retaliation as in, "Don't tread on me". Certainly, to threaten any people or nation with nuclear extinction(as now exists with our possession of first-strike nuclear weapons) is the ultimate violation and rejection of the Gospel imperative of "Love your enemies." Following this imperative is not easy. It's hard work. This much I am learning.
On the lighter side: life in here is not always heavy and serious. I still enjoy a good laugh and feel supported and loved by many on the outside. Days go by fast and are full with a cleaning job, answering mail, reading, exercise, meditation, waiting for meals in long lines. Inmates often join in for yoga sessions outside when it's warm. Sachio, my very active and happy Plowshares partner, seems to be thriving at nearby Allenwood Prison Camp. Good news! Plowshares vs. Depleted Uranium acted on Dec. 19. Daniel
My wonderful support person New address format:
Carol Bellucci, 773 W. Windham Rd. Windham, VT 05359 Ph 802 874 4413 Contact her for info and visits Send her contributions for prison expenses Payable to: Carol Bellucci- Plowshares
Daniel Sicken #28360-013 Federal Prison Camp, Unit 1 P.O. Box 2000 Lewisburg, PA 17837-2000
A single Minuteman III missile = 58 Hiroshimas
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Humans, machines may swap roles in future ...New age of weaponry
Washington Times
December 30, 1999
By Kristina Stefanova
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/business/business-19991230.htm
New communications technology will be critical in war during the next 1,000 years.
"War is a complex system that is all information-based," Mr. Raduschel says.
Specifications and blueprints of one Navy warship weighed more than the ammunition it carried, he notes.
What happens when information systems are the key to winning wars was the main topic at a recent planning meeting at Lockheed Martin.
"A defense system needs to talk to another system somewhere else," Mr. Vonhaase says. "Twenty-five years from now, the [defense] industry will be dominated by information - between platforms, weapons systems, people. That's an enormous amount of information. The trick is to sort out which of those pieces of information are important to the war fighter. Because if they knew everything, they wouldn't be able to digest it."
Scientists and engineers say manual weapons most likely will disappear. They will be replaced by more efficient, cheaper and easier-to-make biological weapons that dispense viruses and diseases.
Mr. Edwords, the Humanist editor, predicts the day when almost anyone could have access to germ warfare.
"Now minor powers can have these kinds of weapons," he says. "Wait until not only dictators but terrorists have all kinds of germ weapons. If computer viruses can spread the way they do, pretty soon diseases will be the same way.
"We have to figure out how to control this sort of weapon," he says....
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An Open Letter to the Leaders of all Non-Nuclear Weapons States
By David Krieger, TFF adviser
The Nuclear Age Peace Foundation
January 2000
http://www.transnational.org/forum/meet/2000/nuclearletter.html
Your Excellencies:
The nuclear perils to humanity are not sufficiently widely recognized nor appreciated. In the words of writer Jonathan Schell, we have been given "the gift of time," but that gift is running out. For this reason vision and bold action are called for.
General George Lee Butler, a former Commander in Chief of all US strategic nuclear weapons, poses these questions: "By what authority do succeeding generations of leaders in the nuclear weapons states usurp the power to dictate the odds of continued life on our planet? Most urgently, why does such breathtaking audacity persist at the moment when we should stand trembling in the face of our folly and united in our commitment to abolish its most deadly manifestation?"
It is time to heed the warnings of men like General Butler, who know intimately the risks and consequences of nuclear war. The time is overdue for a New Agenda on nuclear disarmament. What is needed is commitment and leadership on behalf of humanity and all life.
The heart of the Non-Proliferation Treaty agreement is the link between non-proliferation and nuclear disarmament. The non-nuclear weapons states agree in the Treaty not to develop nor deploy nuclear weapons in exchange for the nuclear weapons states agreeing to negotiate in good faith to achieve nuclear disarmament. The Treaty has become nearly universal and the non-nuclear weapons states, with a few notable exceptions, have adhered to the non-proliferation side of the bargain. The progress on nuclear disarmament, however, has been almost entirely unsatisfactory, leading many observers to conclude that the intention of the nuclear weapons states is to preserve indefinitely a two-tier structure of nuclear "haves" and "have-nots."
At the 1995 Non-Proliferation Treaty Review and Extension Conference many countries and non-governmental organizations challenged the nuclear disarmament record of the nuclear weapons states. They argued that to extend the Treaty indefinitely without more specific progress from the nuclear weapons states was equivalent to writing a blank check to states that had failed to keep their promises for 25 years. These countries and NGOs urged instead that the extension of the Non-Proliferation Treaty be linked to progress on Article VI promises of good faith efforts to achieve nuclear disarmament. Pressure from the nuclear weapons states and their NATO allies led to the Treaty being extended indefinitely, but only with agreement to a set of non-binding Principles and Objectives that was put forward by the Republic of South Africa. These Principles and Objectives provided for:
-- completion of a universal and international and effectively verifiable Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty by 1996;
-- early conclusion of negotiations for a non-discriminatory and universally applicable treaty banning production of fissile materials; and
-- determined pursuit by the nuclear weapons states of systematic and progressive efforts to reduce nuclear weapons globally with the ultimate goal of their elimination.
Progress toward these goals has been unimpressive. A CTBT was adopted in 1996, but has been ratified only by the UK and France among the nuclear weapons states. The US argues that the CTBT necessitates its $4.6 billion per year "Stockpile Stewardship" program, which enables it to design new nuclear weapons and modify existing nuclear weapons in computer-simulated virtual reality tests and "sub-critical" nuclear tests. Despite the existence of this provocative program, ratification of the CTBT by the US Senate was rejected in October 1999. The US and Russia continue to conduct "sub-critical" nuclear weapons tests. Negotiations on a fissile material cut-off treaty have yet to begin, and the "determined pursuit" promise has been systematically and progressively ignored by the nuclear weapons states.
In its 1997 Presidential Decision Directive 60, the US reaffirmed nuclear weapons as the "cornerstone" of its security policy and opened the door to the use of nuclear weapons against a country using chemical or biological weapons. The US, UK and France have also resisted proposals by other NATO members for a review of NATO nuclear policy. Under urgent prodding by Canada and Germany, they did finally agree to a review of nuclear policy, but this will not be completed until December 2000, after the 2000 NPT Review Conference.
The US seems intent on moving ahead with a National Missile Defense plan, even if it means abrogating the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty, which most analysts view as a bedrock treaty for further nuclear arms reductions. The US is also moving ahead with space militarization programs. In the US Space Command's "Vision for 2020" document, the US proclaims its intention of "dominating the space dimension of military operations to protect US interests and investment."
Russia has abandoned its policy of No First Use of nuclear weapons in favor of a policy mirroring that of the western nuclear weapons states. The START II agreement is stalled and is still not ratified by the Russian Duma. The date for completion of START II has, in fact, been set back for five years from the beginning of 2003 to the end of 2007. Negotiations on START III are stalled.
China is modernizing its nuclear arsenal. India and Pakistan, countries that have consistently criticized the discriminatory nature of the NPT, have both overtly tested nuclear weapons and joined the nuclear weapons club. Israel, another country refusing to join the NPT, will not acknowledge that it has developed nuclear weapons and has imprisoned Mordechai Vanunu for more than 13 years for speaking out on Israel's nuclear arsenal.
In the face of the intransigence of the nuclear weapons states, the warning bells are sounding louder and louder. These warnings have been put forward by the Canberra Commission, the International Court of Justice, retired generals and admirals, past and present political leaders, the New Agenda Coalition, the Tokyo Forum, and many other distinguished individuals and non-governmental organizations working for peace and disarmament.
The future of humanity is being held hostage to self-serving policies of the nuclear weapons states. This is an intolerable situation, not only for the myopic vision it represents and the disrespect for the rest of the world that is implicit in these policies, but, more important, for the squandering of the precious opportunity to eliminate the nuclear weapons threat to our common future.
The more nuclear weapons in the world, the greater the danger to humanity. At present we lack even an effective accounting of the numbers and locations of these weapons and the nuclear materials to construct them. The possibilities of these weapons or the materials to make them falling into the hands of terrorists, criminals or potential new nuclear weapons states has increased since the breakup of the former Soviet Union.
What is to be done? Will the 2000 NPT Review Conference again be bullied by strong-armed negotiating techniques and false promises of the nuclear weapons states? Or will the non-nuclear weapons states, the vast majority of the world's nations, unite in common purpose to demand that the nuclear weapons states fulfill their long-standing promises and obligations in Article VI of the Non-Proliferation Treaty?
Ridding the world of nuclear weapons is the greatest challenge of our time. We ask you to step forward and meet this challenge by demanding in a unified voice that the nuclear weapons states fulfill their obligations under Article VI of the Non-Proliferation Treaty. As we stand on the threshold of a new century and millennium, we ask that you call upon the nuclear weapons states to take the following steps to preserve the Non-Proliferation Treaty and end the threat that nuclear weapons arsenals pose to all humanity:
1. Commence good faith negotiations to achieve a Nuclear Weapons Convention requiring the phased elimination of all nuclear weapons, with provisions for effective verification and enforcement.
2. Publicly acknowledge the weaknesses and fallibilities of deterrence: that deterrence is only a theory and is clearly ineffective against nations whose leaders may be irrational or suicidal; nor can deterrence assure against accidents, misperceptions, miscalculations, or terrorists.
3. Publicly acknowledge the illegality of the threat or use of nuclear weapons under international law as stated by the International Court of Justice in its 1996 opinion, and further acknowledge the obligation under international law for good faith negotiations for nuclear disarmament in all its aspects.
4. Publicly acknowledge the immorality of threatening to annihilate millions, even hundreds of millions, of people in the name of national security.
5. De-alert all nuclear weapons and de-couple all nuclear warheads from their delivery vehicles.
6. Declare policies of No First Use of nuclear weapons against other nuclear weapons states and policies of No Use against non-nuclear weapons states.
7. Establish an international accounting system for all nuclear weapons and weapons-grade nuclear materials.
8. Sign and ratify the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, cease laboratory and subcritical nuclear tests designed to modernize and improve nuclear weapons systems, and close the remaining nuclear test sites in Nevada and Novaya Zemlya.
9. Re-affirm the commitments to the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and cease efforts to violate that Treaty by the deployment of national or theater missile defenses, and cease the militarization of space.
10. Set forth a plan to reduce nuclear arsenals in all nuclear weapons states to no more than 200 de-alerted and de-coupled nuclear weapons each by the year 2005, and place these weapons in internationally monitored storage sites.
11. Set forth a plan to complete the transition under international control and monitoring to zero nuclear weapons by 2020.
12. Begin to reallocate the billions of dollars currently being spent annually for maintaining nuclear arsenals ($35 billion in the U.S. alone) to improving human health, education and welfare throughout the world.
You have a unique historical opportunity to unite in serving humanity. We urge you to seize the moment.
Sincerely,
David Krieger
President NAPF
cc: Leaders of United States, Russia, United Kingdom, France, China, India, Pakistan and Israel
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6,000 Shipments of High Level Nuclear Waste Coming to PA
1/22/00
catalyst@envirolink.org (Mike Ewall)
NUCLEAR WASTE SHIPMENTS - ACTION ALERT
The nuclear industry has long been trying to get federal legislation passed which would force the transportation of the nation's high-level radioactive waste to an parking lot outside of an unbuilt nuclear waste dump in a leaky mountain amid fault lines on Native American lands in Nevada. This waste consists of the "spent" nuclear fuels rods from nuclear reactors (spent fuel is approx. 1 million times more radioactive than when it first entered the reactor).
In Pennsylvania, there would be an estimated 3,879 truck casks shipped on our highways and 2,190 rail casks on our railroads. These shipments would be done over the course of about 30 years. You can find maps of the likely transportation routes through the state by vising PEN's Nuclear Team website at http://www.penweb.org/issues/nuclear/ (click on High Level Nuclear Waste and check out the Pennsylvania section of the Nuclear Waste Transportation Map). You'll find that the shipments would go through every congressperson's district in the state. Voting records from past legislative sessions on this bill are also listed on the PEN website.
This "Mobile Chernobyl" legislation has been held back by activists for several years now, but it is getting close to becoming a reality. Please read over the Action Alert below and get some letters written.
For a nuclear-free world,
Mike Ewall PEN Nuclear Waste Leadership Team
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From: rej@acronym.org.uk (Rebecca Johnson)
The Conference on Disarmament (CD) opened its 2000 session on 18 January by adopting an agenda identical to last year's ....
CD Agenda, adopted 18 January 2000
"Taking into account, inter alia, the relevant provisions of the Final Document of the First Special Session of the General Assembly devoted to disarmament, and pending the conclusion of its consultations on the review of its agenda, and without prejudice to their outcome, the Conference adopts the following agenda for its 2000 session:
1. Cessation of the nuclear arms race and nuclear disarmament.
2. Prevention of nuclear war, including all related matters.
3. Prevention of an arms race in outer space.
4. Effective international arrangements to assure non-nuclear-weapon states against the use or threat of use of nuclear weapons.
5. New types of weapons of mass destruction and new systems of such weapons; radiological weapons.
6. Comprehensive programme of disarmament.
7. Transparency in armaments.
8. Consideration and adoption of the annual report and any other report, as appropriate, to the General Assembly of the United Nations."
... The United Nations Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, in a statement delivered by Mr. Vladimir Petrovsky, Secretary-General of the CD, envisaged the new century as "a new opportunity for the Conference to live up to its potential: to draw strength from recent achievements in some areas, and to take an honest look at progress in others." Annan deplored the CD's inability to agree on the issues of nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation and PAROS in 1999. He expressed concern over the proliferation of missiles and the development of their defenses and underlined the importance of the ABM Treaty. Annan urged delegations to "search for compromises in a spirit of flexibility and with real sense of urgency" and emphasised the importance of the progress made at the CD to the upcoming NPT Review Conference....
The Acronym Institute
24, Colvestone Crescent, London E8 2LH, England.
telephone (UK +44) (0) 20 7503 8857
fax (0) 20 7503 9153
website http://www.acronym.org.uk
---
The ABM Treaty is still binding and prohibits the deployment of a nationwide missile defense... unless the United States and Russia reach an agreement to modify the Treaty (as the Clinton Administration wishes to do) to allow the "limited" defense system it is now testing.
For a comprehensive analysis see "National Missile Defense: Rushing to Failure" a href="http://www.fas.org/faspir/v52m6a.htm" target="_blank"http://www.fas.org/faspir/v52m6a.htm/a and see the missile defense section on our web site a href="http://www.clw.org/coalition/libbmd.htm" target="_blank"http://www.clw.org/coalition/libbmd.htm/a
Daryl Kimball, Coalition to Reduce Nuclear Dangers [mailto:dkimball@clw.org], January 20, 2000 8:50 AM
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Fall-out from NMD test failure
January 20, 2000
Stephen Young, Deputy Director,
Coalition to Reduce Nuclear Dangers
http://www.crnd.org
Below are media stories, editorials, and press releases from members of the Coalition to Reduce Nuclear Dangers following the failure of the second NMD test.
Perhaps most significantly, this failure instantly led to calls for delaying the decision to deploy. The NY Times article cites Sens. Hagel (R-NE) and Smith (R-OR) as supporting delay; Sen. Biden (D-DE) also released a statement saying delay might be appropriate. Other Republicans, such as Senate Majority Leader Trent. Lott (R-MI) maintained the need to go ahead. Rep. Curt Weldon (R-PA) said, "This is not a setback by any means."
A second issue to watch is whether the next test must succeed for the Pentagon to give a recommendation to go ahead. The Pentagon has said for some time that at least one so-called integrated system test (IST), involving all the program components, must succeed before the go code would be issued. However, the Pentagon also lowered that bar, saying a provisional go ahead could be given based on the first success last October, as long as an IST success occurred before construction begins in spring 2001. Media reports below indicate the next test must succeed. I spoke with the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization spokesperson today, who said "there is no hard and fast requirement," essentially because the program is so time-compressed.
So a word of caution is in order. If the next text succeeds (scheduled for April/May), some people currently supporting delay may change their position. And the Pentagon may, or may not, be able to give a thumbs up for missile defense depending on the outcome of that test.
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"Delay Sought In Decision On Missile Defense."
New York Times
January 20, 2000
By Elizabeth Becker and Eric Schmitt
WASHINGTON, Jan. 19 -- After an antimissile failure in a critical test on Tuesday night, supporters joined opponents today in asking the Clinton administration to postpone a decision on whether to field a complicated national missile defense system until after the November elections.
President Clinton is scheduled to make this decision in late summer. But the military has only one remaining test in which it now must hit a mock warhead with a missile to provide Mr. Clinton with the required evidence that it is feasible to build the system, which is meant to protect the country against a limited ballistic missile attack.
"We should put this decision off until next year," Senator Chuck Hagel, a Nebraska Republican on the Foreign Relations Committee, said today. "I think a new president and his team should be in place to make the call on this with a new Congress."
Mr. Hagel favors a national missile defense but believes the next administration should decide such a far-reaching foreign policy issue.
The Pentagon said today that the test was not a complete failure.
According to an initial assessment, the interceptor, or kill vehicle, that was shot from the Marshall Islands in the Pacific almost hit its target, a mock warhead launched on a modified Minuteman intercontinental ballistic missile from Vandenberg Air Force base in California, said a senior Pentagon official who spoke to reporters on the condition of anonymity.
Until the final six seconds of the nearly eight-minute flight, the interceptor was on target, the Pentagon official said. But then two infrared sensors, which sense temperature differences to guide the interceptor to its target, apparently failed. Most of the rest of the test sequence performed as planned, he said.
Even before Tuesday's setback, a growing number of members of Congress, from both parties, had joined with European allies in asking why a decision had to be made this summer on a weapons system that could undermine the 1972 Antiballistic Missile Treaty, which is viewed by its advocates as a cornerstone of arms control.
Mr. Clinton's self-imposed deadline is now snarled in the presidential campaign here and in a debate overseas, where countries in Asia and Europe are afraid that the United States will pull out of the ABM treaty, signed with Moscow, which prohibits either country from deploying a missile system to defend its entire territory.
"We must avoid any questioning of the ABM treaty that could lead to a disruption of strategic equilibrium and a new nuclear arms race," President Jacques Chirac of France said in a recent speech in Paris.
State Department officials have expressed confidence to their European colleagues that Russia will agree to enough alterations to avoid such a showdown. But even such negotiations with Russia hinge on the March vote to select a president there.
A White House official said today that Mr. Clinton would stick to his timetable. In late spring, the military will conduct another missile test. In June the Pentagon will present to the president its determination on whether it is feasible to deploy the system. The president would make his decision in the summer, about the time that both political parties hold their national conventions.
"There is a timetable and the president will make a decision this summer," the administration official said. "We're not going to jump to conclusions. If the test succeeds in April or May, then we're back on course."
Mr. Clinton has said his decision will be based on the severity of the ballistic missile threat to national security, on the effectiveness of the technology, on the effect it will have on the ABM treaty and on the cost. Since 1983, the United States has spent $67.7 billion for missile defense research, and the current system is predicted to cost $12.5 billion.
Delaying the decision could carry political consequences for Vice President Al Gore, the front-runner for the Democratic presidential nomination. Democratic strategists fear that a Republican nominee could use a delay to attack Mr. Gore as unwilling to support a strong defense.
"The president's deployment decision will have more to do with defending Al Gore against George Bush than the American people against North Korea," said John Pike, of the Federation of American Scientists. "They will need a lot more tests to decide whether this will work."
Senator Gordon H. Smith, a Republican from Oregon who is also on the Foreign Relations Committee, said today that the failed test demonstrated that the United States should be careful negotiating any lasting changes in the ABM treaty.
"We should defer to another administration, Republican or Democrat," said Senator Smith, a missile system proponent who only wants to slow the deployment decision. "We ought not to be giving up more than we should."
But senior Republican leaders urged a quick decision to deploy.
"We are going to go forward with a national missile defense," the Senate majority leader, Trent Lott of Mississippi, told reporters today.
"It's the right thing to do. It's irresponsible not to do it."
Supporters of a speedy deployment of a national missile defense have urged the White House to wait until Tuesday night's test can be fully evaluated.
"I hope the president will wait until the facts are in before judging this test," said Senator Thad Cochran, Republican of Mississippi, a strong supporter of missile defenses. "I expect that we will learn that this was not an unsuccessful test, even though the interceptor did not hit the target.
Let the program be fully tested, and then judge the merits."
Scientists also said that a decision should be postponed so that a schedule could be geared to scientific rather than political milestones.
"The problem is that the milestones for these programs are being driven by politics and not by science," said Stephen Schwartz, publisher of The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. "The scientists are working very hard to do very difficult things in an extreme schedule and people are expecting them to work miracles."
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Missile Sensor Failed In Test's Final Seconds, Data Indicate,
Defense Officials Expect Analysis to Take Weeks
Washington Post
January 20, 2000
By Roberto Suro, Washington Post Staff Writer
The Pentagon's ballistic missile defense system appeared to be working perfectly until the final six seconds of a $100 million test Tuesday night, when an infrared sensor failed to guide the "kill vehicle" into an incoming missile, senior military officials said yesterday.
Flying blind through space over the Pacific Ocean at 5,000 miles per hour, the 55-inch-long interceptor completely missed its target, a dummy nuclear warhead. It eventually burned up as it reentered the atmosphere, while the fake warhead fell harmlessly into the sea, the officials said.
Designed to protect the United States from a limited missile attack by a "rogue state" such as North Korea or an accidental launch of a few warheads by a major power such as Russia or China, the anti-missile system is said by both critics and supporters to be the most complex weapon ever built--if it is built.
A variety of radars and infrared--or heat-sensing--devices aboard satellites and widely scattered ground stations would be linked to a computer system that would detect an incoming missile, determine its trajectory and guide interceptors to a collision high above Earth, a feat engineers compare to hitting a bullet with a bullet. All of the system's major elements are still in the prototype phase.
Whether the failed test this week will prove to be a major setback, either technologically or politically, remains to be seen. President Clinton is due to decide in late summer whether to proceed with a plan to field the first battery of interceptors by 2005, at a cost of $12.7 billion. By June, the Pentagon is scheduled to advise him on the feasibility of that deadline.
As technicians and engineers flew back to Washington this afternoon from Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands, where the main test facility was located, Pentagon officials said it would take weeks to analyze what occurred.
"The good news is we have a lot of data to look at, and the bad news is we have a lot of data to look at," said a senior military official.
All of the candidates for the Republican presidential nomination favor construction of the system as soon as possible, while the Democratic contenders are more cautious. The Republican front-runner, Gov. George W. Bush of Texas, said at a New Hampshire news conference yesterday that he "would urge the president not to allow this one failure to deter what our country must do, and that is spend the research and development dollars that are necessary to perfect a system that will work."
Sen. Byron L. Dorgan (D-N.D.), who has been skeptical of the program, told the Associated Press: "Obviously this is a setback for the program. It demonstrates that the technology does not exist yet to give anybody any confidence that this is going to work."
Pentagon officials said they were pleased with preliminary data showing that several new systems performed as well or better than expected. But the officials acknowledged they will be under intense pressure to succeed on the next test, scheduled for April or May, which will be the last exercise before Clinton's decision on whether to begin building the system.
At first glance, the only malfunction during Tuesday's test involved a pair of infrared sensors that are supposed to lock on to the target and give directions to mini-thrusters that direct the kill vehicle in the last seconds before impact.
A military official who briefed reporters yesterday, but asked not to be identified by name, said data transmitted by the kill vehicle indicated an "anomaly" that prevented either of the infrared sensors from functioning properly, but so far the nature of the difficulty had not been determined.
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Missile failure fuels long-running debate.
Malfunction blamed; future of proposed defense system in doubt
Baltimore Sun
January 20, 2000
WASHINGTON -- In the final seconds, the "kill vehicle" didn't eliminate its intended target, missing a "warhead" heading toward the United States.
As the stubby, 55-inch missile streamed along about 140 miles above the Pacific Ocean on Tuesday night, its two heat-seeking guides malfunctioned and therefore could not lead it to the dummy warhead, Pentagon officials said yesterday.
"There was an anomaly with both sensors," said a senior defense official. "The very end-game is the [infrared] sensor. Were we tracking the target? Apparently so until the last six seconds."
Other parts of the $100 million test, including the web of ground-based radars and satellites, worked as planned, based on preliminary test information, the official said.
The mishap, however, has fueled a contentious debate, which began two decades ago, over whether to construct a national missile defense system that will cost tens of billions of dollars.
Opponents argue that Tuesday's failure highlights a system that is technologically unworkable or easily fooled. Supporters counter that problems with the complex project can be overcome. More tests and research money, they say, would prove the worth of a missile shield for all 50 states from an intercontinental ballistic warhead fired by North Korea or another rogue state.
Joseph Cirincione, director of the nonproliferation project at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, said Tuesday's failure raises questions about whether President Clinton will approve construction of a national missile shield, a decision scheduled for this summer.
"If this test had been successful, I think a deployment decision was almost certain," he said. "This puts the president's decision very much in doubt because it exposes the fragility of the technology."
Ted Postol, a professor of science, technology and national security at MIT, said the failed infrared sensors show problems of engineering and competence, though there are more fundamental issues. A foe who can build an intercontinental ballistic missile, he said, can easily build a credible decoy, since the kill vehicle senses only a "warm blob" in space.
But Rep. Curt Weldon, a Pennsylvania Republican and a leading missile defense proponent, dismissed the naysayers.
"This is not a setback by any means," he said in a statement. "The purpose of a testing program is to determine problems and resolve them before a system goes into production."
If one failure doomed a program, Weldon said, "the Wright brothers would never have gotten off the ground at Kitty Hawk." And he noted that some of the current weapons in the Pentagon arsenal did not have a glowing testing record -- such as the Sidewinder missile, which had no successful intercepts in 13 attempts.
Still, a national missile defense shield is no simple missile program. It is the most complex weapons system ever built, said Pentagon and congressional aides, pointing to the interconnecting web of ground-based radars, satellites and rocket-borne "kill vehicles" designed to track and then intercept and eliminate an incoming missile before it lands on U.S. soil.
In the oft-repeated comment in the Pentagon, the system is essentially a "bullet hitting a bullet."
The system, however, is a shadow of the "star wars" system first proposed in the 1980s by President Ronald Reagan, a vast system of killer satellites and ground-based interceptors designed to counter a massive Soviet attack.
The current proposal initially calls for 100 interceptor missiles in Alaska that could defeat a few dozen missiles. The Pentagon estimates the plan could cost at least $12.7 billion over the next five years and could be ready for use by 2005.
Last fall, national missile defense passed a key hurdle when the kill vehicle, launched atop a rocket from the Marshall Islands in the Pacific, intercepted and destroyed an unarmed Minuteman rocket launched from California to simulate a missile attack.
Pentagon officials and missile defense supporters said the success showed the "hit to kill" technology can work, though there were several technical problems with the test that the Pentagon acknowledged only last week.
The kill vehicle initially homed in on a decoy balloon, later destroying the rocket after it emerged from behind the balloon. Officials are uncertain whether the rocket would have been destroyed had it not been near the balloon. While opponents highlighted these problems, Pentagon officials called them insignificant.
Tuesday night's test was even more complex than the one last fall.
Those who watched the test late Tuesday night on TV screens at the Pentagon's Ballistic Missile Defense Office said a 10-second countdown preceded the expected hit. Last fall a flash was visible on the monitors; this time there was nothing but a blank screen.
The next scheduled test of the prototype system will be at the end of April or early May, the last test before the Pentagon makes a recommendation to Clinton about whether to go forward with deploying a system.
There is a strong political element to national missile defense that could affect a decision.
For several years, Republicans have vigorously pushed Clinton to spend more on missile defense.
The leading GOP presidential candidates, Texas Gov. George W. Bush and Sen. John McCain of Arizona, have pressed for the deployment of a missile shield as soon as possible, while Vice President Al Gore and Bill Bradley take a more cautious approach.
Moreover, North Korea's launch of a three-stage missile over Japan in the summer of 1998 shocked the defense community and added a new sense of urgency to the question of missile defense.
---
On The Issues: Missile Defense
1/19/00- Updated 10:15 AM ET
http://www.usatoday.com/news/e98/e990.htm
Does America need a national missile defense system to defend itself against nuclear attack?
Democrats
Bill Bradley
''A national missile defense system has not been adequately tested, so it's too soon to say that it is an effective way to defend America against nuclear attack. Even if it is shown to be both technically feasible and strategically desirable, a NMD cannot defend America against nuclear attacks delivered by other means, for example in a terrorist's suitcase. In any case, arms control and diplomatic pressure may be more effective in reducing the possibility of a nuclear attack, and the United States should continue to rely primarily on the threat of nuclear retaliation to deter nuclear attacks.''
Al Gore ''The decision to proceed toward deployment of a national missile defense system needs to be based on: 1. the level of our confidence in the technology; 2. its impact on our ability to protect arms control; 3. an assessment of the cost; and 4. an evaluation of the threat. As president, I would be willing to consider changes to the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty restricting missile deployment and even abandoning the treaty if the United States was seriously threatened by a missile attack from a 'rogue' nation.''
Reform candidates Pat Buchanan ''Yes. The U.S. must not allow a 30-year-old ABM treaty, with a defunct Soviet Union, to prevent us from defending our people from a nuclear missile attack. Test a ballistic missile defense until it works; then build it, without apology. U.S. security is paramount.''
Donald Trump N/A
Republicans Gary Bauer
''As one of my first acts in office, I will order deployment of a strategic missile defense to begin defending the American people against nuclear attacks.''
George W. Bush
''Yes. At the earliest possible date, my administration will deploy anti-ballistic missile systems, both theater and national, to guard America and our allies against attack and blackmail. I will work to persuade Russia that it is in both our nations' best interests to amend the anti-ballistic missile treaty to allow these defense systems to protect our people from rogue attacks. If Russia refuses, we will withdraw from the treaty. The president of the United States has a solemn obligation to protect the American people and our allies from nuclear attack.''
Steve Forbes
''We could construct viable missile defense systems for ourselves and our allies in Europe, Israel, Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea - to name a few - by integrating new missile defense innovations with existing technologies on the Navy's Aegis cruisers. American taxpayers have already invested some $50 billion in missile defense research. Experts believe it would take less than $10 billion to finish the job.''
Orrin Hatch
''Yes. Beginning with my support of Ronald Reagan's Strategic Defense Initiative, I have consistently and without exception supported or co-sponsored every congressional initiative to research, fund and deploy at the soonest possible time a theater missile defense of the United States.''
Alan Keyes
"Yes."
John McCain
''Yes. I believe the American people can and must be protected from the possibility of a missile attack on our soil. Recent reports of successful tests of a missile defense system demonstrate that such a system can work. I supported legislation stating that it should be the policy of the United States to build a national missile defense system as soon as technologically possible. As president, I would make the deployment of a national missile defense system, as well as defense systems for our armed forces deployed overseas, one of my highest priorities.''
---
Close Isn't Good Enough
Los Angeles Times
January 20, 2000
The Pentagon blames a pair of malfunctioning sensors for Tuesday's failure of a $100-million test of a missile interceptor system that it hopes can defend the country against intercontinental attack from rogue states. The test, which followed a claimed successful test in October, saw an interceptor rocket fired from Kwajalein Atoll in the Marshall Islands try to destroy a mock warhead launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base. It may have come very close to succeeding, but in the warhead-killing business close isn't good enough. An interceptor must strike an incoming warhead directly. Until that feat can be demonstrated with some consistency, deployment of what's known as a National Missile Defense system makes no sense.
Congress strongly supports development and rapid deployment of a system, as do the major Republican presidential candidates. President Clinton, while less enthusiastic, has boosted the budget for the program and promised a decision on deployment by June.
The antimissile system isn't designed to protect against attacks from Russia or China. Using 100 or so interceptors, it aims to defend against limited attacks from such potential aggressors as North Korea and Iran, both of which are continuing to develop long-range missiles.
Russia's huge intercontinental missile arsenal could easily overwhelm the planned system. While some incoming Russian warheads might be destroyed in flight, many others would get through. China has far fewer ICBMs, but as one of its defense officials told Times correspondent Jim Mann this week, if the United States deployed a missile defense system, China could boost its missile production to offset that deterrent.
Even though both Moscow and Beijing implicitly recognize that a U.S. system would not significantly affect the balance of power, both bitterly oppose its development. Some NATO allies too have objected, citing a "double security standard" that would leave the United States more secure than its partners. Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott gave the right response: "Why would the United States be a better ally if it were vulnerable to North Korean missiles?"
A third test of the interceptor is planned for April. Then comes the decision on whether the technology is reliable enough and cost-effective enough to go ahead with deployment by 2005. If so, construction could start on radar sites in Alaska. Ultimately the program could cost up to $16 billion.
The potential missile threat from rogue states can't be ignored. But that threat can be met only with a missile interceptor system that has been shown to work in all of its aspects. Rushing ahead with anything less would provide neither deterrence nor defense.
-----------
Dubious missile shield System stands in way of real security: reducing warheads.
Atlanta Journal Constitution: Editorials:
Thursday • January 20
This week's test of U.S. missile defense high above the Pacific Ocean can be likened to a full-dress rehearsal. Every actor in the cast played a part; even a computerized battle-management system made its debut. But the finale fell flat. The interceptor missed its target, a dummy warhead.
Given this last-act fizzle, a smart producer might cut his losses and fold the show. But neither the White House nor the Pentagon have shown that much pragmatism. They intend to give the limited missile-defense program (call it Star Wars Lite) one more run-through, some time in April or May.
The Defense Department has said it must record two "hits" in these interception tests before it can recommend that President Clinton order the deployment of an anti-missile system. Such a system would be designed to defeat a limited attack from a strategic latecomer like North Korea or an unsanctioned launch (accidental or terrorist-inspired) from Russia. Clinton is supposed to decide by June.
The Pentagon's claim to have scored one hit already in a test last October is debatable. Missile-defense opponents point out that although that test was simplified --- choreographed for success, they say --- the interceptor veered off course, then zeroed in on a decoy and only at the last moment rammed its target. Critics call that more luck than technical prowess.
To compare missile defense to "hitting a bullet with a bullet" is to underestimate the difficulty of the feat. The missiles zip along at 20 times the speed of a pistol bullet. Moreover, any regime with the savvy to produce nuclear warheads and a delivery system is very likely to master the simpler technique of using decoys to defeat anti-missile missiles. This is a game where the offense has a lot of advantages over the defense.
Yet an aggressor would have to be suicidal to fire a nuclear- or chemical-tipped missile at the United States, knowing full well the projectile would bear his country's return address in big, bold letters and that Washington would retaliate massively. That is the essence of mutually assured destruction, the doctrine that kept the peace during the Cold War. It still has deterrent value today, more so than any missile defense.
Besides, wouldn't enemies of the United States prefer a sneak attack and hope they leave no fingerprints? A missile defense would be of no use against a nuclear device secreted into the hold of a freighter docking at a U.S. port or a suitcase bomb smuggled into the country. Sad to say, these frightful scenarios are more plausible than North Korea or Iran lobbing an ICBM in our direction.
Then there's the burden of cost. Over the last 40 years, the United States has spent nearly $100 billion on missile defense with very little to show for it. Deployment, through the next five years, would cost an estimated $12.5 billion extra, no doubt a low-ball figure. Pentagon pragmatists worry missile defense spending is draining funds from the armed forces' real-world needs.
Finally, there's the little matter of deployment being a violation of the Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty. Washington has tried to coax Moscow to permit such limited systems for both countries, but the Russians won't hear of revising the accord. Moreover, acting Russian President Vladimir Putin indicates that ratification of the START 2 treaty will be out of the question if the United States breaks the ABM treaty.
Moscow still has plenty of warheads that represent a threat to this country. Can there be any doubt that U.S. security would be better served by the drastic reduction of Russian nuclear warheads, as START 2 would achieve, than by the raising of a highly dubious missile shield?
--------------
HITTING A BULLET WITH A BULLET
Jan. 20, 2000
Chicago Tribune Editoral
January 20, 2000
The Pentagon suffered another humiliating failure in the latest test of its troubled national missile defense system when a prototype rocket missed its target over the Pacific Ocean Tuesday night.
It was another in a string of largely unsuccessful tests of a system that would use space-based satellites and ground-based interceptors to protect America from nuclear-tipped ballistic missiles. Only one more test is scheduled--in late April or early May--before President Clinton is scheduled to make a decision, as early as July, on whether to move ahead with full deployment of this system.
It may take weeks to figure out exactly why the interceptor--a high-tech "kill vehicle" designed to destroy an enemy warhead by ramming it head-on--failed to strike its target. But the test clearly demonstrated one thing: It's premature to order deployment of this $12.5 billion shield. It's not ready.
Still, Clinton might not be able to resist the temptation. This is an election year, and Republicans are clamoring for a missile defense system. They have championed the idea since Ronald Reagan pledged to develop one as part of his so-called "Star Wars" initiative in 1983. Clinton would help Vice President Al Gore intercept a few GOP rhetorical missiles by signing on to deployment.
This is a system well worth spending the money to thoroughly research and develop--and to deploy if it can be proved to be effective in deterring or downing enemy missiles. But so far, it is not yet feasible.
The day may come when deployment of a missile defense will protect U.S. land. It won't make the U.S. impervious to nuclear assault; it is designed to thwart a nuclear missile launched by a rogue state. But deployment will be seen in some quarters as a provocation, and the decision will force the U.S. to conduct a diplomatic tap dance.
Clinton has already informed Russia he wants to amend the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty to allow such a system. The outraged Russians have threatened to stall progress on arms control treaties, fearing the U.S. might expand this defense system one day to try to thwart their extensive nuclear arsenal. If the U.S. proceeds to deploy, other nuclear powers, such as China, may well build more weapons in an effort to overwhelm it, spurring a nuclear arms race if India and Pakistan follow suit.
That's a risk that might be worth taking when the technology for an anti-missile system is ready. But it's not. It's not ready yet.
-----------
PRESIDENT SHOULD DELAY MISSILE DEFENSE DEPLOYMENT DECISION, REQUIRE REALISTIC TESTING
UCS Press Release,
Jan. 19, 2000
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:
Wednesday, January 19, 2000
Contact: Tom Collina (202) 332-0900
David Wright (617) 547-5552
The Union of Concerned Scientists today called on President Clinton to postpone a July decision on whether to approve deployment of a national missile defense system. Last night the second NMD intercept test failed to hit its target. The first test in October did hit its target, although it may have been by chance.
"In two tests the Pentagon has one whiff and one foul ball," said Tom Collina, Director of the Arms Control and International Security Program for UCS. "But the bigger problem is that these tests don't look like the real world. The President should postpone any decision until the system is proven effective against realistic targets."
In a real attack, the system would have to contend with simple but devastating countermeasures designed to confuse and overwhelm the defense.
For biological or chemical weapons, the warhead can be readily divided into dozens or hundreds of small bomblets, or submunitions, that would be released from the missile early in flight. These numerous targets would overwhelm the planned NMD system. For nuclear weapons, which cannot be subdivided, a missile can carry a large number of lightweight decoys to defeat the defense.
"Trying to hit a single, bare warhead with a high- speed interceptor - which the current tests are assessing - is a difficult technical problem," said David Wright, a physicist and Senior Staff Scientist at UCS. "But it is a completely different problem than trying to get the system to work against countermeasures, which is what matters in the real world. Doing the first doesn't mean you can do the second. So basing a deployment decision on the current tests makes no sense - it's the wrong criterion."
"Deploying a defense that doesn't work against the real-world threat is no defense at all," said Collina.
-----------
NATIONAL MISSILE DEFENSE TEST FAILURE: NOT YET READY FOR PRIME TIME
Council for Livable World January 19, 2000
John Isaacs
o (202) 543-4100 x 131;
h (202) 387-6474 or
Luke Warren - (202) 543-4100 x127
Press release
Washington, D.C. . "While National Missile Defense advocates exaggerated the 'success' of the National Missile Defense test in October, there is no reason to read total 'failure' into yesterday's unsuccessful shot," said John Isaacs, president of Council for a Livable World
"Instead, yesterday's test reinforces the necessity to avoid what the Welch panel of independent experts referred to two years ago as 'a rush to failure,'" added Isaacs.
Present plans call for the Pentagon to conduct a "Deployment Readiness Review" in June to make a recommendation on deployment, with a presidential decision on deployment scheduled by the end of the summer.
Only three of 19 intercept tests will have been completed by that time.
"There are too many technical questions to bet American lives on a system that has been tested only three of 19 times and never under real-world conditions," argued Isaacs. "Moreover," said Isaacs, "we should not pull out of the Anti-Ballistic Treaty and threaten further nuclear weapons reductions with Russia for the sake of deploying a missile shield that has not yet proven itself to work."
"The full system has not even been tested yet, and will not be until 2003. Right now the Pentagon is using prototypes for several of the system components, including the intercepting missile. It would be foolish to decide in favor of deployment until the entire system is tested several times under tough circumstances," Isaacs stated.
"Let the full set of tests be completed without political pressures to deploy, and defer a decision until the U.S. is confident that a deployed system will work under real world conditions," Isaacs concluded.
(1"Report of the Panel on Reducing Risk In Ballistic Missile Defense Flight Test Programs," February 27, 1998")
--------------
Statement by Sen. Joe Biden (D-DE)
January 19, 2000
"Yesterday's national missile defense test failure merely demonstrates what experts have said all along: that this program is a high-risk effort that is too tightly scheduled. As a result, it may be necessary to postpone the Deployment Readiness review scheduled for this June. We should wait for the analysis of what went wrong, and then decide whether to proceed with the review. The June deadline may well be unrealistic. It would be a disservice to the program and to the President to make a deployment readiness decision based on an artificial deadline."
Stephen Young, Deputy Director
Coalition to Reduce Nuclear Dangers
110 Maryland Ave. NE #505 Washington DC 20002
p: (202)546-0795 ext. 102; fax: (202)546-7970
http://www.crnd.org
--------
Bonjour,
The important issue of modernizing nuclear weapons is the challenge of new pure-fusion nuclear bombs. That means that France with Megajoule and the US with NIF are starting a new arm race and that is totally a clear violation of NPT and CTBT treaties. You should specify this clearly.
And that would help activists in France for stopping Megajoule building.
Thanks,
Dominique
Date: Thu, 20 Jan 2000 16:59:43 +0100 (MET)
From: Dominique Lalanne - lalanne@lal.in2p3.fr
-------- china
China, U.S. Military To Have Contact
Associated Press
January 22, 2000
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/i/AP-China-US.html
BEIJING (AP) -- A senior Chinese general left for the United States today for the first military contact since Beijing broke off the exchanges eight months ago, following NATO's bombing of the Chinese Embassy in Yugoslavia.
Lt. Gen. Xiong Guangkai, deputy chief of the general staff of the People's Liberation Army, will hold three days of talks in Washington next week with U.S. Undersecretary of Defense Walter Slocombe and other Pentagon officials.
Their meetings are to be the first high-level meetings between the two militaries in 13 months, and should help dispel the lingering ill-will that has clouded Chinese-U.S. relations since the May 7 bombing.
Military exchanges have been among the most complex and hard-won gains in the countries' relations. Cut off after the PLA quelled the Tiananmen Square democracy protests in 1989, relations ploddingly resumed in 1993 and progressed to include base visits and discussions of disaster relief operations.
After U.S. warplanes fired satellite-guided missiles into the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade on May 7, China broke off the military contacts, as well as consultations on arms control and human rights. It also effectively suspended negotiations on its entry into the World Trade Organization.
Although China has never accepted Washington's explanation that the attack was accidental, a WTO deal in November and an agreement last month on compensation for the bombing led Beijing to agree to restart military contacts.
But the bombing heightened the Chinese military's suspicions of U.S. intentions. And despite resuming contacts, the PLA remains wary, especially on the issue of Taiwan's status.
The military sees itself as the ultimate defender of China's claim to the island, a former U.S. ally that Washington by law must aid in defending.
Xiong is one of China's most politically influential generals and is known for his hard-line views on the United States. A former head of military intelligence, Xiong sits on the ruling Communist Party's committee that sets policy toward Taiwan.
China calls Taiwan the most sensitive issue in relations with the United States. A state-run newspaper quoted a diplomat at the Chinese Embassy in Washington today as saying U.S. failures to curb arms sales to Taiwan have hurt relations and increased tensions between the mainland and the island.
``The supply of weapons could drag the U.S. into a war that it is neither prepared for nor willing to fight,'' the China Daily quoted Liu Xiaoming as saying.
While Liu said the Chinese-U.S. relations were making progress, he said several issues were still plaguing cooperation, including Taiwan, Washington's decision to censure China before the U.N. Human Rights Commission, and congressional opposition to granting Beijing the same permanent low-tariff trading rights given other trade partners.
--------
Nuke test site to camel sanctuary
London Independent
By Geoffrey Lean
Sunday, November 8, 1998
LONDON-Beating swords into ploughshares is old hat, it seems. This week there is to be an international treaty to give up atomic weapons for camels.
On Wednesday China and the United Nations are to sign an agreement to turn China's Lop Nor nuclear test site into a sanctuary for the rare Bactrian camel. The unprecedented move results from three pioneering expeditions to the desolate area north of Tibet replete with extraordinary feats of derringdoby a group of explorers whose average age was well above 60. The new nature reservea barren and still partially unexplored tract the size of Germany is to be set up to protect 400 wild Bactrian camels, which have survived more than 40 overhead nuclear explosions, only to be threatened by hunters. It is the first such reserve ever to be set up on an atomic bomb test site.
The two humped wild Bactrians are thought to the last representatives of the herds from which all the world's camels are descended. The one humped dromedaries of North Africa and the Middle East are believed to have evolved from thema single hump equips them better to withstand extreme heat.
This week's agreement largely springs from a long campaign by John Hare, a retired international civil servant from Britain, who persuaded the Chinese authorities to allow him to be the first foreigner to enter the area for half a century.
He led three expeditions into the former test site, fighting off bandits, repairing a truck with wire from an old rocket, and twice almost being stranded hundreds of miles from the nearest villages in one of the most inhospitable places on earth.
There is no fresh water in the vast area, only salt springs, and the camels have adapted to drinking salt water. They eat dry grass and tamarisks that grow around the springs.
"There is no nothing, no people, no fresh water, virtually no vegetation, no birds and almost no animals except the camels," said Hare.
At least 45 atmospheric explosions are thought to have been carried out over the area, before the tests went underground. Testing stopped completely in 1996.
Hare admits to having been a "camel wallah" for 40 years. As a colonial era member of the British Overseas Civil Service in northern Nigeria, he used camels for transportation on the fringes of the Sahara. He also employed them while working for the U.N. Environment Program in Kenya.
-------- europe
Geoffrey E. Perry Dies at 72;
Monitored Soviet Satellites
New York Times
January 22, 2000
By JAMES GLANZ
http://www.nytimes.com/00/01/22/news/national/obit-perry.html
Geoffrey E. Perry, a British grammar school teacher who used rudimentary equipment to uncover secret details of the Soviet space program during the Cold War and later became a trusted consultant to United States government agencies, died on Tuesday near his home in Bude, Cornwall. He was 72.
The cause was a sudden heart attack, said Max White, a close friend.
At the Kettering Grammar School in England, Perry and boys he had trained to interpret satellite signals from a simple radio receiver caused an international stir in 1966, when he announced that the Soviet Union had begun using a third launching site, at Plesetsk in northwest Russia, whose existence was then secret.
The amateur monitoring program, which eventually outgrew the school and is now an international collaboration called the Kettering Group, went on to become one of the best sources of public information on Soviet satellites as they malfunctioned, fell out of the sky or simply went about their routine business.
"He did amazing things with very little equipment," said Marcia Smith, a space policy analyst with the Congressional Research Service, which called upon Perry as a consultant for its reports on the Soviet space program. "The most important pieces of equipment he had were his brain and his desire to share information with the world."
Geoffrey E. Perry was born on Aug. 4, 1927, in Braintree, Essex, and received a bachelor's degree from Reading University, where he studied physics. He began teaching at Kettering in the early '50s.
His interest in space was first stirred by a German V-2 rocket that landed near his home in Braintree during World War II. His interest was further piqued by a multinational scientific program, the International Geophysical Year in 1957, which involved much discussion of conditions in space.
Perry later said his reading on that program left him "mentally prepared" for the Soviet launching of Sputnik in October 1957. By the early '60s, he was monitoring the radio transmissions of telemetry data from Soviet satellites with amateur radio equipment.
Much of Perry's method, said Dr. Jonathan McDowell, an astronomer at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics who also publishes Jonathan's Space Report, revolved around a phenomenon called the Doppler effect. Familiar in causing the rising and falling tones of train whistles as they approach and recede, the phenomenon has a similar effect on radio emissions from satellites.
"Your ordinary signal doesn't do that," McDowell said. "So if you see one of these things Dopplering in and out, it's pretty clear that you've got a satellite."
The degree and timing of the rise and fall allowed Perry to deduce things like changes in satellites' altitudes and other characteristics, McDowell said. Perry eventually learned to use other information, like data on the orbits published by American agencies and the coded information the telemetry signals.
Soon Perry began "assigning" individual satellites to boys at the school, White said. A principal qualification for the work was a willingness to have dinner at school, White said. It was during those hours that the Soviet satellites would generally pass over the Soviet Union and transmit data to control stations.
In 1966, Perry noticed that Soviet satellites were in a different orbit than usual and were communicating to a new place on the ground. He concluded that the Soviets had begun using a new launching site. After a researcher at the Congressional Research Service read his obscure report on the new site in a trade publication and alerted reporters, "the world's media descended on Kettering Grammar School," White said.
In 1978, after a student pointed out irregularities in the motions of a satellite he had been assigned, Perry predicted the crash of a Soviet nuclear-powered satellite. It plummeted to the ground in Canada.
The Kettering Group continued to be one of the world's most reliable sources of public information after it left the school on Perry's retirement in 1984. It is now a worldwide confederation of amateurs.
Perry is survived by his wife, Jean, and by his daughter, Isabel Carmichael.
The recent opening of previously secret Soviet archives, McDowell said, revealed the accuracy of much of Perry's analysis.
"He's like the archetypal English amateur expert," McDowell said. "But at the same time the quality of what he did was better than the professionals'. "
---
French protest against Australian nuclear waste
FRANCE: January 19, 2000
http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=5445
PARIS - Greenpeace activists blocked part of the French Channel port of Cherbourg yesterday ahead of the arrival of a freighter carrying Australian nuclear waste for reprocessing.
About 25 environmental activists blocked access to the terminal used by French state-run nuclear reprocessing group Cogema.
Cogema said the French freighter Bouguenais was due to dock later in the day. It left the port of Botany, near Sydney on November 25 with some 900 kilos (1,980 lb) of spent nuclear fuel to be reprocessed at Cogema's La Hague plant, near Cherbourg.
Cogema said in a statement that the used fuel from the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation's (ANSTO) Lucas Heights reactor was being transported in 20-tonne cylinders which had undergone a series of safety tests and been approved by both French and Australian nuclear authorities.
It said the Bouguenais conformed to International Maritime Organisation standards for the transport of nuclear material, and its contract with Australia, which has come under fire from the Greens Party, conforms with a 1991 ruling.
Greenpeace said the waste consisted of enriched uranium which could have a military use. It opposes shipping nuclear waste as dangerous both for the environment and international security.
---
Australian nuclear waste reaches French plant
FRANCE: January 20, 2000
http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=5462
RENNES - A consignment of 900 kg (2,000 lb) of spent Australian nuclear fuel reached the La Hague reprocessing plant in northern France overnight despite a bid by environmentalists to stop the move, officials said yesterday.
French radio said police detained about a dozen activists from the Greenpeace environmental group who sought to block the fuel in the nearby French Channel port of Cherbourg, where it arrived on Tuesday.
Officials at Cogema, the state-controlled firm which runs the La Hague plant, said the consignment was transferred to the plant overnight.
Cogema says the used fuel from the Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation's Lucas Heights reactor was transported in four 20-tonne cylinders which underwent a series of safety tests approved by both French and Australian nuclear authorities.
Greenpeace said the waste consisted of enriched uranium which could have a military use.
The group opposes shipping nuclear waste as dangerous both for the environment and international security.
-----------
------
German coalition takes hard line on nuclear power
GERMANY: January 20, 2000
http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=5479
BERLIN - Germany's ruling Social Democrats and their Greens coalition partners agreed yesterday to close all nuclear reactors after 30 years operation if power companies fail to agree a more complex shut-down, official sources said.
Government spokesman Uwe-Karsten Heye confirmed Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder would meet senior officials of the four major electricity generators on February 4 but declined to give details of the government's negotiating position.
Schroeder is trying to broker a consensus approach between the ecologist Greens, who want Germany's 19 reactors closed as soon as possible, and the industry, which has been pushing for a minimum operating life of 35 years for reactors.
The government is trying to avoid being sued by power firms for compensation.
Schroeder yesterday met fellow Social Democrats Interior Minister Otto Schily and Justice Minister Herta Daeubler-Gmelin as well as Foreign Minister and Deputy Chancellor Joschka Fischer and Environment Minister Juergen Trittin, both Greens, and non-party Economics Minister Werner Mueller.
The four power companies expected at the February 4 meeting are Viag, Veba, RWE and Energie Baden-Wuerttemberg.
-----------
Ireland says sea safe despite UK nuclear dumping
REPUBLIC OF IRELAND:
January 10, 2000
http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=5352
DUBLIN - An Irish government report into the dumping by Britain of radioactive material in the Irish Sea concluded that the risk to human and marine life was extremely low and did not constitute a health hazard.
The report was compiled by a task force set up following the discovery in 1997 of British official documents which indicated that radioactive waste had been dumped in Beaufort's Dyke in the north Irish Sea, in the Firth of Clyde, Liverpool Bay, Morecombe Bay and the Holyhead Deep between the 1940s and 1970s. "This report allays genuine public anxiety about past radioactive dumping, and is also a critical up-to-date assessment of its effects on public health and the marine environment," Marine Minister Michael Woods said in a statement.
The "unacceptable activity" of radioactive dumping by Britain in the Irish Sea had ceased since 1982 but Ireland would remain vigilant in assessing any threat to its marine environment should new information emerge, Woods added.
While the report was concerned mainly with past dumping of radioactive waste, it noted that the discharge of radioactive effluents from the Sellafield nuclear plant on the northwest coast of England began in the early 1950s and had continued up to the present day.
"The government is determined to maintain Ireland's strong position at international level to eliminate these discharges," Woods said.
Discharges from British Nuclear Fuels Sellafield plant, including that of caesium-137, reached a maximum in the 1970s and had substantially declined since, the report said.
It concluded that people had no reason to be concerned about eating fish caught in the Irish Sea or about swimming or playing on beaches along the coast. Attempting to retrieve the dumped material was not necessary or practical given that the risk of disturbing waste on the seabed was greater than the chances of it resurfacing by other means, it said.
The report recommended that radioactivity monitoring schemes continue and that any attempt by Britain to renew dumping be strenuously resisted.
In 1997 the British government revealed that radioactive material, including low-to-medium-level waste contained in metal drums encased in concrete, two strontium-90 anti-static devices, and 10,000 tonnes of building rubble from a demolished thorium-extracting plant, had been dumped off its coast.
Britain subsequently handed over hitherto unreported documents relating to the dumping to the Irish government, which used them in compiling its study published on Friday.
-------- iraq
Iraq
Deseret News
Saturday, January 22, 2000
http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,150008043,00.html?
BAGHDAD - Inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency arrived in Iraq to verify that the nation's nuclear stocks are not being used for weapons. The IAEA monitors are the first to visit Iraq since U.N. weapons inspectors left the country in late 1998 on the eve of U.S.-British airstrikes.
---
Iraq Nuclear Inspectors Go to Work
Associated Press
January 22, 2000
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/i/AP-Iraq-Atomic-Energy.html
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- An International Atomic Energy Agency team went to work in Iraq today to verify that nuclear stocks are not being used for military purposes.
``We will start our first round this morning,'' was all the Egyptian head of the team, Ahmad Abuzahra, would say as he and five monitors were leaving their Baghdad hotel.
The team arrived in Baghdad on Friday. It is the first visit to Iraq by monitors from the Vienna-based organization since U.N. weapons inspectors left the country in late 1998 on the eve of U.S.-British airstrikes.
Abuzahra said Friday the inspection was not part of the U.N. supervision regime, imposed on Iraq after the 1991 Gulf War over Iraq's invasion of Kuwait.
``We are here to perform routine physical inventory checking for nuclear material,'' he said.
The inspection is part of the monitoring program imposed on all signatories to the nuclear nonproliferation treaty, he said. Iraq signed in 1968.
The agency is also responsible for stripping Iraq of its potential to acquire or produce nuclear weapons. Until the 1998 departure of U.N. weapons inspectors, the agency carried out stringent searches of Iraq's nuclear sites and stockpile.
The agency reported Iraq no longer had the ability to produce nuclear weapons, but said Baghdad still had to answer questions about its past atomic program.
In December, the U.N. Security Council passed a resolution that charges the agency with the task of monitoring Iraq's nuclear facilities.
---
World Briefings
MIDDLE EAST
New York Times
January 22, 2000
http://www.nytimes.com/00/01/22/news/world/world-briefs.html
IRAQ: U.N. ARMS TEAM ARRIVES A five-member team of United Nations inspectors arrived in Baghdad to carry out a routine inspection of Iraq's nuclear power and research plants. The inspection is being conducted by the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency, the United Nations agency that monitors the peaceful use of nuclear energy. The visit is not related to Security Council demands for inspections of suspected sites of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. (Reuters)
Compiled by Terence Neilan
---
Inspectors arrive in Iraq
Saint Paul/Minneapolis Pioneer Press
Published: Saturday, January 22, 2000
http://www.pioneerplanet.com/seven-days/6/news/docs/014667.htm
BAGHDAD, IRAQ - Inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency arrived in Iraq on Friday to verify that the nation's nuclear stocks are not being used for weapons. The IAEA monitors are the first to visit Iraq since U.N. weapons inspectors left the country in late 1998 on the eve of U.S.-British airstrikes. The team leader, Ahmad Abuzahra, said the inspection had nothing to do with the supervision imposed after the 1991 Persian Gulf War over Iraq's invasion of Kuwait. He said the inspection was part of the monitoring program imposed on all signatories to the nuclear nonproliferation treaty.
---
Iraq Arms Inspections
New York Times
January 22, 2000
http://www.nytimes.com/yr/mo/day/letters/l22fra.html
Related Articles
Security Council Stalling on Iraq (Jan. 19, 2000)
http://www.nytimes.com/yr/mo/day/early/01190019wed1.html
To the Editor:
Re "Security Council Stalling on Iraq" (editorial, Jan. 19): Over the last few weeks France suggested to Secretary General Kofi Annan the names of several independent, internationally recognized disarmament experts to head the United Nations weapons inspection team for Iraq.
The aim is to find someone able to ensure that inspections resume.
If this aim is to go beyond wishful thinking, the monitoring must be based on a new and efficient system. The United Nations Monitoring, Verification and Inspection Commission has not been set up to work like the United Nations Special Commission, but better than Unscom -- with professionalism and independence. That is the point of Resolution 1284.
You suggest that France's position is dictated by commercial interests; France's partners make no bones about actively defending their own commercial interests the world over, Iraq included. This suggestion serves only to divert attention from the goal shared by all Security Council members: resuming weapons inspections in Iraq.
FRANÈCOIS DELATTRE Director, Press and Information Embassy of France Washington, Jan. 19, 2000
-------- israel
Israeli Parliament Plans Nuclear Debate
Jan 19, 2000 Eastern
Reuters
From: Pamela Meidell pmeidell@igc.org
JERUSALEM - Israel's parliament plans to hold an unprecedented open debate next week on the country's nuclear capabilities, a parliament official said on Wednesday.
``There is no reason why in a democratic country we shouldn't discuss this issue,'' a spokeswoman for Knesset Speaker Avraham Burg said.
A definite date has not been set and parliament officials have not decided yet how in-depth the discussion would be, the spokeswoman said.
Israel is widely acknowledged to have a nuclear missile potential, developed at its secretive Dimona plant since the facility was built with French help in the late 1950s.
The country pursues a deliberate policy of ambiguity, neither confirming nor denying foreign news reports that it has up to 200 atomic warheads.
Discussion of nuclear issues by lawmakers until now has been behind closed doors in the Knesset's foreign affairs and defense committee.
The planned debate follows some relaxation in public discussion of nuclear issues in Israel.
In November, Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper was cleared to publish parts of the classified transcripts of the trial of Mordechai Vanunu, a former technician at Dimona who spilled its nuclear secrets to Britain's Sunday Times newspaper in 1986.
Vanunu, abducted back to Israel to stand trial, is in the 13th year of an 18-year jail sentence. He spent his first 12 years in prison in solitary confinement.
Issam Mahoul, a parliament member from the left-wing, largely Arab Hadash party, requested the open debate, which was initially rejected for ``security reasons.''
``I think it is one of the most fateful and decisive issues in Israel's collective and personal security and of the nations in the region,'' Mahoul said.
``The only people who know nothing about this issue...are the public in Israel,'' Mahoul told Reuters.
He said he would demand that Israel join an international nuclear disarmament treaty, because in an ``era of peace we have to disarm Israel of all weapons of mass destruction.''
He said he would also suggest that Vanunu deserved a Noble Peace Prize.
---
RE: Israeli Parliament Plans Nuclear Debate
Date: Fri, 21 Jan 2000 03:54:12 -1000
From: "Kiser, Steve, Capt, DFPS"
This is going to be very significant--the US, by law, isn't supposed to give a wide array of support to declared nuclear countries--hence the cut in aid to Pakistan and India after they tested nuclear devices. The US has "skirted" this issue because Israel isn't a "formally" declared nuclear state. With this debate, it will be hard for the US to continue this very hypocritical policy of giving Israel so much aid, while simultaneously ignoring many legitimate Arab needs and questions AND continue what it is doing to Iraq.
This summer I was in Israel for about a month. When we were crossing the mountains into the Mediterranean litorral, and saw the nuke plant, I asked the Israeli guide we had with us what it was. He said with a very straight face "The ministry of tourism asked me to inform you that is Israel's largest concrete plant." Such a statement speaks volumes.
Steve Abolition2000 Pacific Region -- abolition2000@hotmail.com
-------- korea
N.Korea Reconsiders Missile Test
Associated Press
January 22, 2000 Filed at 7:32 a.m. EST
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/i/AP-NKorea-US-Missile.html
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- North Korea said today it was reconsidering its moratorium on long-range missile tests after the United States tested an interceptor designed to shoot down enemy missiles.
The North Korean threat came as American and North Korean officials head to talks in Berlin today on the possibility of dispatching a senior envoy from the North to Washington for a groundbreaking visit.
On Tuesday, the United States tested the missile defense system, saying it needed a shield against a potential attack from the isolated Stalinist state.
The test ``is one more grave challenge to magnanimity and good faith shown by the (North) in its efforts to settle the outstanding issues through negotiations,'' said a spokesman of the North Korean foreign ministry.
It has compelled North Korea to ``take our moratorium into a serious consideration,'' Pyongyang's official Korean Central News Agency quoted the unidentified spokesman as saying.
``We will make an appropriate decision, watching (Washington's) future movement.''
Last September, North Korea agreed to forgo a test of a long-range missile capable of reaching U.S. territory -- for the duration of dialogue aimed at improving ties with the United States.
In return, Washington lifted some of its half-century-old economic sanctions on North Korea, an enemy state.
Before the moratorium, North Korea rattled nerves in Asia and Washington by testing a missile that flew over Japan and landed in the Pacific in 1998.
In today's Berlin talks, Washington wants North Korea to send an envoy to visit the United State in reciprocation after President Clinton sent William Perry, a former U.S. defense secretary, to North Korea in May.
The talks will be headed by Ambassador Charles Kartman, the State Department's chief Korea specialist, and Vice Foreign Minister Gye Gwan representing North Korea.
In Tuesday's $100 million test, the U.S. missile interceptor failed to hit its target 140 miles above the Pacific Ocean. In a preliminary assessment, U.S. officials blamed the failure on malfunction of two heat-seeking devices.
The Clinton administration intends to ask Congress to add $2.2 billion to the coming year's budget to pay for more testing and to expand the number of interceptors that would be fielded.
So far, the administration estimates that building the missile defense system will cost $12.7 billion.
---
N. Korea Threatens to Resume Missile Tests
Reuters
January 22, 2000
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/international/international-nkorea-.html
TOKYO (Reuters) - North Korea said on Saturday it may resume missile tests in response to a U.S. decision to test a missile interceptor system, raising the stakes in delicate talks between Washington and the Stalinist state.
In September, the United States said it was easing its long-standing economic sanctions in exchange for North Korea's pledge to freeze long-range missile tests.
But the North Korean Central News Agency on Saturday quoted a Foreign Ministry spokesman as saying the U.S. tests have ''compelled the Democratic People's Republic of Korea to take our moratorium into serious consideration.''
The spokesman said the U.S. missile defense system test was a direct challenge to the ``good faith'' North Korea had shown in high-level talks the country had with Washington on the missile test moratorium, according to the report monitored in Tokyo.
He added that North Korea's decision about resuming tests would be made after watching U.S. movements.
The United States earlier this week conducted an unsuccessful test of a missile interceptor. The U.S. Congress and President Clinton are squaring off over whether Washington should develop and deploy a multi-billion dollar system that will shoot down missiles from rogue nations such as North Korea.
Pyongyang's threat comes as U.S. and North Korean negotiators met in Berlin on Saturday to try to lay the groundwork for the first high-level North Korean visit to the United States.
Despite the announcement that it was considering a resumption of missile tests, North Korea often makes provocative statements during times when it is entering into serious talks with major industrialized nations.
North Korean relations with the United States and Washington's close ally Japan were severely strained when North Korea launched a long-range Taepodong missile over Japan in August 1998.
In recent months, however, North Korea has moved to warm ties with industrialized powers. The highlight of Pyongyang's decision to abandon some of its reclusive ways came earlier this month with the announcement that Italy had agreed to normalize ties with the communist state.
In addition, Japan and North Korea are also on the road to normalizing ties.
Last month Tokyo lifted sanctions it imposed against Pyongyang to punish it for the missile test, which prompted an initial round of preparatory talks aimed at eventually normalizing ties between the historic foes.
The two nations are set to meet again early this year.
Some other European countries -- Austria, Denmark, Finland, Portugal and Sweden -- already have diplomatic ties with Pyongyang. France and Germany have only informal contacts and the United States has no diplomatic links.
---
World Briefings
NORTH KOREA, U.S.: TALKS TODAY
New York Times
January 22, 2000
http://www.nytimes.com/00/01/22/news/world/world-briefs.html
American and North Korean negotiators will meet in Berlin today to try to prepare the groundwork for the first high-level visit by North Korean officials to the United States. The meeting will build on the positive outcome of the last round of talks in Berlin in November. Washington said last year that it was easing sanctions in exchange for North Korea's pledge to restrain its missile and nuclear programs. Victor Homola (NYT)
--------romania
Snow Blocking East European Roads
Associated Press
January 21, 2000
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/i/AP-Eastern-Europe-Weather.html
http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,150008065,00.html?
BUCHAREST, Romania (AP) -- An avalanche blocked the entrances to a uranium mine Friday in western Romania, trapping 120 people below ground after heavy snows blanketed Eastern Europe.
Snow piles up to 20 feet high covered the entrances of the Baita-Plai mine, and machines needed to clear the entrances also were buried, said Lt. Col. Petru Catana of the Civilian Protection Corps in the city of Oradea.
Officials at the mine were able to communicate with the trapped workers by telephone. The miners said they had enough water and heat, but had run out of food, Catana said. Several specialists were dispatched from Oradea to help free the miners.
Elsewhere, drifting snow collapsed more than 100 homes in northern Romania on Friday and forced police to close checkpoints on the borders with Hungary and Ukraine.
Col. Petru Tiplea, spokesman for Romania's border police, said that near the borders, ``the snow blanket reached 2.5 meters (more than eight feet) and we lost contact with our people.''
He said the borders were declared closed after many border officers could not reach their checkpoints.
The Mediafax news agency reported that more than 100 Gypsy families were moved onto a stationary train after their homes in Targu Lapus collapsed. A dozen houses also collapsed under the weight of snow around the village of Coroieni, 270 miles northwest of Bucharest.
Snowstorms also blocked traffic on several roads, mainly in central and northern Romania, isolating dozens of villages in the counties of Bihor, Satu Mare, Cluj, Salaj and Mures, Romania's traffic police said.
The snowstorm also cut water and electricity to 50,000 people in Miercurea Ciuc city, 140 miles north of Bucharest, civil defense authorities said. More than 500 villages across the country were without electricity, the national electric company, Conel, reported.
In the Czech Republic, a state of emergency was declared in one of the country's eastern districts after it was paralyzed by snow.
``We've called the army to help us cope with the calamity,'' said Frantisek Jonas from the district council in Trebic, 125 miles southeast of Prague. He said traffic was blocked due to snow and several cars were stuck on the roads.
Traffic on the main D-1 highway, linking the country with Slovakia and Austria, was ``hopelessly blocked with hundreds of cars in each direction, waiting for snowplows to make the road passable,'' a highway police spokesman said. In several sections of the highway, traffic jams stretched for six miles.
The engine of a local passenger train derailed in the south of the country on a railway line covered with snow, blocking rail traffic for the entire day, Czech rail authorities said.
A state of emergency also was declared in several regions of northeastern Slovakia after falling snow stalled traffic, media reported.
An avalanche blocked a railway line connecting the northern towns of Kralovany and Trstena, interrupting train service for the day, and avalanche warnings were issued for mountainous regions of Slovakia.
In Miskolc, 100 miles east of Budapest, heavy snowfall accompanied by lightning, thunder and 60-mph winds walloped the city, the state news agency MTI reported.
Winds of up to 95 mph were clocked overnight in Austria. Heavy snowfall hindered traffic in the central part of the country.
---
Avalanches in Romania Kill Six
Reuters
January 22, 2000
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/i/AP-Romania-Weather.html
BUCHAREST, Romania (AP) -- Heavy winds and avalanches of snow killed two people Saturday, bringing the death toll from the storms that battered Romania to six.
Snowfall and strong gusts continued Saturday, mainly in north and central Romania. In western Romania, authorities freed 120 uranium miners who had been trapped below ground since Friday by snow piles up to 20 feet high.
An avalanche had covered the entrances of the Baita-Plai mine, some 260 miles northwest of Bucharest. The rescuers had to make a tunnel under the snow to free those trapped, said Lt. Col. Nicolae Petrut, of the Civilians Protection Corps.
Mine authorities suspended work until the danger of new avalanches passed.
A 54-year-old man and his 20-year-old son who had left their home to cut firewood were killed Saturday when they were buried by snow near the northwest village of Rebra, government television reported. Also in the northwest, another avalanche killed a 15-year-old girl on Friday in the village of Garda.
Villagers in the western town of Cornisoru tried but failed to rescue a 41-year-old woman and her two sons, aged 13 and 14. The three were buried Friday by an avalanche and their bodies were found Saturday.
The deaths were confirmed in a government statement broadcast on national radio.
One other person is missing.
-------- russia
Russia-Poland spy scandal intensifies with expulsions
Saint Paul/Minneapolis Pioneer Planet
Published: Saturday, January 22, 2000
http://www.pioneerplanet.com/seven-days/6/news/docs/014667.htm
MOSCOW - In one of the biggest spying scandals of the post-Soviet era, Russia on Friday ordered nine Polish Embassy employees to leave the country, issuing the order one day after Poland expelled nine Russian diplomats for espionage. Neither country gave details of how the alleged spying was conducted or what information may have been compromised. The expulsion orders complicate already-strained relations between the two countries. Russia has watched with anger and anxiety as its onetime Warsaw Pact ally moves closer to the West. Poland joined NATO last year, pushing the Western alliance's reach to the border of Kaliningrad, the Russian enclave where much of its western naval fleet is based.
-------
Datelines
Russia
Deseret News
Saturday, January 22, 2000
http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,150008043,00.html?
MOSCOW - Russia's space agency said Friday that the International Space Station remains its main priority even though it may struggle to replace rockets that will now be used to extend the lifetime of the Mir station.
--------
Moscow blind to N-missiles
By JONATHAN LANDAY
Sydney Morning Herald,
January 11, 2000
http://www.smh.com.au/news/0001/11/world/world3.html
Russia's early-warning system is so decayed that Moscow is unable to detect United States intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) launches for at least seven hours a day, US officials and experts say.
Russia also could no longer spot missiles fired from US submarines at all, they said.
At most, only four of Russia's 21 early-warning satellites were still working, observers of Moscow's space program said.
That would mean Russian commanders have no more than 17 hours - and perhaps as little as 12 hours - of daily coverage of the 550 nuclear-tipped ICBM silos in Colorado, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota and Wyoming.
"Against submarines, they basically have no warning," said Professor Theodore Postol of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
But because the logic of nuclear deterrence requires both sides to launch their missiles before a surprise attack obliterates them, Russia's problems are just as dangerous for the US.
The fear is that in the heat of a serious crisis Russian military and civilian leaders could misread a non-threatening rocket launch or ambiguous data as a nuclear first strike and launch a salvo at the US and Western Europe.
An August 1999 report by the Congressional Budget Office said that if Russia's early-warning system "cannot reassure Russian leaders that false alarms are indeed benign events, the danger for both countries could be significant".
Mr James Goodby, a former ambassador who negotiated the US-funded destruction of Russian nuclear weapons, said: "I think the chances [of a nuclear mistake] are rising ... from what I felt was a very, very low level."
US officials, while acknowledging that Russia's early-warning system had deteriorated badly, said Russia retained considerable early- warning capabilities and control of its nuclear forces.
In addition, the US and Russia now notified each other of rocket launches in advance.
Although US officials insisted there was little chance of an inadvertent nuclear war, the US finds itself in the unusual position of offering to help the Russians detect a US missile attack.
One proposal calls for a joint early-warning centre to be set up in Moscow, and another for help to finance the rebuilding of Russia's early-warning system.
Early-warning radars and satellites remain important because, while the US and Russia have agreed to "de-target" each other, both can re-program their missiles in minutes.
Russia still keeps an estimated 2,000 nuclear warheads on high alert, most of them atop silo-based SS-18 missiles.
Experts say the US has as many as 2,500 warheads on high alert.
The Kremlin cannot afford to put into orbit the six replacement satellites it needs to resume 24-hour surveillance of US missile silos, experts say. Nor can it pay to activate replacements for two land-based early-warning radars.
As a result, Russian radars are blind in the northern areas of the Atlantic and Pacific oceans where US ballistic missile submarines operate.
However, a US official said, the Russians were "committed to ensuring that their part of command-and-control works".
"It is hard for me to imagine that this degradation is making them more hair-triggered; it's making them more cautious."
--------
Strike at Leningrad NPP postponed
2000.01.18 16:41
http://www.bellona.no/imaker?id=14720&sub=1
Strike at Leningrad nuclear power plant has been postponed until Saturday, January 22. The employees of the plant insist on 40 percent salary raise while the administration says that it can manage only 10 percent increase. A new meeting between the conflicting parties is scheduled to take place on Tuesday and, given no compromise is reached, the strike is imminent: The strikers will act by reducing the plant's energy output down to 50 percent. Leningrad NPP operates on four RBMK-1000 reactors.
---
Strike threats at Leningrad NPP
The trade union at Leningrad nuclear power plant says the plant will go on strike on Tuesday if the salary is not increased.
Thomas Nilsen,
2000.01.14 13:47
http://www.bellona.no/imaker?id=14605&sub=1
Just one month after the last threats to go on strike, the employees at Leningrad nuclear power plant have delivered another ultimatum to their superiors: A salary raise by Tuesday or the strike will start. The lowest monthly salary for the plant's operators is 733 rubles (some $27). An even bigger problem is that the salaries are not paid on regularly basis.
The conflict regarding payment between the workers of the nuclear power plant and its management contains nothing new. Back in 1996, the first strike ever at a Russian nuclear power plant was arranged at Leningrad NPP when a number of employees occupied one of the four reactor halls. Since then, strikes and strike threats have followed the plant's cash-stripped economy as a shadow.
The St. Petersburg Times writes today that the plant's earnings dropped in the forth quarter of 1999, compared to those in the third quarter. Another problem is that the clients of Leningrad nuclear power plant can not pay their debts in cash. As much as 90 percent of the debts is fixed by various kinds of barter agreements - bills of exchange or shares.
Representatives of the trade union refer to their employee contracts for the year 2000 where it is stated that they should have a 22 percent increase in their monthly salaries. Plant officials say they might be able to give a maximum of 10 percent, which in fact is no more than the recent days' devaluation of the Russian ruble.
Should the parties reach no agreement by Tuesday, the union says most of the 6,100 employees will go on strike. A minimum number of staff will be on call at the plant for safety reasons.
Leningrad nuclear power plant is located around 80 kilometres outside of St. Petersburg. It operates four RBMK-1000 reactors.
---
Submarine spent fuel shipment underway
Submarine spent fuel is being shipped from Murmansk; another Delta-II is being prepared for decommissioning.
Igor Kudrik,
2000.01.17 12:03
http://www.bellona.no/imaker?id=14677&sub=1 http://www.bellona.no/data/b/0/14/67/8_1407_1.jpg
The spent nuclear fuel transport train arrived to Murmansk on January 4 and is shortly to departure for the Mayak reprocessing plant. Meanwhile, at Severodvinsk - the train's apparent next destination - a Delta-class submarine is being prepared for defuelling.
This year's first train consisting of four railway cars is being laden with spent nuclear fuel that mainly derived from the defuelling of a Victor-II class submarine. Spent fuel from this submarine was taken out by a civilian ship Imandra, operated by Murmansk Shipping Company, at Nerpa shipyard at the Kola Peninsula in November-December 1999. This defuelling was called an 'experiment' by officials and was designed to obtain a practical experience for a civilian ship to unload fuel from general-purpose submarines. Altogether, around 500 fuel assemblies were removed from the two reactors of Victor-II (K-476). The train is capable to take 588 naval fuel assemblies, or 2-2,5 submarine reactor cores.
Last year, the train made at least five trips to the Mayak plant taking spent fuel from Murmansk, Severodvinsk and from the Pacific Fleet in the Russian Far East. Transportation of at least 12 reactor cores (around six submarines) was covered by the Co-operative Threat Reduction program (CTR) - an American initiative tasked to secure former Soviet Union's weapons of mass destruction. The funding of the shipments required a waiver from U.S. policy which prohibits that American funds be spent on support of reprocessing. The permission was limited to spent fuel from 15 strategic submarines. Their dismantlement was also funded by CTR.
Delta-II to be defuelled
A Delta-II class submarine (K-421) is prepared for defuelling and earmarked for decommissioning at Zvezdochka shipyard in Severodvinsk, Arkhangelsk County. Delta-II is a strategic submarine commissioned in 1975. The dismantlement of the submarine will be funded by CTR. All in all, CTR has plans to fund scrapping of 26 Russian strategic submarines of Delta-class in the Northern Fleet and the Pacific Fleet.
So far, 14 strategic nuclear powered submarines have been dismantled at Zvezdochka shipyard. Another four will be dismantled in the course of this year. In addition, negotiations are complete for CTR funding to construct a land based spent fuel transfer facility and storage pad for transport casks at Zvezdochka. When this pad is completed in June 2001, the rate of the submarine being defuelled is expected to increase.
---
Reactor compartments to be stored onshore
A proposal to establish a new onshore storage site for submarine reactor compartments at the Kola Peninsula met protests from the local population; goes ahead anyway.
Igor Kudrik,
2000.01.13 13:22
http://www.bellona.no/imaker?id=14327&sub=1
The plans of the Russian Northern Fleet to establish an onshore storage sites for reactor compartments that derived from decommissioned submarines met protests from the neighbouring city of Skalisty (Gadzhievo) at the Kola Peninsula. The local city council said it intended to put the issue on referendum, while the regional authorities of the Murmansk County tried to seek solutions.
The storage site in question is a place called Sayda Bay - a former fishing village that was annexed as a military area in 1990. The area is now used for storing reactor compartments from scrapped nuclear powered submarines. Currently there are 25 compartments afloat tied to piers in Sayda Bay. The designers of this site said the compartments could be stored at the piers for a period of up to 10 years. Sayda Bay is the central storage site for reactor compartments in north-west Russia. They are towed here both from the shipyards at the Kola Peninsula and from Severodvinsk in Arkhangelsk County.
To store the reactors afloat is an unsafe procedure that prompted the Northern Fleet to establish an onshore storage site in Sayda Bay. Northern Fleet officials said the onshore site would be designed to take 77 reactor compartments from decommissioned submarines.
But the city council of the town of Skalisty (Gadzhievo) went against the proposal. The members of the council say that the city boarder of Gadzhievo lies only 2-2,5 kilometres from the planned storage site and it creates grounds for concern among the local population.
Gadzhievo itself hosts a base for strategic nuclear submarines of Delta-class and general-purpose submarines of Akula-class.
A commission headed by the vice-governor of Murmansk County was established to examine the matter. The conflict is presently frozen while the parties are waiting for results from en environmental impact study and detailed description of the technical part of the project.
The Russian Northern Fleet has been looking for a storage place for reactor compartments the past 6-7 years. Another alternative proposed earlier was to use three tunnels blasted out at the naval base in Ara Bay at the Kola Peninsula. The tunnels were originally thought to become a hiding place for nuclear powered submarines. But they have never been used according with their intended purpose. The establishing of an onshore storage site in Sayda Bay has more realistic perspectives being considered to be relatively safe and, more important, cheap in comparison to other options.
---
Nikitin case verdict
St. Petersburg City Court,
29 December, 1999
http://www.bellona.no/imaker?id=14177&sub=1
Comment:
The first part of the verdict reproduces the main points of the indictment against Nikitin. Then follows an overview over the evidence of the case, starting with the phrase "After having investigated the materials of the present criminal case, the court came to the following conclusions", and ending with a listing of various open sources that have been examined by the Court. The Court's own evaluation starts after this listing with the phrase "The Court examined the above mentioned literature ....".
2000.01.19 17:05
Case No. 02 - 1. Not secret.
VERDICT
The Russian Federation
Saint-Petersburg City Court consisting of:
Presiding - judge GOLETS, S. Y.,
Citizen judges - AKHMEDOV, G. S., GOLTSOV, I.A.,
Court Secretary SEMYONOVA V.P.,
With participation of State Prosecutor GUTSAN, A.V.,
Defence Attorneys SCHMIDT, Y. M., MATINOV, M.A. and PAVLOV I. Yu.
On December 29, 1999 the St.-Petersburg City Court, considered in a closed judicial session the criminal case against the accused NIKITIN, ALEKSANDR KONSTANTINOVICH, born on May 16, 1952 in Akhtyrka, Sumskaya oblast, in the Ukrainian SSR, (ethnic) Ukrainian, citizen of the Russian Federation, with higher education, married, captain of the 1st rank, pensioner of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, no prior convictions, place of residence: St. Petersburg, Ul. Tukhachevskogo, 5 - 4 - 69, for having committed the crimes stipulated in Article 275 and Article 283 para. 2 of the Penal Code of the Russian Federation, has established:
During the preliminary investigation, the defendant NIKITIN was accused with, being a citizen of the Russian Federation, bringing damage to the external security of Russia, in August 1995 in St.- Petersburg, having collected data, which constitutes state secrets, with the purpose to transfer it to a foreign organisation, and in September 1995 in Murmansk, having passed over the information to a representative of this foreign organisation, i.e.: having committed State Treason in the form of espionage (Article 275 of the Penal Code of the Russian Federation). Besides in the spring - autumn of 1995 in Murmansk he disclosed information constituting state secrets, which he got familiar with during his military service. The disclosure had serious consequences (Article 283 para. 2 of the Penal Code of the Russian Federation).
The State prosecutor, basing on the court sessions, based his accusations against NIKITIN on Article 275 of the Penal Code RF, and dropped the accusation related to Article 283 para. 2 of the Penal Code RF, because he found it necessary to qualify his [Nikitin's] actions under Article 283 para. 1 of the Penal Code RF.
As it is evident from the materials of the criminal case submitted by the body of the preliminary investigation, the crimes were accomplished under the following circumstances.
The defendant NIKITIN has, after having graduated from the Sevastopol Naval Engineer College, served in the Northern Fleet until 1985. Between September 1985 and July 1987 he studied at the Naval Academy named after the admiral of the Fleet of the Soviet Union N.G. Kuznetsov (VÌÀ), in Leningrad, majoring in: "Organisation of exploiting and repairs of naval nuclear reactors". After graduating from the Academy, he continued to serve in Moscow, at the Inspection of Nuclear safety of nuclear installations of the Defence Ministry of the Russian Federation. During his service he had acquired permit No. 1 to information pertaining to state secrets. Since 1987, serving in the Inspection, and since 1989 being the chief of the above-mentioned Inspection, he had access to the information pertaining to state secrets. Because of the post he occupied he had knowledge about the following: About the bases of nuclear submarines of the Northern and Pacific fleet of the USSR navy, about the bases of nuclear submarines of special assignments and laid-up ships, about all shipyards and ship-repairing enterprises of the Navy. Besides, he had access to information on tactical-technical characteristics, factory and tactical numbers of nuclear submarines, nuclear surface ships, and about all types of reactors in use.
In November 1992, because of staff redundancies and his own desire, he retired as a captain of the first degree, and moved on a constant residence to St. Petersburg to his wife - CHERNOVA, T.E. When he retired he signed a subscription about not to disclose the information pertaining to state secrets, which he had been entrusted to or had learned in course of his service.
Throughout the next two years he was engaged in various commercial activities, in particular in AOZT "Konnors" (Petersburg), which was selling cars.
Then, the defendant, together with his wife and under her initiative, decided to move abroad for permanent residence in Canada. With this purpose they sent the appropriate application to the Canadian embassy in Moscow.
Besides, in order to fulfil short-term trips abroad, NIKITIN has on January 12, 1994 received in OVIR of the Police Department of St.-Petersburg, on general terms, an international passport.
In February and December 1994 and April 1995, NIKITIN used this passport to travel to Norway.
During his stay in Norway in February 1994, together with his father-in-law retired rear-admiral of the USSR Navy, Hero of the Soviet Union, CHERNOV Y.D., and with assistance of the latter, he got acquainted with Robert BATHURST - an employee of the Norwegian Institute of World Problems (PRIO), who as it was established during the investigation, earlier had served in the USA intelligence.
Later, NIKITIN and BATHURST corresponded with each other, and in the spring of 1994, in Murmansk, the latter introduced him to the representatives of the Norwegian public organisation "Bellona". They asked him to review the Version No. 1 of this organisation's Report named "Sources of radioactive pollution in Murmansk and Arkhangelsk areas"
After having familiarised himself with the report in the spring of 1994, NIKITIN wrote such a review and sent it to the representatives of "Bellona" in Murmansk. NIKITIN kept in touch with the representatives of this organisation over the phone and during his trips to Murmansk. In the winter of 1995 the defendant signed a contract on co-operation with this foreign organisation for a fee of USD 1200.
Further, as the bodies of preliminary investigation established, the events developed as follows.
According to the contract, NIKITIN was obliged to write some sections of Version No. 2 of the mentioned Bellona-report, later titled "The Northern Fleet - Potential Risk of Radioactive Pollution of the Region", using his knowledge in the field of nuclear and radiation safety on nuclear installations. He should also render this foreign organisation consulting services.
Throughout his work on the report from February to September 1995, NIKITIN prepared the text of the parts and chapters that were entrusted to him.
In August, 1995 the defendant asked his acquaintance - a retired Navy officer (formerly also an employee of the Inspection of Nuclear Safety of Atomic Installations in the Defence Ministry of the Russian Federation) RUDENKO, V. L., about special literature on accidents on nuclear submarines. NIKITIN was told that such literature is present at the first Central Scientific Institute of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, at the Main Technical Management of operation and repair of the Russian Navy, and at the Naval Academy.
In order to get access to this literature, the defendant called his acquaintance - senior lecturer of the Naval Academy, ARTEMENKOV V.S., on August 7, 1995. He asked for permission to enter the Navy's special library containing literature on nuclear accidents on nuclear submarines.
Knowing that NIKITIN as a retired Navy officer, had had access to secret and top secret information, including the data on nuclear reactors on the nuclear submarine fleet and surface ships, ARTEMENKOV told him that such literature indeed exists in the Academy's special library. He agreed to provide NIKITIN with this secret and top secret literature. They agreed that NIKITIN should visit the Academy the next day.
On August 8, 1995, the defendant using his officer's identification card, which he did not return upon retirement, received a paper with permission signed by ARTEMENKOV, entered the territory of the Naval Academy. In the office of the faculty he received from ARTEMENKOV the top-secret books "Incidents Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines 1965-1983", issued in 1987, and "Technical Malfunctions Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines of the Navy 1984-1987", issued in 1990. He also received the secret books "The Description of the Common Incidents Onboard Vessels and Service Boats of the Navy in 1989", issued in 1990, and " Description of the Common Incidents Onboard Vessels and Service Boats of the Navy in 1991", issued in 1992. ARTEMENKOV had received the literature in the library containing secret documents before meeting NIKITIN. By giving it to NIKITIN he violated the acting rules of secret office-work.
Taking advantage of these circumstances, NIKITIN being guided by standard and special shortenings, and also conventional signs known to him from his service, copied from the secret and top secret books, the below-mentioned information about accidents and incidents on the nuclear submarines of the USSR Navy, taking place in the period from 1965 to 1989:
From the top secret book "Incidents Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines 1965-1983" (1987 edition), it is copied from pages 103-104 information about the USSR Navy nuclear submarine K-27, concerning an accident that occurred when the reactor parameters were checked while the submarine was at full speed.
The expert commission at the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, concluded on June 10, 1999 that the information copied by NIKITIN discloses information on construction failures, peculiarities regarding the construction and operation of nuclear submarine K-27 as armament and military technology. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997) this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
From the top secret collection "Incidents Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines 1965-1983" (1987 edition) he copied from pages 95-96 information concerning an accident on the nuclear submarine K-140, which occurred while modernising work were carried out.
The expert commission at the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, concluded on June 10, 1999 that the information copied by NIKITIN about K-140 disclosed information on construction failures and peculiarities regarding the durability of domestic nuclear reactors installed at nuclear submarines, and also about the usage and operation of nuclear submarines as armament and military technology. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997) this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
From the top secret book "Incidents Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines 1965-1983" (1987 edition) he copied from pages 104-106 information concerning an accident on the nuclear submarine K-123, concerning steam generator operation and emission of coolant into the reactor-compartment. The expert commission at the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, concluded on June 10, 1999 that the information copied by NIKITIN about K-123 disclosed information about construction failures in the nuclear power installations and about the nuclear submarine as military technology, and also about the usage of newly developed nuclear power installations in military shipbuilding. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraph 2 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997) this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
From the top secret book "Incidents Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines 1965-1983" (1987 edition) he copied from pages 97-99 information about an accident on the nuclear submarine K-222, which occurred while the submarine was being repaired on a naval shipyard. The expert commission at the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, concluded on June 10, 1999 that the information copied by NIKITIN about K-222 discloses construction failures and peculiarities in the automatic control system of domestic nuclear reactors installed on nuclear submarines, and also about usage and operation of the control system of armament and military technology. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997) this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
From the top secret book "Incidents Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines 1965-1983" (1987 edition) he copied from pages 96-97 information about an accident on the nuclear submarine K-320, which occurred while the submarine was under construction at the naval shipyard and hydrologic tests were carried out. The expert commission at the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, concluded on June 10, 1999 that the information copied by NIKITIN about K-320 disclosed construction failures and peculiarities in the construction and operation of the nuclear submarine as armament and military technology. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997) this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
From the secret book "The Description of the Common Incidents Onboard Vessels and Service Boats of the Navy in 1989" (1990 edition) he copied from pages 67-71 information about an accident on the nuclear submarine K-192, which occurred when the submarine was returning from active service back to its base. The expert commission at the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, concluded on June 10, 1999 that the information copied by NIKITIN about K-192 disclosed information about peculiarities in the construction of the nuclear reactors, and failures in the operation of domestic nuclear reactors installed on nuclear submarines. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997) this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
From the top secret book "Technical Malfunctions Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines of the Navy 1984-1987" (1990 edition) he copied from pages 53-54 information about an accident on the nuclear submarine TK-208, which occurred during an ordinary start of the nuclear installation. The expert commission at the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces concluded on June 10, 1999 that the information copied by NIKITIN about TK-208 discloses information about construction failures and peculiarities in the construction and the operation of domestic nuclear reactors installed on nuclear submarines, and also about usage and operation of the submarine as armament and military technology. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997) this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
From the top secret book "Technical Malfunctions Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines of the Navy 1984-1987" (1990 edition) he copied from pages 54-56 information about accidents on nuclear submarines K-279, K-447, K-508, K-209, K-210, K-216, K-316, K-208, K-462, K-38, K-370, K-371, K-306 and K-367, concerning the bodies of indemnification, regulation and emergency protection, and also cases of decompression and leaky steam generators. The expert commission at the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces concluded on June 10, 1999 that the information copied by NIKITIN about the mentioned nuclear submarines disclosed information about construction failures and peculiarities in the construction and the operation of domestic nuclear reactors installed on nuclear submarines, and also about usage and operation of the submarines as armament and military technology. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997) this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
That NIKITIN with the purpose of the subsequent transfer to the foreign organisation "Bellona" collected information from the top secret book "Incidents Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines 1965-1983" (1987 edition), the secret book "The Description of the Common Incidents Onboard Vessels and Service Boats of the Navy in 1989" (1990 edition) and the top secret book "Technical Malfunctions Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines of the Navy 1984-1987" (1990 edition of) about accidents and incidents, which have occurred in the period between 1965 and 1989 on nuclear submarines in the USSR navy with the tactical numbers: K-27, K-320, K-140, K-123, K-222, K-192, K-208, K-447, K-508, K-209, K-210, K-216, K-306, K-316, K-462, K-38, K-370, K-371, K-367, K-279, which according to the conclusion of the expert commission at the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces of June 19, 1999 pertains to state secrets. Besides, it is also disclosed information about losses of armament and military technology in the times of peace. According to paragraph 6 of item 1 of Article 5 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions of October 6,1997) this information is confidential and constitutes state secret.
In the period from September 19 to September 23, 1995, in the Murmansk office of the foreign organisation "Bellona": at Ul. Rusanova, house 7, - using a personal computer belonging to this organisation, and being assisted by other person, he prepared the text of paragraph 2 of chapter 8 named "Nuclear-powered submarine accidents" of the report of the Norwegian organisation Bellona "The Northern Fleet - potential risk of radioactive pollution of the region". NIKITIN added the information that he had picked up at the Naval Academy, including secret information. In this way he handed over the information to the organisation presented by other person, who subsequently forwarded the finalised report, version 2, to Norway.
In the text of section 2 of chapter 8 of the mentioned report, NIKITIN has contributed with information from the top secret book "Incidents Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines 1965-1983" (edition of 1987), the secret book "The Description of the Common Incidents Onboard Vessels and Service Boats of the Navy in 1989" (edition of 1990) and the top secret book "Technical Malfunctions Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines of the Navy 1984-1987" (edition of 1990) about the following accidents and incidents in the period between 1965 and 1989 on nuclear submarines of the USSR Navy:
On the accident on the nuclear submarine K-27, concerning failures at checking of the parameters of the nuclear installations in operation. The expert commission at the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, concluded on June 10, 1999 that the information transferred by NIKITIN about K-27 discloses information on construction failures and peculiarities regarding the construction and operation of the nuclear submarine as armament and military technology. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997) this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
On the accidents on the nuclear submarine K-140, concerning failures that occurred while it was repaired and modernised at the shipyard. The expert commission at the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, concluded on June 10, 1999 that the information transferred by NIKITIN about K-140 discloses information on construction failures and peculiarities regarding the durability of domestic nuclear reactors installed at nuclear submarines, and also about the usage and operation of nuclear submarines as armament and military technology. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997) this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
From the top-secret book "Incidents Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines 1965-1983" (edition of 1987) he copied from pages 104-106 information about the accident on K-123 concerning steam generator operation and emission of coolant into the reactor-compartment. The expert commission at the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, concluded on June 10, 1999 that the publishing of the information copied by NIKITIN about the nuclear submarine K-123's construction failures in the nuclear power installations and about the nuclear submarine as military technology, and also about the usage of newly developed nuclear power installations in military shipbuilding, which used "liquid metal" as coolant, is confidential and constitutes state secrets according to Article 5, item 1 paragraph 2 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997).
On the accident on the nuclear submarine K-222 while its main power installations was examined at the shipyard. The expert commission at the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, concluded on June 10, 1999 that the information transferred by NIKITIN about K-222 discloses information about construction failures and peculiarities in the composition and the operation of the automatic control system of domestic nuclear reactors installed on nuclear submarines, and also about usage and operation of the nuclear submarine as armament and military technology. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997) this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
On the accident on the nuclear submarine K-192, concerning failures which have occurred at its return from active service to the base. The expert commission at the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, concluded on June 10, 1999 that the information transferred by NIKITIN about K-192 discloses information about peculiarities in the construction of the nuclear reactors, and failures in the operation of domestic nuclear reactors installed on nuclear submarines. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997) this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
On the incidents (failures) on the nuclear submarines K-208, K-279, K-447, K-508, K-209, K-210, K-216, K-316, K-462, K-38, K-371 and K-367. The expert commission at the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces concluded on June 10, 1999 that the text transferred by NIKITIN about the mentioned nuclear submarines disclosed information about construction failures and peculiarities in the construction and the operation of domestic nuclear reactors installed on nuclear submarines, and also about usage and operation of the submarines as armament and military technology. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997) this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
Besides, NIKITIN also transferred to the foreign organisation information that was used in the text of section 2 of chapter 8 of the report "the Northern Fleet - potential risk of radioactive pollution of the region" about the nuclear submarines of the USSR Navy with the tactical numbers K-27, K-123, K-140, K-222, K-192, K-208, K-447, K-508, K-209, K-210, K-216, K-316, K-462, K-38, K-371, K-367 and K-279. The expert commission at the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces concluded on June 10, 1999 that this text discloses information about losses of armament and military technology in the times of peace. According to Article 5, item 1, paragraph 6 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997) this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
Besides, the body of preliminary investigation refers to the fact that in February 1995 in Murmansk, he signed a contract with the foreign organisation "Bellona" to contribute for a fee to several chapters of the report "the Northern Fleet - potential risk of radioactive pollution of the region". In order to fulfil the part of the work he agreed to take part in, he wrote section 3 of chapter 2 of the mentioned report named "Nuclear Power Installations" in the spring of 1995. He also described naval reactors of the 3rd generation, and referred to construction peculiarities, which he became familiar with while carrying out his service in the Russian Navy. In particular he wrote about problems with the circulation, the system of cooling down and equipment for controlling the state of the reactor on various levels of power and the system of shutting down the reactor when the submarine overturns.
The expert commission at the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces concluded on June 10, 1999 that it in the text written by NIKITIN is disclosed information about technical characteristics of armament and military technology, and about technical solutions used on 3rd generation nuclear submarines. According to Article 5, item 1, paragraph 6 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions of October 6, 1997) this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
In September 1995 in Murmansk he handed over his writings, which included information pertaining to state secrets, to the representative of the foreign organisation "Bellona" KUDRIK I.V. The latter forwarded the work of NIKITIN to Norway. Thus, the body of the preliminary investigation concluded that NIKITIN had disclosed information pertaining to state secrets.
The defendant NIKITIN, interrogated in the court, did not admit guilt, and stated that he neither had committed state treason nor disclosed information pertaining to state secrets. According to the official written contract with "Bellona", he participated in the writing of the chapters of the report as the investigation had established. However, he did not contribute with secret or top secret information about nuclear submarines in his work. He obtained all the information from open sources, or he knew that open or public available information existed about the topic that interested him. During this period he had not knowledge about the use of personal computers, so that his written notes were transcribed to the PC by other employees of the Murmansk office of Bellona.
After having investigated the materials of the present criminal case, the court came to the following conclusions:
As it is evident from the submitted materials of the case, the body of the preliminary investigation has based the charges in order to substantiate the guilt of the defendant, on a number of proofs, which were examined by the court:
- The testimony of NIKITIN, who during interrogations as a witness, confirmed his participation in the said Report; in particular, in the updating of separate sections of chapter 1; in the writing of section 3 of chapter 2 named" Nuclear Power Installations" and of some parts of chapter 4. In addition he corrected chapter 8. NIKITIN insisted that "the information was taken from his memory, and also with the use of the open sources". He did not deny that he had got familiar with some of the information during his service in the Northern Fleet. He claimed that he understood well, which information is secret and top secret and that the chapters he had written have no such information. In addition he explained that he had no access to any secret or top secret information after 1992; i.e.: after he quit his service and was transferred to the reserves (volume 1, sheet 113-116, 126-128). Moreover, he claimed that he while working on the report had used open sources, but he added that some information could have been taken from sources with the stamp "secret", which he had familiarised himself during his service. NIKITIN also reported that he some times had visited the Kuznetsov Naval Academy, including on August 8, 1995, when he was meeting with ARTEMENKOV. He confirmed that some of the information it the report came from the books he received from ARTEMENKOV; but he could not remember which (Volume 1, sheet 133-139).
- The testimony of NIKITIN as an accused confirmed that he had visited the Academy on August 8, 1995, using a pass issued for his name and an identification card as an officer from the days of his service. NIKITIN explained that he went to ARTEMENKOV's faculty, where the latter produced two top-secret books about incidents on nuclear submarines from his safe. They together looked through these books, trying to find information on the level of radioactive pollution in course of the accidents. ARTEMENKOV was in the same room all the time, or came up to the table at which he sat and they looked through the books together. According to NIKITIN's testimony, he could only find a few pieces of information that he copied in his notebook (Vol. 1, sheets 182-184). He denied that he familiarised himself with the secret books "The Description of the Common Incidents Onboard Vessels and Service Boats of the Navy in 1989", and "The Description of the Common Incidents Onboard Vessels and Service Boats of the Navy in 1991, while visiting the Naval Academy. He explained that he had familiarised himself with this literature earlier, during his service in the Navy (Vol. 1, sheet 188-189).
- The testimony of the witness RUDENKO V.L., a former employee of the Inspection of nuclear safety of atomic installations, concerning NIKITIN's question to him in the summer of 1995 about the books or reports that would contain information regarding nuclear accidents in the nuclear submarine fleet. As the witness explained, also in the court session, he had told NIKITIN that such literature exists and can be found at the First Central Scientific Institute of the Defence Ministry, at the Main technical management of the Russian Navy, and at the library of the Kuznetsov Academy. NIKITIN had told the witness about his intentions; that he wished to receive information about accidents on nuclear submarines from somebody he knew at the Academy where he had studied.
- The testimony of the accused ARTEMENKOV [V.] S., which were announced according to Article 286 of the Russian Criminal Procedure Code, where he told that NIKITIN had contacted him on the telephone on August 7, 1995, asking if special literature concerning accidents on nuclear submarines were available at the secret library of the Naval Academy. NIKITIN had asked for his assistance in familiarising with the literature. On August 8, 1995, NIKITIN, using a pass prepared for him in advance, had arrived to the faculty of the Naval Academy. ARTEMENKOV had earlier on this day before the meeting with NIKITIN, received at the special library of the Academy the books: the top secret book "Incidents Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines 1965-1983", issued in 1987; the top secret book "Technical Malfunctions Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines of the Navy 1984-1987", issued in 1990; the secret book "The Description of the Common Incidents Onboard Vessels and Service Boats of the Navy in 1989", issued in 1990; and the secret book "Description of the Common Incidents Onboard Vessels and Service Boats of the Navy in 1991", issued in 1992. The books were given to NIKITIN for familiarising in room no. 385 of the mentioned faculty. NIKITIN familiarised himself with them in room no. 383 of the same faculty, and approximately after an hour or 1-1/2 hours later he returned the said collections. NIKITIN had said that in the collections "is nothing related to radiation safety and environmental problems". ARTEMENKOV then decided that NIKITIN would not use the information he obtained from the books (Volume 2, sheets 102-112, 125-132, 152-156).
- The testimony of the witness SOPKO, G.D., also interrogated by the Court, confirmed that ARTEMENKOV had handed over the mentioned collections and descriptions on August 8, 1995.
- The report of the investigation of the records of the daily circulation of the secret and top secret literature of the special library at the Naval Academy, shows that ARTEMENKOV on August 8, 1995, had received the above-mentioned 2 top secret and 2 secret books (Volume 6, sheets 46-49, 206-209).
- The telephone conversation between ARTEMENKOV and NIKITIN is recorded on an audiocassette, and taken down in shorthand by the operative division of the FSB and obtained on August 7, 1995. In this conversation NIKITIN agreed with ARTEMENKOV upon visiting the Naval Academy in order to familiarise himself with the literature concerning accidents on nuclear submarines. And from the recording and shorthand notes of the telephone conversations between NIKITIN and KUDRIK, it is evident that on August 8 and 18, 1995, he told KUDRIK about his visit to the Naval Academy, and his familiarising with its literature (Volume 8, sheets 15-20, 68-70, Volume 15, sheets 1-5).
(Interrogated in the court session, the defendant NIKITIN confirmed that the contents of the telephone conversations were correctly reproduced. The Court has examined the basis for the investigative bodies' decision on telephone tapping the defendant, and found it to be correct, as well as the contents of the above-mentioned conversations.)
- The passes for entering the Naval Academy, issued in defendant's name, confirms that NIKITIN arrived faculty No. 33 of the Naval Academy on August 8, 1995, at 9.45 and left in at 12.45 (Volume 15, sheets 7,8).
- Hand-written notes, confiscated in course of the search at NIKITIN's place of residence on October 5, 1995. He had made the mentioned notes personally, what is confirmed by the conclusion drawn by handwriting experts; (Vol. 5, sheets 103-104; Vol. 10, sheets 80-84).
- The protocol of the comparative survey of NIKITIN's hand-written notes from the books "Incidents on nuclear submarines 1965-83", issued in 1987, and "Technical incidents on the "Navy's nuclear submarines 1984-87", issued in 1990, which have been obtained from the Naval Academy, and chapter 8 of the report "The Northern Fleet - the potential Risk of Radioactive Pollution of the Region", confiscated in course of the search at NIKITIN's place of residence (Volume 6, sheets 132-192).
- The record of the comparative survey of the mentioned hand-written notes of NIKITIN from the books "Description of the characteristic incidents at the Navy's ships and boats in 1989", issued in 1990, and "Description of the characteristic incidents at the Navy's ships and boats in 1991", issued in 1992, and the chapter 8 of the report "The Northern Fleet - the potential Risk of Radioactive Pollution of the Region", confiscated in course of the search at NIKITIN's place of residence (Vol. 6, sheets 193-202).
- Documents: the books, "Incidents on nuclear submarines 1965-83", issued in 1987, "Technical incidents on the "Navy's nuclear submarines 1984-87", issued in 1990, "Description of the characteristic incidents at the Navy's ships and boats in 1989", issued in 1990, and "Description of the characteristic incidents at the Navy's ships and boats in 1991", issued in 1992 - which are labelled with the respective secret labels: "secret" and "top secret". The books arrived from the Naval Academy in a separate sending examined by the Court.
- The conclusion drawn by the expert commission of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces on April 18, 1996, according to which the books "Incidents on nuclear submarines 1965-83", issued in 1987; "Technical incidents on the Navy's nuclear submarines 1984-87", issued in 1990; "Description of the characteristic incidents at the Navy's ships and boats in 1991", issued in 1992; and "Description of the characteristic incidents at the Navy's ships and boats in 1989", issued in 1990; contain information, which constitutes state secrets. (Volume 10, sheets 58-62).
- The conclusion drawn by the expert commission of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces on January 30, 1996, September 10, 1996 and May 28, 1997, according to which the information about accidents and incidents on the nuclear submarines of the USSR navy in section 2 of chapter 8 of the report, "The Northern Fleet - the potential Risk of Radioactive Pollution of the Region", constitutes state secrets (Volume 10, sheets 6-13, 106-128, Volume 19, sheets 46-76).
- The conclusion of the additional expert commission of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces from June 10, 1999, which had been carried out according to the instructions of the Court. The experts came, concerning the factual information, to the same conclusions as the previous experts. A comparative analysis of the texts in the secret and top secret collections about accidents and incidents on nuclear submarines and boats, with the hand-written notes, written with a red pen in the notebook with blue cover, shows that the author being guided by common and special terms and shortenings copied the following from the mentioned books:
from the top secret book "Incidents Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines 1965-1983" (1987 edition) concerning the accident on K-27. The mentioned transcript discloses K-27's construction failures, peculiarities regarding the construction and operation of the nuclear submarine as armament and military technology. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997); items 6 and 7 in the "List of information pertaining to state secrets" enforced by the decrees of November 30, 1995 No. 1203 and January 24, 1998 No. 61 by the President of the Russian Federation; items 300 and 317 of the "Temporary list of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation", enforced by the Decree of the Ministry of Defence of September 7, 1993 No. 071; and items 287 and 305 in the "List of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation", enforced by the decree of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation August 10, 1996 No. 55; this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
from the top secret book "Incidents Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines 1965-1983" (1987 edition) concerning the accident on K-140. The mentioned transcript discloses K-140's construction failures and peculiarities regarding the durability of domestic nuclear reactors installed at nuclear submarines, and also about the usage and operation of nuclear submarines as armament and military technology. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "On State Secrets"; items 6 and 7 in the "List over information pertaining to state secrets" enforced by the decrees of November 30, 1995 No. 1203 and January 24, 1998 No. 61 by the President of the Russian Federation; items 300 and 317 of the "Temporary list of secret information in the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the Decree of the Ministry of Defence of September 7, 1993 No. 071; and items 287 and 305 in the "List of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the decree of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation August 10, 1996 No. 55; this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
from the top secret book "Incidents Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines 1965-1983" (1987 edition) he copied from pages 104-106 information concerning an accident on the nuclear submarine K-123, concerning steam generator operation and emission of coolant into the reactor-compartment. The expert commission at the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, concluded on June 10, 1999 that the information copied by NIKITIN about K-123 disclosed information about construction failures in the nuclear power installations and about the nuclear submarine as military technology, and also about the usage of newly developed nuclear power installations in military shipbuilding. According to Decrees No. 071 and 055 of the Defence Minister of the Russian Federation, and also Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997) this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
from the top secret book "Incidents Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines 1965-1983" (1987 edition) concerning the accident on K-222. The mentioned transcript discloses K-222's construction failures and peculiarities in the automatic control system of domestic nuclear reactors installed on nuclear submarines, and also about usage and operation of the control system of armament and military technology. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "On State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997); items 6 and 7 in the "List over information pertaining to state secrets" enforced by the decrees of November 30, 1995 No. 1203 and January 24, 1998 No. 61 by the President of the Russian Federation; items 300 and 317 of the "Temporary list of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the Decree of the Ministry of Defence of September 7, 1993 No. 071; and items 287 and 305 in the "List of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the decree of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation August 10, 1996 No. 55; this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
from the top secret book "Incidents Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines 1965-1983" (1987 edition) concerning the accident on K-320. The mentioned transcript discloses K-320's construction failures and peculiarities in the construction and operation of the nuclear submarine as armament and military technology. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997); items 6 and 7 in the "List over information pertaining to state secrets" enforced by the decrees of November 30, 1995 No. 1203 and January 24, 1998 No. 61 by the President of the Russian Federation; items 300 and 317 of the "Temporary list of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the Decree of the Ministry of Defence of September 7, 1993 No. 071; and items 287 and 305 in the "List of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the decree of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation August 10, 1996 No. 55; this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
from the secret book "The Description of the Common Incidents Onboard Vessels and Service Boats of the Navy in 1989" (1990 edition) concerning the accident on the nuclear submarine K-192. The said transcript discloses K-192's peculiarities in the construction of the nuclear reactors, and failures in the operation of domestic nuclear reactors installed on nuclear submarines. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997); items 6 and 7 in the "List over information pertaining to state secrets" enforced by the decrees of November 30, 1995 No. 1203 and January 24, 1998 No. 61 by the President of the Russian Federation; items 300 and 317 of the "Temporary list of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the Decree of the Ministry of Defence of September 7, 1993 No. 071; and items 287 and 305 in the "List of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the decree of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation August 10, 1996 No. 55; this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
from the top secret book "Technical Malfunctions Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines of the Navy 1984-1987" (1990 edition) concerning the accident on the nuclear submarine TK-208. The mentioned transcript discloses TK-208's construction failures and peculiarities in the construction and the operation of domestic nuclear reactors installed on nuclear submarines, and also about usage and operation of the submarine as armament and military technology. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997); items 6 and 7 in the "List over information pertaining to state secrets" enforced by the decrees of November 30, 1995 No. 1203 and January 24, 1998 No. 61 by the President of the Russian Federation; items 300 and 317 of the "Temporary list of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the Decree of the Ministry of Defence of September 7, 1993 No. 071; and items 287 and 305 in the "List of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the decree of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation August 10, 1996 No. 55; this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
from the top secret book "Technical Malfunctions Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines of the Navy 1984-1987" (1990 edition) he copied information about incidents regarding decompression of the nuclear power installation at the nuclear submarines K-279, K-447, K-508, K-209, K-210, K-216, K-316, TK-208, K-462, K-38 and K-370, and also information about negligence in the indemnification, regulation and emergency protection on the nuclear submarines K-306 and K-367. The mentioned transcripts discloses the nuclear submarines' construction failures and peculiarities in the construction and the operation of domestic nuclear reactors installed on nuclear submarines, and also about usage and operation of the submarines as armament and military technology. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "On State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997); items 6 and 7 in the "List over information pertaining to state secrets" enforced by the decrees of November 30, 1995 No. 1203 and January 24, 1998 No. 61 by the President of the Russian Federation; items 300 and 317 of the "Temporary list of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the Decree of the Ministry of Defence of September 7, 1993 No. 071; and items 287 and 305 in the "List of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the decree of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation August 10, 1996 No. 55; this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
The transcript of the mentioned books about accidents and incidents, which have occurred in the period from 1965 to 1989 on nuclear submarines in the USSR Navy with the following tactical numbers: K- 27, K- 320, K- 140, K- 123, K- 222, K- 192, K- 208, K- 447, K-508, K- 209, K- 210, K- 216, K- 306, K- 316, K- 462, K- 38, K- 370, K- 371, K- 367 and K- 279, also contain information about losses of armament and military technology in the times of peace. According to paragraph 6 of item 1 of Article 5 of the Russian Federal Law "On State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 (with changes and additions of October 6,1997); item 3 and 13 in the "List over information pertaining to state secrets" enforced by the decrees of November 30, 1995 No. 1203 and January 24, 1998 No. 61 by the President of the Russian Federation; item 242 (column II) of the "Temporary list of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the Decree of the Ministry of Defence of September 7, 1993 No. 071; and item 235 (column II) in the "List of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the decree of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation August 10, 1996 No. 55; this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
The analysis of the text in section 2 of chapter 8 of the mentioned report of Bellona, and the text copied into the notebook with blue cover from the secret and top secret books about accidents and incidents, which had occurred in the period from 1965 to 1989 on nuclear submarines in the USSR navy, according to the experts' the opinion to make the conclusion that it is transferred information from the text in the notebook to the text in the report:
- about nuclear submarine K-27, disclosing information on construction failures and peculiarities regarding the construction and operation of the nuclear submarine as armament and military technology. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "On State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997); items 6 and 7 in the "List over information pertaining to state secrets" enforced by the decrees of November 30, 1995 No. 1203 and January 24, 1998 No. 61 by the President of the Russian Federation; items 300 and 317 of the "Temporary list of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the Decree of the Ministry of Defence of September 7, 1993 No. 071; and items 287 and 305 in the "List of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the decree of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation August 10, 1996 No. 55; this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
- from the top-secret book "Incidents Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines 1965-1983" (edition of 1987) he copied from pages 104-106 information about the accident on K-123 concerning steam generator operation and emission of coolant into the reactor-compartment. The expert commission at the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, concluded on June 10, 1999 that the publishing of the information copied by NIKITIN about the nuclear submarine K-123's construction failures in the nuclear power installations and about the nuclear submarine as military technology, and also about the usage of newly developed nuclear power installations in military shipbuilding, which used "liquid metal" as coolant, is confidential and constitutes state secrets according to decrees No. 071 and 055 of the Defence Minister of the Russian Federation, and also Article 5, item 1 paragraph 2 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997).
- about the nuclear submarine K-140, disclosing information concerning construction failures and peculiarities regarding the durability of domestic nuclear reactors installed at nuclear submarines, and also about the usage and operation of nuclear submarines as armament and military technology. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997); items 6 and 7 in the "List over information pertaining to state secrets" enforced by the decrees of November 30, 1995 No. 1203 and January 24, 1998 No. 61 by the President of the Russian Federation; items 300 and 317 of the "Temporary list of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the Decree of the Ministry of Defence of September 7, 1993 No. 071; and items 287 and 305 in the "List of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the decree of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation August 10, 1996 No. 55; this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
- about the nuclear submarine K-222, disclosing information concerning construction failures and peculiarities in the automatic control system of domestic nuclear reactors installed on nuclear submarines, and also about usage and operation of the control system of armament and military technology. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997); items 6 and 7 in the "List over information pertaining to state secrets" enforced by the decrees of November 30, 1995 No. 1203 and January 24, 1998 No. 61 by the President of the Russian Federation; items 300 and 317 of the "Temporary list of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the Decree of the Ministry of Defence of September 7, 1993 No. 071; and items 287 and 305 in the "List of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the decree of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation August 10, 1996 No. 55; this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
- about the nuclear submarine K-192, disclosing peculiarities in the construction of the nuclear reactors, and failures in the operation of domestic nuclear reactors installed on nuclear submarines. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997); items 6 and 7 in the "List over information pertaining to state secrets" enforced by the decrees of November 30, 1995 No. 1203 and January 24, 1998 No. 61 by the President of the Russian Federation; items 300 and 317 of the "Temporary list of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the Decree of the Ministry of Defence of September 7, 1993 No. 071; and items 287 and 305 in the "List of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the decree of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation August 10, 1996 No. 55; this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
- about the nuclear submarines K-208, K-279, K-447, K-508, K-209, K-210, K-216, K-316, K-462, K-38, K-371 and K-367, disclosing construction failures and peculiarities in the construction and the operation of domestic nuclear reactors installed on nuclear submarines, and also about usage and operation of the submarines as armament and military technology. According to Article 5, item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 No. 5485-1 (with changes and additions October 6, 1997); items 6 and 7 in the "List over information pertaining to state secrets" enforced by the decrees of November 30, 1995 No. 1203 and January 24, 1998 No. 61 by the President of the Russian Federation; items 300 and 317 of the "Temporary list of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the Decree of the Ministry of Defence of September 7, 1993 No. 071; and items 287 and 305 in the "List of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the decree of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation August 10, 1996 No. 55; this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
The text of the report of the foreign organisation "Bellona" about the nuclear submarines in the USSR Navy with the following tactical numbers: K- 27, K- 320, K- 140, K- 123, K- 222, K- 192, K- 208, K- 447, K-508, K- 209, K- 210, K- 216, K- 306, K- 316, K- 462, K- 38, K- 370, K- 371, K- 367 and K- 279, also contain information about losses of armament and military technology in times of peace. According to paragraph 6 of item 1 of Article 5 of the Russian Federal Law "About State Secrets" dated July 21, 1993 (with changes and additions of October 6,1997); item 3 and 13 in the "List over information pertaining to state secrets" enforced by the decrees of November 30, 1995 No. 1203 and January 24, 1998 No. 61 by the President of the Russian Federation; item 242 (column II) of the "Temporary list of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the Decree of the Ministry of Defence of September 7, 1993 No. 071; and item 235 (column II) in the "List of secret information in the armed forces of the Russian Federation, enforced by the decree of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation August 10, 1996 No. 55; this information is confidential and constitutes state secrets.
After the experts of the General Staff during the additional investigation June 10, 1999, on the instructions of the Court, had carried out a detailed analysis of the open literature NIKITIN had provided to them, which allowed them to conclude on May 28, 1997, that the hand written notes in the notebook confiscated at NIKITIN's residence, contained transcripts of the above-mentioned secret and top secret books, which NIKITIN had familiarised himself with on August 8, 1995 at the Naval Academy. These transcripts disclose information that constitutes state secrets, and according to the conclusion of the experts were the part of section 2 of chapter 8 of the report of the foreign organisation "the Northern Fleet -potential risk of radioactive pollution of region."
During the court hearing the experts confirmed the correctness of the conclusion, given by them, and have also specified that the information contributed by NIKITIN to the report from the open sources is about 60-70 %, while the rest could not be obtained from the open sources. Besides, the experts pointed out that it is not important for them whether the information obtained by NIKITIN about the submarines was available in the open sources or not. They are guided only by the decrees of the Minister of Defence of Russia, which say if the Ministry of Defence declassified the information or not.
- the report of Military Unit No. 20601 saying that in course of his military service NIKITIN had familiarised himself with the book "Incidents Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines 1965-1983", while the book "Technical Malfunctions Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines of the Navy 1984-1987" had not arrived to the special library of the mentioned Military Unit (vol. 12, sheet 39).
- the report of Military Unit No. 27177, - the publisher of the book "Technical Malfunctions Onboard Nuclear-Powered Submarines of the Navy 1984-1987", which provides a list of the libraries of the Navy bases where the book had been distributed (Vol. 12, sheets 112-113), the reports of these military units, where the mentioned books are available, showing that NIKITIN did not familiarise himself with it during his service (vol.12 sheets 207-222).
- material evidence: a request to issue a pass for NIKITIN, signed August 7, 1995, and pass no. 32 into the building of the Kuznetsov's Naval Academy of August 8, 1995, issued in his name, and also the protocol of the examination of the mentioned documents, which testify that NIKITIN had visited the Kuznetsov's Naval Academy (Vol. 6, sheet 50, vol. 15, sheets 6-8).
- the conclusion of the criminal experts, according to which the signature on pass no. 32 of August 8, 1995, which allowed exit from the building of the Kuznetsov's Naval Academy, had been made by ARTEMENKOV himself (Vol. 10, sheets 141-143).
- the testimony of the witness KUDRIK I.V, announced according to article 286 of the Criminal-Procedure Code, who told about the circumstances of writing the report, "The Northern Fleet - the Potential Risk of Radioactive Pollution of the Region", and about its authors. Particularly, he told that the working group of the report writers consisted of himself, Norwegian citizen Thomas NILSEN and also NIKITIN, who had directly participated in writing chapter 1, part 3, chapter 2 "Nuclear power installations", partially part 4 of chapter 2, various parts of chapter 4 and chapter 8 titled "Accidents on nuclear submarines". Witness Kudrik also informed that the result of their common work was the version of the report, which was confiscated by the investigation. In the course of work NILSEN received translations of the prepared chapters of the report, including the ones prepared without his participation. According to KUDRIK, NILSEN had the whole text of the report in the Norwegian language. He came with a portable computer, on which he printed the prepared text (Vol. 3, sheets 169-175, 176-177, 178-184 and 187-192).
- the testimony of witness MORMUL N.G, who had participated in the writing of certain chapters of the report, "The Northern Fleet - the Potential Risk of Radioactive Pollution of the Region" and who confirmed that he participated in writing chapter 8 of the report, but said that he did not write in the way it was published, because it now contains data on accidents at nuclear submarines, which he does not have. This data could be obtained from Pavlov's book.
In course of the search at the Murmansk office of Bellona, computers and floppy discs, which contained files with the text passed by NIKITIN of part 2 of chapter 8 of the report "The Northern Fleet - the Potential Risk of Radioactive Pollution of the Region" have been confiscated (vol. 5, sheets 132-145).
In course of examination of the Polyarniye Zori hotel in Murmansk, an application form has been confiscated. The form testifies that NIKITIN had stayed at the mentioned hotel between September 19 and 23, 1995 (vol. 5, p.c. 188-189, 192).
The environmental expert commission of "Lenkompriroda" had drawn a conclusion that the report "The Northern Fleet - the potential Risk of Radioactive Pollution of the Region" does not touch on the environmental problems. In certain chapters (which NIKITIN has nothing to do with) problems of environmental safety are touched upon. The content of chapter 8 part 2 of the mentioned report of the foreign organisation does not relate to the ecology and ecological researchers (Vol. 10 sheet 154-160).
Alongside with the above-mentioned, the court pays attention to the report of the chairman of "Lenkompriroda" (vol.10 sheet 94) that actually "Lenkompriroda" is not authorised to carry out any judicial-ecological examination.
- According to the conclusion drawn by the Russian Defence Ministry's Inspection for nuclear safety of atomic power installations regarding the former head of the group, head inspector NIKITIN, the latter had knowledge about the secret and top secret data in the field of arrangement, rules of operating the nuclear power installations of nuclear submarines and ships, applications of the new nuclear power installations in the military shipbuilding and providing their nuclear safety. (Vol. 12, sheets 32-33). On October 10, 1992 NIKITIN signed a form in which he promised not to disclose the classified information which he learned while in service (vol. 12, sheet 41).
- In course of the search at NIKITIN's place of residence on October 5, 1995, hand-written notes have been confiscated which, according to the handwriting expert commission conducted for this case, have been made by NIKITIN himself (vol. 5, sheet 102-108, vol. 10, sheet 292-296).
At the same time, the court pays attention that the given evidence is received with infringement of the requirement of Article 69 of the Criminal Procedure Code, about what will be told below.
- the conclusion on chapter 2.3 of the report "The Northern fleet - potential risk of radioactive pollution of the region" is confirmed by the results of the additional experts' evaluation performed by the expert commission of the General Staff of Russian Armed Forces for detecting the level of secrecy of the documents. In their conclusion of June 10, 1999 the experts came to the following conclusion:
In chapter 2.3.3 of the mentioned report under title "The nuclear power installations" in the subchapter "Third generation reactors" in the paragraph beginning with the words: "A new block system..." there is information about the presence of the circulation mode. This discloses the possibilities and partially principles of providing low-noise operation mode of the modern reactors at nuclear power submarines, and not only possibilities of organising cooling of the active zone at complete or partial power failure, as it is mentioned in the report, but also information about new design and technical solutions used in the reactors of the 3rd generation nuclear power submarines.
Thus, the experts believe that in chapter 2.3 of the "Bellona" report, from the text extracts, the information about technical characteristics of the armament and military machinery is disclosed as well as technical solutions used in the reactors at 3rd generation nuclear power submarines. This information is confidential and constitutes state secret according to Article 5 item 1 paragraphs 2 and 4 of the Law "On State Secrets"; items 6 and 7 of "The list of the information pertaining to state secrets" authorised by the decree No. 1203 of November 30,1995 and No. 61 of January 24,1998 of the President of the Russian Federation; item 317 paragraph 1 and item 355 paragraph 2 of "The temporary list of the information to be classified in the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation" authorised by the decree no.071 of September 7,1993 of the Minister of Defence; item 305 paragraph 2 of "The list of the information to be classified in the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation" authorised by the decree no. 055 of August 10, 1996 of the Minister of Defence (vol.24 sheets 140-165).
At the same time, according to the conclusion of the Ministry of Atomic Energy of the Russian Federation (Minatom) (vol.10 sheets 202-205), in chapter 2.3 of the report version no.2 there is no information constituting state secret according to Minatom's competence.
- the testimony of witness PEROVSKY, interrogated in this connection in the Court, who also explained that based on his special knowledge obtained during his service and work, he came to a conclusion that some information from the Bellona-report may constitute state secrets.
However, in this part defendant NIKITIN told the court that chapter 2.3 "Nuclear Power installations" of the report "The Northern Fleet - potential risk of radioactive contamination of the region" was written directly by him with the use of the open sources.
The expert commissions at the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces repeatedly investigated the open sources of the information, which were used by the defendant while writing chapter 2.3 of report of the foreign organisation. In particular, in the conclusions from May 28, 1997 and June 10, 1999 the experts came to a conclusion that by compilation of the information from the sources, to which NIKITIN refers, it is impossible to receive those concrete data on design features of the reactors of the 3rd generation nuclear power submarines given in the report, which are recognised as constituting state secret (vol.19 sheets 46-76, vol.24 sheets 140-165).
During the court hearings the following open sources of the literature were observed and examined, as presented by the defendant:
Pavlov A.S., The military ships of the USSR and Russia.1945-1995, Yakutsk, 1995
Burov V.N., The domestic military ship-building, Sudostroenie, 1995.
P.L. Olgaard, Nuclear ship accidents, (translated) Copenhagen, Danish Technical University, 1994.
2 editions of - Jane's Fighting ships, 1987-1988 and 1995-1996.
L. Osipenko, L. Zhiltsov, N. Mormul, The atomic underwater epic, Moscow, Borges, 1994.
D.A. Romanov, The tragedy of submarine "Komsomolets", St.-Petersburg, 1993.
Bellona report version no. 1, The Sources of Radioactive Contamination in Murmansk and Arkhangelsk counties, 1994.
Morskoy Sbornik no. 4-8, 1995
A.N. Batyrev, V.D. Kosheverov, O.Y. Leykin, The naval nuclear installations of the foreign states, St.-Petersburg: Sudostroenie, 1994.
A.A. Sarkisov, V.N. Puchkov, The physical basics of operating reactor insatallations, Energoatomizdat, 1989.
V.A. Kuznetsov, The naval nuclear installations, Leningrad: Sudostroenie, 1994
Half a century in the nuclear installation production, Construction-Design Bureau, Nizhny Novgorod, 1997.
The submarines of Russia, Central Construction-Design Bureau, St.-Petersburg, 1996.
The Court examined the above mentioned literature with the purpose of direct perception and due to the non-concrete expert evaluation of June 10,1999 (this question was not solved by the experts during the court hearing), which only pointed out in the part concerning the open sources which had been used by the defendant while writing chapter 2.3, that "... from the presented sources, ... it is impossible to obtain the data on design features of the 3rd generation nuclear reactors".
The examination showed that the complete, detailed data on design features, parameters and operating description of the cooling system, which operated independently of the batteries on the 3rd generation nuclear power submarines, was disclosed not by the defendant during writing chapter 2.3, but before that in the magazine "Morskoy sbornik" 4:1995, and in the above mentioned book by D. A. Romanov. Besides, the court believes that the events concerning nuclear submarine K-27 (events of 1968), K-123 (events of 1982) are revealed thoroughly and in details, not in chapter 8.2 of the report written by NIKITIN, but in the books by A. Pavlov and N. Mormul, which were published earlier for wide range of the readers. Especially much information was given in Jane's Book 1987-1988, which the experts refused to examine.
Moreover, it remains unclear which exactly version of the report, version no.2, was presented to the experts of the General Staff. As it comes from the case files (vol. 5, sheet 1-2) on 17.11.1995 witness Kudrik voluntary gave out (as he pointed out) the final version of the report, version no. 2 of 90 pages. Besides, the witness commented that chapter 8 was placed on the diskette which he also gave out to the investigation. Later the defendant was also charged with writing this chapter.
However, it is evident from the case files (vol. 5 sheets 3-100) that the report contains 97 pages while neither the diskette itself nor its content was examined or attached to the case files. And at the present time the diskette is not available.
According to the covering note of the preliminary investigation of December 5,1995 the report containing 104 pages was sent for expert evaluation to the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces (vol. 10 sheet 4). But according to the conclusion of the experts of the General Headquarters of the Russian Ministry of Defence of 15.02.1996 it is clear that the experts were given different texts on 11 and 26 sheets for examination, regarding the charges against the defendant (vol. 10 sheet 24). According to the experts of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces of 10.09.1996 (vol. 10 sheet 108) they received the version of the report on 99 sheets for examination. The investigator's decision of 23.04.1997 regarding assigning the additional expert's evaluation does not say anything about the volume of the report, version no. 2 has only the reference that the report is sent in the version presented by witness Kudrik (vol.19 sheet 14) as it was said above.
It is not clear from the text of the experts' evaluation of 28.05.199[7] which version of the report (or its part), in which form and in which volume they were examining (vol.19 sheet 47).
The volume of the report submitted on 10.06.1999 to the experts' commission for the examination also remained unclear (vol.24 sheet 73, 141).
Moreover, the court would like to emphasise that the body of preliminary investigation has attached other versions of the report to the case files, version no. 2, which vary in volume and content. These are the version presented by the witness Perovsky (vol.1 sheets 14-107) on 93 sheets; the version presented by the witness Kudrik on 90 pages, mentioned above; the version confiscated on October 5, 1995 during the search in Bellona's office in Murmansk (vol.16 sheets 163-244) on 81 sheets. Neither of these were subjects of expert evaluation, except for the version presented by Kudrik.
At the same time the court examined the evidence - the protocol of the search at Nikitin's flat of October 5, 1995 submitted by the body of preliminary investigation (vol.5 sheet 102-108). During the search the defendant's notebook was found and confiscated. The notebook had blue cover and notes in red ink (vol.5 sheet 107 - protocol 66, vol.6 sheet 41). These notes were the foundation for the charges against NIKITIN. The court finds that this evidence was obtained with the violations of Articles 69 and 70 of the Russian Criminal Procedure Code.
As it comes from the presented materials, the investigative action - FSB investigator Osipenko conducted the search at Nikitin's flat on October 5, 1995.
However, the criminal case was launched on October 5,1995 (vol.1 sheet 2) and given to the FSB investigator Maksimenkov. According to the decision of the chief of the FSB investigation body on October 6,1995 the investigation team was established (vol. 5 sheet 3). Osipenko was not included in the team. Only on April 1, 1996 Osipenko was included in the investigation team in a proper way in accordance with the decision of the chief of the FSB investigation body (vol.1, sheet 4).
At the same time it is evident from the case files that nobody entrusted investigator Osipenko with conducting the investigative actions, search at defendant Nikitin's flat. And he did not have the rights to do that.
Taking into consideration the above mentioned, the court finds that this evidence (protocol of the search of 5.10.1995) due to the requirements of Article 69 para. 3 of the Russian Criminal Procedure Code, is obtained with the violations of the law and should be excluded as unacceptable.
Alongside with above-mentioned, the court also comes to the following conclusions.
In accordance with the universally recognised postulate the constitution of the State (in this case the Russian Constitution) lies in the base of any legal, and also criminal liability. And no liability exists which contradicts the constitution.
According to its Article 15 para. 1, the Russian Constitution has supreme legal force and is direct acting and applies throughout the territory of the Russia. Laws and other legal enactment must not contradict the Constitution. The supreme legal power and direct action of the Constitution mean that a law or enactment contradicting the Constitution in one or another way, can not be applied. And the appropriate legal relations are regulated directly by the norms of the Constitution.
Moreover, in accordance with Article 29 para. 4 of the Russian Constitution each person has the right freely to seek, receive, pass on, produce, and disseminate information by any legal method.
This provision of the Constitution was later concretised in the "Law of the Russian Federation on Mass Media" (with the Additions and Amendments of 13.01.1995 no. 6, 6.06.1995 no.87, 19.07.1995 no.114, 27.12.1995 no.211) which pointed out the following:
"Article 1. Freedom of Mass Communication In the Russian Federation, the retrieval, receipt, production and dissemination of mass communication, the foundation of mass media, the possession, use and disposal of these media, the manufacture, acquisition, storage and use of technical facilities and equipment, raw and auxiliary materials designed for the production and spread of products of mass information media; shall not be liable to restrictions, with the exception of those prescribed by the legislation of the Russian Federation on mass media.
Article 3. Inadmissibility of censorship No provision shall be made for the censorship of mass information, that is, the demand made by officials, state organs, organisation, institutions or public associations that the editor's office of a mass medium shall get in advance agreement on a message and materials (except for the cases when the official is an author or interviewee) and also for the suppression of the dissemination of messages and materials and separate parts thereof.
Article 4. Inadmissibility of misuse of mass media freedom No provision shall be made for the use of mass media for the purposes of committing criminally indictable deeds, divulging information making up a state secret or any other law-protective secret, calling for the seizure of power, violently changing the constitutional system and the state integrity, fanning national, class, social and religious intolerance or strife, propagating war and also for the spreading of broadcasts propagandising pornography or the cult of violence and cruelty".
(In the edition of the Federal law of 19.07.1995 no. 114)
However, in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution, the List of information pertaining to state secrets is stipulated by the Federal Law while the possible limitations of rights, freedoms of the man and citizen is stipulated only by the Federal Law (Article 55 para. 3 of the Constitution).
At the moment of NIKITIN's committing of the above-mentioned actions, no such a law existed. The only legal act, which regulated the legal relations in the field of protecting the state secrets, became the decree of the Russian president no. 1203 of 30.11.1995.
In this connection it is necessary to note, that before adopting the Constitution of the Russian Federation in 1993, the protection of the state interests was carried out by the order determined by the Russian President's decree No. 20 of January 14,1992. According to this decree the appropriate chiefs pending the edition of the new legal acts of Russia stipulating the protection of the Russian state secrets, were instructed to apply the legal acts which came into force before. Later the Russian government issued the decision No. 733-55 of February 18,1992 "About the temporary list of the information constituting state secrets". It was of general declarative character, it was not subject to official publishing and it was declared secret by the confidential decree of the minister of defence No. 052 of October 13,1992.
Along with the above-mentioned basic constitutional provisions directly regulating the issue, there are some other norms of the Constitution, which are connected with this. For instance, according to Article 15 para. 3 of the Russian Constitution any normative legal enactment affecting human and civil rights, freedoms and duties cannot be applied unless they have been officially published for general knowledge.
At the same time, according to Article 41 para. 3 of the Russian Constitution the concealment by officials of facts and circumstances creating a threat to people's lives and health entails responsibility in accordance with federal law. In accordance with Article 42 of the Russian Constitution each person has the right to a healthy environment, reliable information about the state of the environment, and compensation for damage caused to his health or property by ecological offences.
According to Article 54 of the Russian Constitution no law establishing or aggravating liability can be used retroactively; no one can be held liable for any act, which at the time it was committed, was not considered to be in violation of the law. Later this provision was concretised in Article 10 of the Penal Code of the Russian Federation.
The Federal Law referred to in Article 29 para. 4 of the Russian Constitution is the Law of the Russian Federation "On state secrets" of July 21, 1993 which was significantly changed on October 6, 1997.
According to Article 1 of the mentioned law, the provisions of the present Law are mandatory for execution within the Russian Federation territory and outside it, also by citizens of Russia who have assumed obligations or are obligated by virtue of their status to comply with the requirements of the legislation of the Russian Federation on State secrets. At the same time, suspension of the access to the state secrets does not exempt the citizen from the assumed obligations about not divulging the information pertaining to state secret.
However, the valid Russian Constitution demands that the list of information PERTAINING TO STATE SECRETS shall also be determined by the FEDERAL LAW. This constitutional demand was fulfilled completely only during the updating of the "Law on state secret" in October 1997 when Article 5 of the Law received the list of information constituting state secrets, instead of the list of information that can pertain to state secrets (as it was written in the 1993 edition of the Law).
According to Article 9 para. 4 of the Law, the President of the Russian Federation shall approve the List of Information referred to as state secrets, (which corresponds with Articles 84 and 90 of the Russian Constitution). Simultaneously, according to Article 9 para. 4 of the Law in both editions (July 21, 1993 and October 6,1997) the List of Information referred to as state secrets is approved by the President of the Russian Federation, and is subject to publishing and revising when needed.
As it is evident of the case files, at the moment when Nikitin committed the above mentioned alleged actions (from February till September 1995) Article 5 Item 1 of the "Federal Law on State secret" (in the part regarding the charges against the defendant) was worded as follows:
"The following information can pertain to state secrets. Item 1. Information in the military field:
paragraph. 2. - about directions of the development of armament and military technology;
- about the contents and results of special programs, scientifically research and experimental design work on developing and modernising of armament and military technology;
paragraph. 4. - about tactical-technical characteristics and the possibilities of combat usage of various kinds of armament and military technology;
- about characteristics and composition or technology regarding the production of new types of propellant or military explosives for military usage;
paragraph. 6. - about stationing, real designations;
- organisational structure, arms, strength of troops, and the condition of their military logistics;"
It should be mentioned that this Federal Law in the new edition of October 1997 received rather detailed amendments, which were included in the above mentioned Article 5 item [1], including paragraphs 2 and 6.
The examination of Article 5 of the Law (irrespective of its edition) shows that it by itself does not establish the degree of secrecy, i.e.: it does not classify any information, as the classification shall be carried out according to the special procedure, described in article 9 of this Law, partially - through the decrees of the Minister of Defence (Lists of information pertaining to state secret) and partially - through the Decrees of the President of Russia.
The given circumstance also means, that in the initial form Article 5 of the discussed Law "On state secret" can not be a sole basis for accusation of espionage or disclosure of state secret. It should be complemented by other normative acts.
In addition to Article 5, the following normative acts were used in the defendant's case: the decree of the President of Russia No. 1203 of 1995 (in the edition of January 24,1998 - Articles 6 and 7), decree of the Defence Ministry No. 071 of September 7,1993 (articles 242, 287, 300, 317, 612 etc.), decree of the Defence Ministry no. 055 from August 10, 1996 (articles 275, 287, 305, 582 etc.).
While discussing these documents in Court, the experts clarified that all these documents are normative. In their opinion, the charges against NIKITIN on the base of secret and unpublished decrees of the Ministry of Defence are acceptable, as well as charges on the base of the changes which were made in the President's decree up till 1998, i.e.: in the edition of January 24, 1998, and the Law on State Secret in edition of October 6,1997. They pointed that out in their conclusion.
Besides, the expert Bakhanov, in particular, explained to the Court that the experts' commission used only two decrees of the Defence Ministry no. 071 and 055. Basing on these decrees the experts' commission concluded that the information collected and revealed by Nikitin contains state secrets. In fact, when writing their conclusion, the "Law on state secret" was not applied. The given circumstance proves to be true also by the confidential explanation note received earlier by the investigation from the Department of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, where it is said that that according to the order of the Russian Defence Ministry, the experts' evaluations regarding the degree of secrecy, is conducted only on the base of the decree of the Minister of Defence of Russian Federation, at that period - decree no. 071 (vol. 13, sheet 137).
In this connection, it is also necessary to note that Article 5 of the discussed "Law on state secret" has no provisions which could allow to relate the information "about the losses" of armament and military equipment in the times of peace to state secrets. But nevertheless, the defendant is accused of collecting and transferring this information to the foreign organisation, what is indicated by the experts' committee.
The above-stated position of the experts raised doubts in the court also on the following grounds.
As it is evident of the case files and the above-stated circumstances, Nikitin finished writing the material for the Bellona report in September 1995.
The President's decree of November 30,1995 and the decree of the Defence Ministry No. 055 of August 10, 1996 were not in force then, while decree No. 071 of 1993 as well as decree No. 055 of 1996 were secret. At the same time, according to the order of the Defence Minister of August 10,1996, the secret decree of the Russian Defence Ministry No. 071 was not in force after September 1, 1996. It follows from the given provisions that application of the mentioned normative acts as the basis for charges against Alexander Nikitin is in direct violation of the Russian Constitution (article 15 para. 3 and article 54).
Thus, article 5 of the Law (in the edition existing for the period of the actions the defendant is charged with) can not be used as formal basis for the charges without attaching additional normative acts, which could form the lawful legal base of the charges. The circumstances about the insufficiency of the "Law on state secret" is evident of the experts' explanations given in the courtroom. Such normative acts [that the experts have used] may only be used provided that they are officially published and had come in force before the alleged actions of Nikitin.
The Court believes that the body of the preliminary investigation realised the above-mentioned circumstance. As already specified, it is obvious from the case files that the charges were based on the conclusions of the experts' commission at the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces. These conclusions were in turn based on the secret decrees of the Minister of Defence of the Russian Federation, which was indicated in the indictment for this criminal case.
Besides, the Court believes that the presented charges are not concrete in connection with the provisions of Article 5 of "The Law on State secret".
As the files of the criminal case show, the charges against the defendant NIKITIN (vol. 24 sheets 44-55) were formally presented only on the base of Article 5 item 1 paragraphs 2, 4 and 6 of "The Law on state secret" in the edition of 6.10.1997. However, the factual charges were based on the normative acts indicated in the experts' conclusion and in the indictment, but not mentioned in the formula of guilt in the decision of launching the criminal case against Nikitin, in particular:
1. On the List of information pertaining to state secret, confirmed [and entered into force] by the decrees of the President of the Russian Federation no. 1203 of November 30, 1995 ( in the edition no. 61 of January 24, 1998);
2. On the Temporary list of the information pertaining to state secrets within the Russian armed forces, which was enforced by the decree of the Minister of Defence No. 071 of September 7,1993;
3. On the List of the information pertaining to state secrets within the Russian armed forces, confirmed [and enforced]by the order of the Minister of Defence No. 055 of August 8,1996;
As it is evident of the above mentioned provisions of Article 5 of the "Law on state secret" (in the edition of 6.10.1997, which came into force after the alleged actions of NIKITIN, and which was suggested by the body of the preliminary investigation) its paragraphs 2-6 contain precisely designated components - categories of the information protected by the state, essentially distinguished on the contents (e.g. paragraph 2:
- about plans of building up the Russian armed forces and other Russian troops;
- about directions of the development of armament and military technology;
- about the contents and results of purpose-oriented programs ... aimed at creating and modernising models of weapons and military technology;
Paragraph 6: - about stationing, real designations;
- organisational structure, armament, strength of troops, and the condition of their military logistics;
- about military-political and operational situation).
Nevertheless, when presenting the charges to the defendant, these categories were not described in details, and it remained unclear which of them the charges are based on. It can only be assumed about the presence of some categories in the charges. No appropriate explanation is present in the conclusion of the experts' commission. As it was already mentioned, it was specified in the court that the examination of the allegedly disclosed information was carried out on the base of the decrees of the Ministry of Defence. Therefore, it is necessary to believe that the charges against Nikitin have remained not concretised with the reference to the basic Law on State Secret. That prevented the defendant to defend himself by the legal ways and belittled his rights for defence.
As mentioned above, after the adopting and entering into force of the Constitution of the Russian Federation in 1993, the precise order of informing about the items of information pertaining to state secret was established for the citizens of Russia. This order was determined by 3 accessible and published normative acts:
1. The Constitution of the Russian Federation - Article 29 para. 4: "The list of information constituting state secrets is determined by federal law".
2. "The Federal law on state secret" authorised by the President of the Russian Federation on July 21, 1993 - Article 5: "Information, which can pertain to state secrets" (in the edition of the Federal law of July 21,1993) or
Article 5: "List of information constituting state secrets" (in the edition of the Federal Law of October 6,1997, no. 131 FZ)
Article 4 para. 2: "The President of the Russian Federation shall: approve the state programs in the field of protection of State secrets; approve the composition and structure of the Interdepartmental Commission for protection of State secrets and the Regulation on this Commission upon presentation by the Government of the Russian Federation; approve, upon presentation by the RF Government, the Roster of officials of state authorities empowered to classify information as a state secret, as well as the List of Information constituting state secrets; conclude international treaties of the Russian Federation on joint use and protection of information constituting a state secret; determine powers of officials in ensuring protection of State secrets in the Administration of the President of the Russian Federation;
- within the limits of his powers, resolve other problems arising in connection with referring information to a state secret, classifying or declassifying and protecting it.
Article 9 para. 4: "In order to pursue uniform state policy in the field of classification of information, the Interdepartmental Commission for State Secret Protection shall, on the basis of proposals from the State authorities and in accordance with the List of information constituting State secrets, form the List of information constituting state secrets. This List shall specify the State authorities empowered to handle such information. The aforementioned List shall be approved by the President of the Russian Federation, it shall be openly published and revised as required".
[3.] According to the above-mentioned Law "The List of the information constituting state secret" was authorised by the decree of the President of the Russian Federation on November 30, 1995.
Thus, after the publishing of "the Law on State Secrets" and the entering into force of the Constitution of the Russian Federation, i.e.: after December 12, 1993, new constitutional rules, which have never existed before and which were different in quality, began to work. These rules gave an opportunity to a citizen of Russia to determine whether this or that information pertains to the category of information constituting state secrets, however, - not earlier than November 30, 1995 (i.e.: not earlier than the date of publication authorised by the President "of the List...").
In other words, at the moment of finalising the report "The Russian Northern Fleet: Sources of Radioactive contamination" (August-September 1995) and Nikitin's participation in it, the mentioned document did not exist and the defendant had no possibility to familiarise with it.
This circumstance was also confirmed by the experts' commission of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation in their conclusion of May 28,1997 (vol. 19 sheet 52), where it is indicated that "... according to Article 9 para 4 of "the Law on State Secrets" the List of information constituting state secrets should be formed, in order to pursue uniform state policy in the field of classifying information. The President of the Russian Federation shall approve the List and it shall be openly published. In the period of the events under examination, i.e.: in August 1995, such a list, approved by the President of the Russian Federation, was not available".
Besides, as it the case files show, the defendant NIKITIN left the military service in November 1992 and had due to this fact no real opportunity to familiarise himself neither with the decree of the Minister of Defence No. 071 of September 7,1993 nor the decree of the Minister of Defence No. 055 of August 10,1996 (which are both secret), and as stated above, the unpublished decision of the government of the Russian Federation no. 733 (confirmed by the above-mentioned decree No. 071 of the Ministry of Defence).
At the same time the Court wants to state that according to Article 6 of "the Law on state secrets" of the Russian Federation: "The referring of information to state secrets and its classification shall be carried out in accordance with the principles of legality, soundness, and opportuneness.
The legality in referring information to state secrets and classifying it, means that it shall be conformity between the classified information and the provisions of Articles 5 and 7 in this law and the legislation of the Russian Federation on state secrets".
Article 7 of "The Law on State secret" of the Russian Federation: The following information shall not be referred to state secrets and classified: about accidents and catastrophes endangering the safety and the health of citizens, and about consequences thereof, as well as about natural disasters, their official forecasts and consequences; about the condition of the ecology, public health, sanitation, demography, education, culture, agriculture, as well as about crime activity;
These provisions are concretised in "the Law on Radiation Safety" of the Russian Federation of December 5,1995, in particular in the following:
Article 2. Legal regulations in the field of ensuring radiation safety.
1. Legal regulations in the field of ensuring radiation safety are performed by the present Federal Law and other normative legal acts of the Russian Federation as well as by the other normative legal acts of the subjects of the Russian Federation.
1. The Federal Laws, other normative legal acts of the Russian Federation, laws and other normative legal acts of the subjects of the Russian Federation may not establish norms reducing the requirements to the radiation safety and their guaranties stipulated by the present Federal Law.
2. According to the Constitution of the Russian Federation the conventional principles and norms of the international law and international treaties of the Russian Federation in the field of ensuring radiation safety, are parts of the legal system of the Russian Federation.
If an international treaty of the Russian Federation stipulates other rules than those stipulated by the law of the Russian Federation in the field of radiation safety, the rules of the international treaty shall apply".
In connection with the above-mentioned circumstances, the court finds, that any citizen of the Russian Federation, in this case - the defendant Nikitin, has not (had not) a real opportunity to determine that the information is related to the concept "information constituting state secret", if -
- this information is not included in "the List of information constituting state secret", determined by the Federal law or authorised by the Decree of the President of Russia;
- the given list is not officially published for the general knowledge;
- the content of this information consists of the data on the condition of the ecology (about accidents and catastrophes endangering safety and health of citizens, and about consequences thereof).
The court believes that in that case the citizen has the right to consider that, according to the law, this information is not secret and can not contain the information constituting state secret.
The given circumstances have been reflected in the decision of the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation no. 17 - P of December 20,1995:
" ... the state has the right to classify some information in the field of military, economical and other kinds of activity if distribution thereof can inflict the damage to the defence of the country and security of the state. In this connection article 29 para. 4 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation stipulates that the list of information constituting a state secret is determined by federal law. The state has also the right to determine the means and the ways of protecting state secret, including establishing criminal liability for its disclosure and transferral to the foreign state.
However, by virtue of the specified constitutional norm, the criminal liability for transferral of state secret to the foreign state is lawful only on the condition that the federal law contains the list of the information constituting state secret, and that the law is officially published for general knowledge. The legal decision, including the court verdict, can not be based on the unpublished normative legal act, which follows from article 15 para. 3 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation".
At the same time, according to para. 1 paragraph 1 of the decree of the President of the Russian Federation no. 104 of January 21,1993, it is established that:
"The legal acts, which have not passed the state registration or have been registered but not published in the appropriate order, do not entail legal consequences as they are invalid. They may not serve as the lawful base for regulating appropriate legal relations or for any sanctions to the citizens, officials and organisations for default of the instructions; it is impossible to refer to the specified acts in the resolution of disputes".
In this connection it is also necessary to mention that much later than the criminal case against the defendant was launched (October 5, 1995), the Law was essentially amended on the basis of the Decrees of the President of Russian Federation No. 490 of May 16, 97 and No. 963 of May 13, 98 "About the order of publication and coming into force of the acts of the President of the Russian Federation, the Government of the Russian Federation and normative legal acts of the federal bodies of the executive authorities", which radically changed its content, by adding 10 new provisions. They have specified in new paragraphs 8 and 10, that from the present time it is admissible not to publish the acts of the Federal bodies of the executive authorities containing information constituting state secret.
The above-mentioned provision of Article 54 of the Russian Constitution shall be taken into account when applying the last law on the events concerning the accusations against the defendant.
The court finds that while Nikitin was working on the report (August-September 1995) it would be wrongful to apply Article 5 of the law of the Russian Federation "On State Secrets" in order to solve the question regarding which concrete information that can be related to the category "information constituting state secret". The mentioned article contained the list of information as its disposition specifies which could be pertained to state secret only after observance of the special procedure, i.e.: after inserting the information constituting state secret to the List [of secrets].
It is necessary to admit that in the discussed period in Russia there was such a situation in the field of protection of state secrets that the Supreme legislative body of the country - the State Duma of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation - required to pay attention to it. In the resolution No. 1271-1 GD of October 27, 1995, it is written:
"On September 21, 1993 the Law of the Russian Federation "On State Secrets" came into force. According to this law the President of the Russian Federation shall approve upon presentation by the Government of the Russian Federation, the List of Information referred to as state secrets.
However, till now the Government of the Russian Federation has not submitted for approval such list to the President of the Russian Federation. In this connection the law-enforcement bodies of the country are deprived of a legal basis for performance of the functions, assigned to them, on providing security of the state, society and individual". Further, the State Duma of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation has decided to ask the Government of the Russian Federation to prepare and present for approval to the President of the Russian Federation, the List of information referred to state secret not later than November 20, 1995.
As it is known and was already stated before, the above mentioned List was confirmed by the decree of the President of the Russian Federation only on November 30, 1995.
The new edition of the Law of the Russian Federation "On State Secrets", which was put into force by the Federal law on October 6, 1997, has put the law in conformity with the requirements of the Constitution. And hence, only from this moment there was a possible independent application of Article 5 of the Law of the Russian Federation "On State Secrets". That is without the reference to "The List of the information referred to state secret", which was confirmed by the decree of the President of the Russian Federation on November 30, 1995.
Thus, in the period from December 12, 1993 to November 30, 1995, there was no legislative definition of the information pertaining to state secrets. Due to this fact, referral of any information to a category pertaining to state secret in the discussed period for the qualification of the actions, was arbitrary and not based on the law. In the current case this concerns the qualification of the actions of the concrete defendant - Citizen A. K. NIKITIN who is a civilian, regarding the reference to state secrets of the information related to the features of operation of the nuclear installations on the nuclear power submarines.
At the same time the Court considers the position of the state prosecution which has dismissed the charges against the defendant regarding the material damage caused by his actions to the protected state interests of Russia.
Taking into account the above-mentioned circumstances, the court finds that at the present time the opportunities of collecting and obtaining the new evidences are exhausted.
Therefore, taking into the consideration Article 49 of the Constitution of the Russian Federation and also Article 6 para. 2 of the European Convention on human rights, ratified by the Russian Federation, and having examined the evidence on the case, the Court comes to a conclusion concerning the lack of the content of the alleged crimes in his actions.
Basing on the above stated, ruling by Articles 301-303 and 310-317 of the Criminal Procedure Code of the RSFSR, the Court
HAS RULED:
NIKITIN Aleksandr Konstantinovich is acquitted of the charges presented to him regarding committing the crimes stipulated by articles 275 para. 1 and 283 para. 1 of the Penal Code of the Russian Federation, -due to the lack of the content of the alleged crimes in his actions.
To dismiss the restriction chosen in the form of city arrest for A.K. Nikitin.
After the entering into force of the verdict to destroy the material evidences stored in the separate box according to the inventory (paragraphs 1-10, 14).
To return 1 videotape, 1 reel of the recording tape and 4 books marked "Secret" and "Top Secret" to the Investigation Department of St.-Petersburg FSB because of the ownership.
To return 2 personal computers "Dell" to the Russian department of the organisation "Bellona" in Mu rmansk because of the ownership.
After the entering into force of the verdict to destroy 1553 copies of the report "The Russian Northern Fleet: Sources of Radioactive contamination".
The verdict can be appealed to the Court Collegium on criminal cases of the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation within 7 days of its announcing.
The Chairman: signature
The Jurors: signatures
-------- us nuc weapons
Secret Nuke Documents Made Public
Associated Press
January 22, 2000 Filed at 1:04 a.m. EST
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/w/AP-Nuclear-Secrets.html
WASHINGTON (AP) -- The government's aggressive push five years ago to declassify historic papers led to about 1,000 documents containing nuclear weapons secrets to be mistakenly declassified, the Clinton administration told Congress.
While the nuclear weapons documents were inadvertently opened to researchers, only one of the files -- on nuclear weapons deployment in foreign countries in the 1950s -- was actually examined by any outsiders before the mistakes were discovered, the Department of Energy said in a report.
The papers were among millions of pages that were declassified between 1995 and 1998 under an executive order from President Clinton directing federal agencies to lift the veil of secrecy from documents that are more than 25 years old.
The openness campaign was widely applauded as an effort to reverse decades of secrecy about the nuclear weapons programs at the old Atomic Energy Commission and about a variety of events from the Vietnam War and UFO research to the failed Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba.
The declassification effort is expected to cover about a billion pages before it is completed in a few years.
The classified report sent to Congress just before Christmas details the findings of a DOE audit of some 948,000 pages of nuclear weapons related documents that had been part of the three-year declassification effort.
During the review, auditors found that 14,890 pages containing secret weapons information were mistakenly declassified and made available for public view at the National Archives, according to an unclassified summary of the report.
The material covers ``about 1,000 documents,'' many of which originated in the old Atomic Energy Commission but had been transferred to other agencies and declassified there, said a DOE official, who spoke on condition of not being identified further.
Although none was declassified by the Energy Department, the mistakes were found in DOE audits of the declassification process required by a law passed by Congress in 1998.
Included among the 14,890 pages was information on nuclear bomb tests in the 1950s and 1960s ``that provided insight ... in weapons design technology'' as well as yields on specific weapon and their deployment and storage, according to the unclassified summary.
In a letter accompanying the report, Energy Secretary Bill Richardson cited ``the gravity of these inadvertent releases'' and said he was increasing the number of auditors and expanding training programs for those conducting declassification at the other agencies.
While the documents contained information that was in some cases 30 to 40 years old, the report said it still could be useful to someone seeking to build a crude nuclear device.
Such information, because it is technically less sophisticated, ``can provide useful design parameters to emerging (nuclear) proliferant nations and to terrorist groups,'' the department said.
The documents were erroneously declassified for a variety of reasons, the DOE official said. In some cases, reviewers were not adequately trained and did not recognize the material. In other cases, documents dating back decades were misfiled or incorrectly labeled.
Steven Aftergood, who directs the Project on Government Secrecy at the Federation of American Scientists, said that while the government should pursue ``a vigorous and successful declassification program, nobody wants to see sensitive nuclear weapons information disclosed.''
He said the fact that DOE is conducting audits that discovered the declassification mistakes ``suggests the DOE is finding a balance which will allow declassification to proceed without risking unintentional disclosure.''
Aftergood's organization obtained a copy of the unclassified portions of the DOE report to Congress and made it available.
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U.S. And Russian Arms Officials End ABM Talks
Inside China Today
Jan 22, 2000
http://www.russiatoday.com/news.php3?id=127871
GENEVA, -- (Reuters) Senior American and Russian arms control experts on Friday ended three days of talks on their differences over a planned U.S. national missile defense system, diplomatic sources said.
John Holum, senior arms adviser at the State Department, and his Russian counterpart Yuri Kapralov also discussed a future START-3 treaty aimed at further cutting their long-range nuclear weapons arsenals, they added.
No statement was issued after the technical-level discussions, which U.S. officials close to the talks described as having been "open and business-like".
Officials on both sides were tight-lipped about the talks due to sensitivities over the expected vote by late March in Russia's lower house of parliament, the Duma, on ratification of the stalled START-2 arms reduction treaty.
The U.S. Senate has ratified the 1993 pact which calls for the United States and Russia to cut their nuclear arsenals to 3,500 warheads each.
The talks follow the failure of a critical U.S. anti-missile test last Tuesday that has been denounced by Russia and China, who say development of an anti-missile defense system would violate the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty (ABM).
The 1972 ABM, hailed as a cornerstone of strategic stability, limits the type of systems Russia and the United States may deploy to intercept incoming missiles.
U.S. President Bill Clinton is to decide this summer on whether to go ahead with a national missile defense scheme to be deployed by 2005. It would be a limited version of former President Ronald Reagan's "Star Wars" program to protect U.S. cities against attack from rogue states such as North Korea.
Clinton and former Russian President Boris Yeltsin agreed last June in the German town of Cologne to work to resolve their differences over the ABM and strategic nuclear weapons.
Yeltsin agreed at the time to hold talks to listen to U.S. proposals to modify the ABM, although he reiterated Russia's strong opposition to changes.
The Geneva talks, the third round since then, came ahead of a January 31 meeting in Moscow between U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov.
Russian Defense Minister Igor Sergeyev last week urged the Duma to ratify START-2 before presidential elections are held at the end of March, adding that it would help convince the United States not to breach the ABM.
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Switzerland
Deseret News
Saturday, January 22, 2000
http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,150008043,00.html?
GENEVA - Top U.S. and Russian officials ended nuclear disarmament talks Friday with Russia refusing to modify a key anti-ballistic missile treaty. No new agreements were announced, but the Russian news agency ITAR-Tass quoted diplomatic sources as saying the talks were constructive
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The Anti-Missile Clock
Washington Post
Saturday, January 22, 2000; Page A18
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/2000-01/22/087l-012200-idx.html
PRESIDENT CLINTON has promised to decide by this summer whether to move ahead with deployment of a national missile defense system. The promise was made mainly for political reasons; it was a way of buying time and maneuvering room on the issue a year ago.
It has become increasingly clear, however, that by summer Mr. Clinton won't have sufficient information to make a reliable decision. Tests of the elaborate technology have been inconclusive and likely will remain so. The decision should be deferred; the administration should begin to lay the groundwork for deferral now. The issue is too important to be driven by election-year considerations. This is not the right way to measure which party is strongest on national defense, and the president should muster the courage to say so.
As currently envisioned, the system would be a defense against a limited attack, not a massive one. The principal threat is no longer thought to lie with the former Soviet Union but with smaller states such as North Korea and Iraq. About 100 interceptors would be built at an estimated cost of $12.5 billion (and rising). Democrats have tended to be skeptical about constructing even a limited system, partly on cost-benefit grounds, partly because deployment would deviate from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and complicate further nuclear arms negotiations with Russia. But Republicans have urged deployment and made it into a totem of dedication to defense. They were helped in this by a North Korean test firing in 1998 that showed that country to have a greater missile capability than U.S. intelligence agencies had previously believed. A well-respected congressional advisory panel in 1998 also urged deployment. The president last year yielded, though with asterisks, signing legislation that said a system would be deployed if "technologically possible" and promising the decision this summer.
But based on what? After years of disappointment, the Pentagon finally succeeded in intercepting an incoming missile in a test last October, but critics say the test was eased, if not quite rigged, to produce the result. A further test over the Pacific last week resulted in a miss, though apparently not by much. A third test is scheduled this spring. But a Pentagon panel has meanwhile warned against a "rush to failure," and after last week's result, even some Republican supporters were urging that a decision be postponed. The sensible course is to put off deployment, continue research and development--and engage in serious further discussions with the Russians after their own elections this spring. Delay in this case is not a way of getting to no by another name. It's a way of getting to the right answer.
---
First Airborne Laser Aircraft Arrives at Boeing
Wichita for Start of Major Modification Work
747-400 Freighter to Undergo 18 Months of Modification by Team ABL In Preparation of Laser System Installation and Testing Next Year
Excite News
January 22, 2000
http://news.excite.com/news/pr/000122/ks-boeing-laser-arcft
WICHITA, Kan., Jan. 22 /PRNewswire/ -- The first Airborne Laser (ABL) flying platform -- a 747-400 Freighter -- flew into Boeing (NYSE:BA) facilities in Wichita, Kan., today (Saturday, Jan. 22) and will immediately begin 18 months of major modification work by Team ABL. The aircraft left Paine Field in Everett, Wash., earlier today on its next step toward becoming the world's first flying missile defense system.
At the end of the modification effort, the aircraft will be ready for installation and testing of a sophisticated high-energy chemical laser system capable of shooting down Scud-like missiles at the speed of light from hundreds of miles away. The ABL is to be the world's first laser-armed aircraft of the new millennium and a critical component of the Department of Defense's theater missile defense strategy.
The 747-400 Freighter rolled out from a Boeing assembly building in December four months after manufacturing started.
Team ABL -- Boeing, Lockheed Martin and TRW -- and the Air Force are developing a high-energy chemical oxygen-iodine laser carried aboard a modified Boeing 747-400 Freighter.
Welcoming the widebody aircraft to Wichita was Lt. Gen. Robert H. Foglesong, commander of the 12th Air Force and U.S. Southern Command Air Forces. Joseph Diamond, Air Force program executive officer for weapons, the Pentagon, joined the ceremony, as well. Also on hand were Kansas state and congressional leaders, led by U.S. Senator Pat Roberts, U.S. Rep. Todd Tiahrt, U.S. Rep. Jim Ryun and Wichita Mayor Bob Knight.
"We are moving forward with the ABL to ensure that we are providing the right equipment to our warfighters and thereby continuing to enjoy our reputation as the only all-purpose aerospace force in the world," Foglesong said. "It would not be smart to ever let our airmen enter a fair fight -- the ABL is another step toward ensuring we have an unfair advantage over our enemies."
Col. Michael Booen, director of the Air Force Airborne Laser System Program Office at Kirtland Air Force Base, N.M.; and Team ABL's industry leadership, also flew into the Boeing plant this afternoon.
Over the next 18 months, this Airborne Laser platform will undergo significant changes. The most visible difference will be the installation of a turret in the aircraft nose, from which a beam of laser light will emanate to destroy Scud-like missiles hundreds of miles away.
Additionally, the aircraft will be modified to accept a multi-megawatt-class chemical laser, specialized optics, and computer hardware and software that will allow the aircraft to spot a theater ballistic missile in its boost phase shortly after being launched, lock onto and destroy it.
"Today marks the hardware part of ABL's revolution -- a revolution in global airpower, missile defense, and in military affairs," Col. Booen said. "My hat is off to the Air Force -- industry team which has worked so hard. Your effort will save American lives in the future."
This first aircraft designated for ABL -- the YAL-1A Attack Laser -- is the first to be acquired for Air Force use under the military's new commercial "off-the-shelf" philosophy. Labeled Aircraft No. 00-0001, the ABL platform also is the first U.S. Air Force aircraft of the new century. The plane also is the third-ever Boeing 747-400 built using a new fuselage assembly process that significantly improves quality, and reduces rejection tags and cycle time.
As Team ABL leader, Boeing is responsible for creating the ABL surveillance system; developing the battle management, and command and control system; integrating and testing the weapon system; and supplying the 747-400 Freighter airplane. Lockheed Martin Missiles & Space, of Sunnyvale, Calif., is building the ABL target-acquisition, fire control and beam control systems. TRW, of Redondo Beach, Calif., is building the laser and the related ground-support subsystem.
"The ABL program continues on track to develop this critical element toward establishing a comprehensive theater ballistic missile defense," said Paul Shennum, Boeing vice president and Team ABL program director.
"Reaching this delivery and modification-start milestone is significant in a number of ways: we've achieved it through teamwork with the Air Force, innovation and dedication of all the Team ABL people. And we've done it when we said we'd do it, for the price we promised."
Air Force plans call for a fleet of seven ABL aircraft to be ready for rapid deployment within 24 hours to any spot around the globe. The fleet's mission is to deter the use of theater ballistic missiles. More than 30 nations today are believed to have at their disposal more than 13,000 of those missiles. Many of those countries also are known to have or are developing nuclear, chemical and biological capabilities for their missiles.
During the current $1.3 billion Program Definition and Risk Reduction phase, Team ABL is designing, developing, integrating and testing the ABL weapon system. The effort will culminate with the planned test destruction of Scud-type missiles by the ABL in 2003, providing the U.S. and its allies with emergency defense if needed against theater ballistic missiles.
Contact: Bob Smith, 253-773-0983, or Dick Ziegler, 316-526-3153, both of Boeing; or Rich Garcia of U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory, 505-846-4583
--------us nuc weapons facilities
Whistle-Blower Quits Livermore Lab
20-year engineer says retaliation continues
San Francisco Chronicle
Saturday, January 22, 2000
Bernadette Tansey, Chronicle Staff Writer
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2000/01/22/MN66331.DTL
LIVERMORE -- A Lawrence Livermore laboratory engineer who says the lab undermined his career after he blew the whistle on safety violations turned in a resignation letter yesterday.
``It's pretty clear I have no future at the laboratory,'' said David Lappa, who will leave the lab in Alameda County on February 4 after 20 years.
Lappa's conflict with lab officials began in 1997, when he helped investigate possible errors in plutonium handling at a facility called the Superblock, where workers were preparing parts for underground weapons testing in Nevada.
Lappa refused to sign the final report on the incident because it omitted his conclusion that the workers may have knowingly violated safety rules by placing too much plutonium together in a work area.
At worst, such errors can initiate nuclear chain reactions leading to an explosion and release of radiation. No such consequences resulted from the alleged errors at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, however.
But Lappa said his attempts to alert Department of Energy headquarters to the safety lapses cost him job assignments at the lab, which is managed for the Energy Department by the University of California. In 1998, the Department of Labor sustained Lappa's retaliation claim against the university, which did not appeal.
Lappa later filed a civil suit against the university, claiming the retaliation was continuing.
Lawrence Livermore spokesman David Schwoegler said he could not comment because Lappa's case is a personnel matter under pending litigation.
Lappa said he has been given few responsibilities in his current position and believes that he would spend the next 15 years until his retirement fighting for assignments that match his abilities. He declined to say whether he has lined up a new job.
``I expect to be employed,'' Lappa said. ``Obviously, I have skills.'' Lappa's attorney, Morgan King, said Lappa, a nuclear engineer, may have to work outside his field and will face the loss of benefits built up over many years.
``The message this sends to everybody at the lab is, `Keep your mouth shut,' '' King said.
---
Lawyer Alleges Threats in Race Trial
Associated Press
January 22, 2000 Filed at 4:54 a.m. EST
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/a/AP-Discrimination-Lawsuit.html
COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) -- A lawyer says he was hit by a car and threatened during a trip to South Carolina last year to meet with his clients.
Ivan D. Smith is representing black workers at a federal nuclear complex who are suing over alleged racial discrimination.
He spoke about the threats to CBS' ''60 Minutes'' for a story scheduled to air Sunday.
Smith says that when he visited South Carolina in June 1999 he was hit by a car driven by a white man, who then shouted a racial slur ``as I bounced off the hood of his car.''
He said he suffered a broken nose and other injuries.
Smith said he also received threats at his New York home, but never reported them for fear that other potential attackers would learn where he lived.
The lawsuit, filed in 1997, accuses Westinghouse Savannah River Co., which runs the former weapons complex for the U.S. Energy Department, of discriminating against blacks in raises and promotions.
It also says the company failed to stop the use of racial epithets and intimidation of black employees and that black workers were given jobs that exposed them to radiation hazards more often than others.
The workers seek back pay, unspecified compensatory and punitive damages and changes in how promotions and pay raises are made.
The company has denied the allegations.
``We do not tolerate discrimination against any group, or against any individual,'' said Will Callicott, a Westinghouse Savannah River Site spokesman. ``We regret that this case has resulted in litigation.''
About 90 employees are represented in the lawsuit. Smith wants to turn it into a class action representing all black employees of the companies.
--------terrorism
Ireland and U.S. May Have Lost Chance to Learn of Terrorist Plot
New York Times
January 22, 2000
By WILLIAM K. RASHBAUM
http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/global/012200ireland-terror.html
Related Article
Canada Adds Details on Algerians' Suspected Bomb Plot (Jan. 21, 2000)
http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/global/012100terror-plot.html
Early on the morning of Dec. 21, with tensions growing around the world about possible acts of terror during New Year's celebrations, Irish police officers raided a house in a working-class section of Dublin as part of a series of sweeps that rounded up five North African immigrants for questioning.
But they released the men after about 24 hours, saying they did not have enough evidence to hold them, said Barbara A. Scarlett, a spokeswoman for the United States Embassy in Dublin.
Within days, authorities in Ireland and the United States began to realize that they might have missed a chance to learn more about a terrorist network.
They now say an analysis of documents and a computer seized in the raids show that one of the men, Hamid Aich, might have had ties to an Algerian, Ahmed Ressam, who was arrested in Seattle on Dec. 14 after military explosives and homemade detonators were found in his car.
The Irish authorities, aware that Mr. Ressam had been arrested trying to cross into the United States from Canada, decided to question the handful of Algerian and Libyan immigrants in Dublin. American officials say they asked the Irish to detain all five until a determination could be made about their potential threat.
Neither American nor Irish law enforcement officials would speak publicly about the circumstances surrounding Mr. Aich's release, although Ms. Scarlett, the embassy spokeswoman, acknowledged that Mr. Aich had been detained and released with the knowledge of United States authorities.
But in interviews, American law enforcement officials made it clear that they were disappointed that they were unable to question Mr. Aich or fully explore his ties to Mr. Ressam. They are still reviewing information in his computer, hoping that it might explain Mr. Ressam's plans for the explosives hidden in the wheelwell of his car, his possible accomplices and any broader organization or group that may have sponsored the plot. No criminal charges have been brought against Mr. Aich, F.B.I. officials said.
One investigator said some material on the computer suggests that Mr. Aich had ties to Egyptian Islamic Jihad, which has targeted tourists and Egyptian officials.
American law enforcement officials would not say whether they suspect that Mr. Aich was directly involved in the plot involving Mr. Ressam, nor would they detail the possible ties between him and Mr. Ressam found on the computer.
But one official said he hoped that the ongoing analysis of the computer and documents would prove valuable to the F.B.I. in its efforts to unravel what investigators believe was a terrorist plot to set off as many as four bombs somewhere in the United States.
Little is known about Mr. Aich, a 34-year-old Algerian who American law enforcement officials said had been in Canada, where Mr. Ressam had been living before his arrest. One law enforcement official said Mr. Aich had stayed at the same Vancouver address as Abdel Hakim Tizegha, another figure in the Seattle investigation.
A former counterterrorism official said that Mr. Aich had been picked up in Dublin at the suggestion of a Western intelligence agency and that the sweep was part of new procedures set in place after the Aug. 7, 1997, bombings of the United States Embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. Under the guidelines, police officers around the world question suspected terrorists and search their homes in an effort to forestall any possible planned attacks.
The raids in Ireland were part of a series of sweeps around the world last month, from Canada and New York, to Jordan and other parts of Europe, officials said.
Irish Special Branch detectives from a unit that investigates terrorist groups detained Mr. Aich in the working-class South Dublin suburb of Talaght.
Irish officials would not discuss the raids or Mr. Aich, saying only that their police had acted properly.
"We're satisfied everything was done appropriately," said Eamonn C. McKee, a spokesman for the Irish embassy in Washington.
F.B.I. officials in Washington and New York would not comment on Mr. Aich.
An American official said the Central Intelligence Agency had alerted counterparts in Ireland to the significance of the five, but declined to specify whether the raid was made at Washington's request. It was not clear whether Irish authorities had a clear picture of Mr. Aich's significance or possible ties to Islamic militants.
-------- spying
World Briefings
NORWAY: JOURNALIST CALLED SPY
New York Times
January 22, 2000
http://www.nytimes.com/00/01/22/news/world/world-briefs.html
A Norwegian journalist has been charged with spying for the former East Germany and is at large "somewhere in Europe," his newspaper, Aftenbladet, said. Stein Viksveen, the paper's Brussels correspondent, is accused of delivering secret NATO documents to Stasi intelligence agents from 1962 to 1989. Warren Hoge (NYT)
--------
As the U.S. moves into the presidency of the UN Security Council this month, the Clinton administration is declaring January 2000, "the month of Africa." Hoping to counter criticisms that it has been engaged in a rhetorical promotion of U.S.-Africa relations over the past two years without substantive follow-up, the administration has announced its intent to prioritize finding solutions to current conflicts in the region, including a 30-year civil war that trudges on in Angola and the ongoing crisis in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). It has not, however, accepted its own responsibility in helping to create the conditions that have led to these seemingly intractable conflicts.
A new report by the Arms Trade Resource Center, Deadly Legacy: U.S. Arms to Africa and the Congo War (available online at www.worldpolicy.org/projects/arms/reports.html), highlights the role of the U.S. in planting the seeds of the current crisis in the Democratic Republic of the Congo through decades of weapons sales and military training to corrupt regimes.
Key findings of the report include:
· The U.S. provided more than $300 million in weapons and $100 million in military training to Mobutu throughout his brutal rule. When Kabila took power, the Clinton administration quickly offered military support to the new leader by developing a plan for new training operations with the armed forces.
· The U.S. has helped build the arsenals of eight of the nine governments directly involved in the Congo war, and supported various nonstate armed groups like Jonas Savimbi's UNITA through covert weapons transfers during the 1970's and 80's.
· The Clinton administration is undertaking a wave of new military training programs in Africa, including troops fighting on both sides of the DRC's civil war. Under the Pentagon's Joint Combined Exchange Training (JCET) program, U.S. special forces have trained military personnel from at least 34 of Africa's 53 nations, including troops fighting on both sides of the DRC's civil war * from Rwanda and Uganda (supporting the rebels) to Zimbabwe and Namibia (supporting the Kabila regime).
· While the U.S. ranks number one in global weapons exports, it falls dead last among industrialized nations in providing non-military foreign aid to the developing world. In 1997, the U.S. devoted only 0.09% of GNP to international development assistance, the lowest proportion of all developed countries.
Although President Clinton is now making grand gestures at building a "new partnership" with the region, the administration is doing little to redress the failures of the past and contribute substantively to building a durable peace in the region. By relying on counter-productive Cold War policies and a new wave of military training programs as the basis for U.S.-Africa relations, the Clinton administration is only adding fuel to the fire, undermining human development and long-term peacebuilding across the continent.
If the U.S. does want to promote democracy, development, and the peaceful resolution of conflict in Africa, it should begin matching its words with real policy action. As a first step, Congress should pass and President Clinton should sign the bipartisan McKinney-Rohrabacher Code of Conduct on Arms Transfers (HR 2269), a measure which would take U.S. weapons out of the hands of dictators and human rights abusers. Congress should also close the loopholes in military training programs by passing the International Military Training Transparency and Accountability Act (HR 1063) and end all training exercises with countries that violate human rights. Finally, President Clinton and Congress should commit to unconditional debt relief and encourage civil society-building in Africa by immediately forgiving all military debt accrued by governments no longer in power and increasing development assistance to $2 billion by 2003.
Words will not be enough to create real partnership between the U.S. and the countries of Africa; actions must follow. By shifting a mere fraction of the energy that currently goes to strengthen African militaries toward non-military alternatives that could promote democracy, development, and peacebuilding, the United States could make a significant contribution to promoting security and stability in the region.
For a copy of the full report, Deadly Legacy: U.S. Arms to Africa and the Congo War, contact Frida Berrigan (212-229-5808, ext. 112, or berrigaf@newschool.edu); or consult our website, www.worldpolicy.org/projects/arms.
A number of other organizations are working to improve U.S. policy toward Africa and provide good resources for citizen action:
· The Africa Fund, www.prairienet.org/acas/afund.html
· The Africa Policy Information Center, www.africapolicy.org
· Demilitarization for Democracy, www.dfd.net
· Washington Office on Africa, www.woaafrica.org
Frida Berrigan
Research Associate
Arms Trade Resource Center
65 Fifth Avenue, Suite 413
New York, New York 10003
212-229-5808 ext. 112
fax: 212-229-2279
email:berrigaf@newschool.edu
------
Planned U.S. warhead upgrades --
That Old Designing Fever
by Greg Mello,
Bulletin of Atomic Scientists,
Jan-Feb 2000
http://www.bullatomsci.org/issues/2000/jf00/jf00mello.html
Ten years after the end of the Cold War, the U.S. nuclear weapons labs are having no trouble staying busy. Inflation-corrected budgets are much higher than Cold War averages, and a variety of weap ons projects--some for upgraded components, some for modified or entirely new weapons--have hummed along in the 1990s. One high-priority project that went all the way to deployment in 1996, for instance, was the modification of an existing bomb to create the B61-11 variable-yield earth penetrator--what the Pentagon calls "a better weapon."1
The labs and bomb bureaucrats are at it again--this time devising upgrade options for the navy's arsenal of submarine-launched ballistic missile warheads (SLBMs). Three complementary programs are under development in the benign-sounding "Submarine Warhead Protection Program" or SWPP.
The first--the "default option"--is an upgrade of the arming, firing, and fuzing components of the most numerous warhead in the U.S. arsenal, the 100-kiloton W76. This upgrade would give these 3,200 air-burst warheads a near-ground-burst capability, making them extremely lethal against hardened targets. Unless another upgrade is chosen or the program delayed, the new fuze is slated to begin entering the stockpile in late fiscal 2004.2
Beyond the arming, firing, and fuzing (AF&F) project, the Energy Department is attempting to provide the navy with two certifiable new warhead options to augment its stock of high-yield W88s. One would involve a "mature design," which could go into production by fiscal 2004.3 It would use a recycled--and thus "pretested"--plutonium pit and possibly a recycled thermonuclear secondary.
The other would utilize an entirely untested design, which is supposed to be certifiable soon enough to achieve a "first production" date of fiscal 2007.4 According to the Energy Department, both are "new" nuclear designs--that is, designs that have not been deployed before, either in this specific configuration (the first option) or ever (the second).
Certification of either would require a combination of past nuclear test data, underground subcritical tests, above-ground hydrodynamic and subcritical tests, computer simulations, and flight tests.
At least one of these two designs--or possibly yet another warhead--is slated to eventually replace what the navy called in 1995 the "exiting" W76 and W88 warheads.5
But these new warhead options are not the Energy Department's only plans to change the nuclear explosives in the stockpile. Under Energy's current policy, eventually all the nuclear weapons in the stockpile are to be replaced with either modified versions or with entirely new weapons.6
Whether new or heavily modified "physics packages" can be fully certified for the long run without nuclear explosive tests is a matter of internal debate at the labs. But one thing is clear: if the Energy Department is allowed to introduce changes and new nuclear designs into the stockpile, the objective link between stockpile reliability and the nuclear testing record will be greatly weakened, making stockpile "confidence" more and more the subjective technical and institutional property of the nuclear laboratories themselves.
During the Cold War, such a mono poly was a principal source of the laboratories' political power. It has always translated directly into funding and could, in the present deteriorating arms control climate, result in a resumption of nuclear testing--either through a change in U.S. policy or as a response to one or more foreign nuclear tests.
Euphemisms
Even if just the "baseline" project--the new ground-burst fuze--is deployed on W76 weapons, there will be several adverse effects. First, arms control diplomacy will have to take into account the fact that the United States is converting 3,200 air-burst weapons into highly accurate, hard-target counterforce weapons.
This conversion would occur in the face of steep declines that are expected in the numbers of Russian strategic nuclear weapons, a process that is occurring independently of START II ratification.7
In turn, deploying significant numbers of additional hard-target weapons would increase the "launch on warning" incentive for Russian commanders, decreasing crisis stability and increasing the dangers from any problems that might arise in Russian nuclear command-and-control systems.
Further, all three upgrade programs fly in the face of the binding obligation to successfully negotiate nuclear disarmament and the "cessation of the nuclear arms race" found in Article VI of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. They also contradict the explicit purpose of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, which was recently rejected by the U.S. Senate. According to the treaty's preamble, its purpose is to promote nuclear disarmament.
Finally, the upgrade projects set the stage for abandoning the Pentagon's official "no new nuclear weapons production" pledge that was part of the 1994 Nuclear Policy Review, a policy that was proposed by the Pentagon and signed by the president.
Internal documents show that Energy Department managers have been sensitive to the hypocrisy in this program, and they have sought to hide it under euphemisms such as "surety." Energy Department honchos have even suggested that, given the political environment, "the use of the word ëwarhead' may not be acceptable."
In the Bush administration, a warhead was a warhead. Is the Clinton-era Energy Department working on new weapons? That depends on what your definition of "new" is.
Ten cents on the dollar
The navy deploys two kinds of warheads on its 18 Ohio-class submarines: the 100-kiloton W76, carried within the Mk4 reentry body, and the 475-kiloton W88 warhead, carried within the larger Mk5. In comparison, the bomb that destroyed Hiroshima was about 15 kilotons.
The eight Pacific-based submarines are equipped with the older Trident I C4 missiles, which carry only the W76/Mk4. Both types of warheads can be deployed on the newer Trident II D5 missiles, although warhead types are not mixed on a single missile. As currently configured, both types of missiles carry eight reentry bodies on a "bus" that releases the individually targeted warheads.
Each Trident submarine carries 24 missiles. If all the missiles were fully loaded, there would be 192 warheads per submarine. Currently, 384 W88/ Mk5 and 3,072 W76/Mk4 warheads are deployed.8 The D5 missile has a longer range than the C4, a heavier throw-weight and, above all, greater accuracy. To take advantage of the D5's accuracy, the high-yield W88/Mk5 warhead was given a radar fuze that enables it to explode, if desired, very close to the ground, at most a few meters above.9 The resulting cratering and shock makes the W88, according to Rear Adm. George P. Nanos, director of the navy's Strategic Systems Programs, a "hard target killer." The W76 is not yet such a weapon.10
If the hard targets are missile silos or launch centers, the sooner the U.S. warheads are launched, the more likely they are to arrive before the target missiles have been launched. The target country knows this. At a time of great tension and high strategic alert, the target country could conceivably elect to launch sooner and more massively rather than later or not at all. The more "hard-target killers" there are in the U.S. stockpile, the more threatening its strategic posture will appear.
Toward the end of the Bush administration, the navy prepared to downsize its fleet to 10 Trident II subs.11 President Clinton's 1994 Nuclear Posture Review reversed ground, choosing to retain a total of 14. Conversion of four of the older subs to carry the larger D5 missiles will take place between 2000 and 2005.12
But without an upgrade to the warheads themselves, only about 11 percent of the Navy's warheads would "be all they can be"--namely, "hard target killers." Again, Admiral Nanos:
"Our capability for [the] Mk4, however, is not very impressive by today's standards, largely because the Mk4 was never given a fuze that made it capable of placing the burst at the right height to hold other than urban industrial targets at risk.
"With the accuracy of D5 and Mk4, just by changing the fuze in the Mk4 reentry body, you get a significant improvement. The Mk4, with a modified fuze and Trident II accuracy, can meet the original D5 hard-target requirement.
"Why is this important? Because in the START II regime, of course, the ICBM hard-target killers are going out of the inventory and that cuts back our ability to hold hard targets at risk. The air force has some plans for how to upgrade their ICBM force to restore that capability. We can do that with the Mk4 reentry body for 10 cents on the dollar in terms of investment because of the accuracy of our system, and we have made this option available to the strategic CINC [commander in chief]."13
New product lines
The admiral's hopes are being realized at Sandia National Laboratory. According to the March 1999 version of Energy's stockpile stewardship master plan, the new modular fuzing system will allow the "incorporation of Mk5 fuzing functionality (including radar-updated path length fuzing, and radar-proximity fuzing) as an option for a replacement of the much smaller Mk4 AF&F."14
The plan claims that the current arming, firing, and fuzing system of the W76/Mk4 is approaching the end of its design life, and that the occurrence of age-related defects is "unpredictable." But the fuze modification will enable the W76 to "take advantage of the higher accuracy of D5 missile."
The new arming, firing, and fuzing system is on a fast track. Production is expected to begin as early as 2003, in plenty of time for installation during refurbishment of the W76, now scheduled to begin in fiscal 2005.15 Further, the new arming, firing, and fuzing system is to be modular and compatible with W88 warheads as well as with new warheads now under development for the navy.16
Another upgrade project is the "near-term" design and preliminary certification of a new warhead for the Mk5 reentry body that would use recycled plutonium pits and an existing thermonuclear secondary design, possibly one already "in stock."
This warhead is to be designed so that it could be assembled "rapidly" in large numbers without new pit production.17 The warhead would be "derivative" of the one that was explosively tested in Nevada as a pit-reuse option for use in the W89 Short-Range Attack Missile II.18 Energy characterizes this effort as a:
"Relatively mature design that utilizes available retired pits in a new insensitive high explosive primary with fire resistant features included."19 (Emphasis added.)
Meanwhile, design of the thermonuclear secondary for the weapon is not regarded as a significant issue: "There are adequate data in the nuclear test history of the secondary to establish its nuclear performance."20
Livermore is taking the lead on this recycling project. According to the Energy/Defense interagency stewardship plan, the March 1999 "Green Book," its peer-reviewed final design "decision package,"is supposed to be delivered early in fiscal 2001, along with the flight-tested arming, firing, and fuzing system being developed at Sandia. At that point, the pit-reuse option will either be shelved or enter full-scale engineering development, with a view toward full-scale production in early fiscal 2004.21
Livermore managers seem enthusiastic about the economic potential of this warhead for their laboratory: "For the last two decades," writes James Tyler, the original SWPP manager at Livermore, "LLNL has largely been shut out of the SLBM warhead arena, which we invented and once dominated. . . . In any future scenario of nuclear deterrence for the United States, we can expect the SLBM systems to play a central role, and I believe that it is essential for LLNL to take this opportunity to once again be a major player. . . .
"I believe we should view this as a major corporate marketing decision. What product lines will we pursue? I believe that the SLBM system and the strategic navy will be as solid a market as there is in the nuclear weapons field, and I believe we should pursue that line."22
The second--and competitive--warhead project is based at Los Alamos. It is described by the Energy Department and the labs as a "new design that will not have UGTs [underground tests] for certification," using a "conservative/high margin design" for the Mk5 reentry body.23 The Energy Department expects to reach a full-scale engineering development decision at the end of fiscal 2003, with production to begin in fiscal 2007, if desired.
"Damn the test ban; full speed ahead"
The arming, firing, and fuzing project at Sandia--together with Livermore's pit reuse warhead and Los Alamos's "high margin" warhead--are collectively known within the Energy Department as the "Submarine Warhead Protection Program" (SWPP).
The Livermore and Los Alamos portions of the Submarine Warhead Protection Program are at odds with recommendations by the JASONs, the Energy Department's most senior scientific advisers. In November 1994, 17 JASONs strongly counseled the Energy Department to avoid designing or building new nuclear explosives in a test ban regime:
"The primary--if not the sole--nuclear weapons manufacturing capacity that must be provided for in an era of no nuclear testing is the remanufacture of copies of existing (tested) stockpile weapons. The ultimate goal should be to retain the capability of remanufacturing SNM [special nuclear material] components that are as identical as possible to those of the original manufacturing process and not to ëimprove' those components. This is especially important for pits."24
The following August (1995), 14 JASONs, including some of the most senior nuclear weapons designers from the Los Alamos, Lawrence Livermore, and Sandia laboratories, made a detailed technical review of the design and performance of all the nuclear weapons in the U.S. arsenal, with an eye to maintaining these weapons under a zero-yield test ban. Their "Conclusion 3" repeats the previous year's warning even more strongly:
"The individual weapon types in the enduring stockpile have a range of performance margins, all of which we judge to be adequate at this time. In each case we have identified opportunities for further enhancing their performance margins by means that are straightforward and can be incorporated with deliberate speed during scheduled maintenance or remanufacturing activities. However greatest care in the form of self-discipline will be required to avoid system modifications, even if aimed at ëimprovements,' which may compromise reliability."25
It seems, however, that the Energy and Defense Departments, as well as the labs, had long planned another approach to stockpile stewardship. In February 1995--in the interval between the two JASON reports--the draft "Green Book" noted that two new weapon "Phase 2" feasibility studies had been completed. One was for the air force. The other was for the navy; it became the Submarine Warhead Protection Program later that year.26
During the week of May 29, 1995, laboratory weaponeers briefed the military at a secret "Stockpile Confidence Symposium" in Omaha. The topics included new "warhead candidates." It was precisely these candidate warheads that became the basis of the Submarine Warhead Protection Program.27
At the first Submarine Warhead Protection Program meeting in June 1995, laboratory representatives apparently described the "yield certification process," "expanded test and analysis techniques to eliminate need for UGTs [underground nuclear tests]," the candidate warheads themselves, and the schedule and process to bring the warhead candidates to the "decision point."28
The Submarine Warhead Protection Program, even from this early date, was not merely a "concept development" study ("Phase 1," in Energy's system) or a "feasibility and cost study" ("Phase 2"). That early work had taken place between 1990, when Livermore first proposed a pit reuse option for the Mk5 reentry body, and 1994, when a Phase 2 study was peer reviewed by the three labs.29
In fact, the Submarine Warhead Protection Program is designed to produce prototype, flight-tested, nuclear-certified hardware. By November 15, 1995, the Submarine Warhead Protection Program plans and schedules had been approved by the Nuclear Weap ons Council Standing and Safety Committee.30 As Energy Department minutes of a subsequent senior-level Submarine Warhead Protection Program meeting make clear, certification was a primary goal:
"All parties view this program as a forcing function for the DOE to define certification for a new weapon and apply it to the products of the SWPP as a trial run."31
The labs' Submarine Warhead Protection Program work is not only to be directed toward practical, certifiable weapons, but from the beginning it was integrated with military targeting considerations--specifically near-ground-burst capability. At the first project meeting, Strategic Command's homework, due at the next meeting, was to "Determine user sensitivity to Mk4 and Mk5 yield and accuracy with overall mission effectiveness," and to "Compare systems effectiveness of prox [proximity fuzing] and RUPL [radar-updated path length fuzing] options for Mk4 application."
Further, the December 1995 "Draft Memorandum of Understanding" between the navy and the Energy Department's Defense Programs (DP) is clear about the role of the program in defining a certification methodology for future weapons:
"The DP will be responsible for . . . providing a warhead certification me-thodology which does not rely on future Underground Nuclear Testing (UGT) and is consistent with the forecasted capabilities for both above and underground non-nuclear testing and computational techniques of Science Based Stockpile Stewardship (SBSS)."32
The reason such a certification methodology is so sorely "needed" is that the Energy Department believes that it would be modifying nuclear explosive packages in stockpile weap ons indefinitely, as well as adding entirely new weapons to the stockpile.
For example, at the first Submarine Warhead Protection Program inter agency executive meeting (which included representatives from the Nuclear Weapons Council, the Energy Department, the labs, the Office of the Secretary of Defense, and the uniformed military), Energy presented a briefing slide titled "Notional Stockpile Support Strategy."
The slide shows near-term primary modifications for all types of B61 gravity bombs as well as for the W80 cruise missile warhead. According to this plan, every weapon in the stockpile would have a "renewed" nuclear explosive package in the out years, after a "new infrastructure" was built. The stockpile shown on the slide included a future "B93" bomb and a "W94," the latter described as a "potential new warhead."33 This policy was the same two years later. Energy's authoritative October 1997 stewardship plan states:
"The requirement to maintain the capability to design and engineer new weapon systems to military requirements [was] stated in the DOD Nuclear Posture Review (NPR). Nuclear wea pons in the enduring stockpile will eventually be replaced. (New system development may be needed even to maintain today's military characteristics). This work is anticipated to begin around 2010.
"In the meantime, future national policies are supported for deterrence by retaining the ability to develop new nuclear options for emergent threats. . . . Miniature, modular building blocks for nuclear weapon systems are being developed . . . proof-of-principle flight tests will demonstrate alternative concepts to address new threats and will provide the technology for new approaches to deterrence, should the nation ever need them, as well as attract and train new nuclear weapon system engineers."34
Energy's 1998 and 1999 stewardship plans--the most recent, publicly available redacted "Green Books"--do not mention any doubts about the ability to certify the Submarine Warhead Protection Program pit-reuse option, which it describes as a "mature" design.
But doubts are beginning to arise about the "high margin" warhead Los Alamos is working on. The Energy Department said in April 1998, "The replacement warhead for the Mk5 may not be certifiable without nuclear testing."35
Run silent, run deep
The military, the labs, and the Energy Department have not been comfortable discussing these projects. In an April 1996 breakfast meeting with reporters, Harold Smith, chair of the Nuclear Weapons Council Standing and Safety Committee, denied all knowledge of the Submarine Warhead Protection Program--even though he was the one who formally requested that the Energy Department, along with the Defense Department, flesh out an "alternative warheads" program for the navy in May 1995. Smith's denial, as reported by Elaine Grossman in Inside the Pentagon, was complete:
"'There are no new nuclear designs for the SLBM force. None. There are no new warheads. There cannot be,' said Smith, whose official title is assistant to the secretary of defense for nuclear and chemical and biological defense programs. ëBecause if you cannot test, you cannot develop new warheads. That is almost the eleventh commandment as given to Moses on Mount Sinai,' Smith said. [Emphasis added.]
"When pressed on whether new designs were being sought, even if they would be shelved for possible emergency production in the future, Smith suggested the navy could remanufacture existing designs. ëThose are all well-tested designs,' said Smith of the warheads already fielded. ëWe have the blueprints. We will simply go back, and if necessary remanufacture them from scratch.'"36
This interview has often been cited to quell fears that the Energy Department could or would develop new weapons under a test ban. But Smith's remarks are unfortunately contradicted by the documentary record, some of it bearing his signature.
At a June 6, 1996 Energy Department meeting, damage control was in full swing:
"Karen Lombardo DOE HQ (DP-17) explained for the benefit of the Labs and AL [Albuquerque] the political climate that is evolving in Washington concerning the development of new nuclear weapons. Questions of whether WPP [Warhead Protection Program] constituted a new weapon have been raised. . . . Therefore, it is paramount that the program develops and maintains a direction that emphasizes Stockpile Stewardship and de-emphasizes new warhead development.
"In addition HQ [headquarters] was concerned about the name of the program and the name of ëHigh Margin Warhead' and suggested that we consider changing them. The group raised some concerns over changing the name of the program. LANL stated that they had already considered a name change to ëReplacement Warhead.' It was suggested that the use of the word ëwarhead' may not be acceptable. Because of the confusion over wording, Karen Lombardo had been asked at the Program Review to develop a Program Definition Glossary."37
With or without the "glossary," it proved impossible to entirely expurgate the word "warhead" from a program to develop new warheads. A second-best option--couching the program in vague and reassuring language--was chosen. In a May 1997 status report, the current activities in the replacement warhead project included "Warhead Surety Theme being developed."38
A few questions
The Submarine Warhead Protection Program is much more than an effort to maintain weapons. It is designed to increase the military capability of the U.S. arsenal as it downsizes--while pioneering the design and certification of new weapons without nuclear testing.
Despite its potentially adverse effects on crisis stability, stockpile reliability, and arms control and disarmament efforts, there has been no public or congressional debate over upgrading warheads or the gratuitous modification and novel design of nuclear explosives. Rather, there have been denials that such efforts are occurring or could occur--even though the public record is replete with references to these developments. A public debate might start with a few basic questions:
Is it a good idea to threaten Russia with even more hard-target weapons? Is the Stockpile Stewardship Program, as currently structured, compatible with any comprehensive test ban treaty? If untested weapons are allowed to enter the stockpile, who but the labs--whose funding rides on the answer--can credibly say whether those untested designs actually work, now and in the years to come? Looking beyond the Submarine Warhead Protection Program, will continuous weapons development build pressure for the eventual deployment of new weapons? Continuing nuclear weapons programs, including the Submarine Warhead Protection Program and the earlier B61-11 modifications, raise still more fundamental questions: Will the United States comply with its Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty commitment to successfully negotiate nuclear disarmament? Or will it pursue a goal of continued--and increasing--military utility for nuclear weapons?
Neither the Clinton administration nor the Congress has yet asked these questions, much less provided answers. Nor has the Energy Department been provided with policy guidance on the question of new weapons and weapons with new military utility.
In the absence of such guidance, the labs and their Energy Department overseers have been making up policy as they go. In the case of bureaucracies whose fundamental purpose has been to devise new weapons, whatever is not forbidden may well be considered mandatory.
Progress in nuclear arms control, let alone nuclear disarmament, will require disarming the institutions that defend and promote nuclear weapons.
Greg Mello is director of the Los Alamos Study Group in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
NOTES-
1. Greg Mello, "New Bomb, No Mission," Bulletin, May/June 1997, pp. 28-32. The Pentagon quote is from Harold Smith, assistant to the secretary of defense for nuclear, chemical, and biological defense programs, in March 20, 1997 testimony to the Senate Energy and Water Development Appropriations Subcommittee.
2. Ronald Hartwig, "Overview of Sandia's SWPP Project & Initiatives Aimed at Reducing Defects," briefing slides, Sandia National Laboratory (SNL), January 14, 1997.
3. U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), Stockpile Stewardship and Management Plan: Second Annual Update, April 1998, pp. 5-9, 5-16.
4. Ibid., p. 5-16.
5. Adm. George P. Nanos, "Slbm Warhead Protection Program," memo to Harold Smith, NWC-SSC, April 14, 1995.
6. DOE, Stockpile Stewardship and Management Plan: First Annual Update, October 1997, p. 7-34.
7. Alexei Arbatov, "Deep Cuts and De-alerting: A Russian Perspective," in The Nuclear Turning Point: A Blueprint for Deep Cuts and De-Alerting of Nuclear Weapons, Harold Feiveson, ed. (Washington D.C.: Brookings, 1999), 305-24.
8. Robert S. Norris and William M. Arkin, "U.S. Strategic Nuclear Forces, End of 1998," Bulletin, January/February 1999, pp. 78-80.
9. Sandia National Laboratory, "Product Realization Initiatives: SLBM Warhead Protection Program," briefing slide titled "Radar ringdown design optimization is more efficient," January 14, 1996.
10. Adm. George P. Nanos, "Strategic Systems Update," Submarine Review, April 1997, pp. 12-17. This important article was provided by Joshua Handler of Princeton University and Bruce Hall, then of Greenpeace.
11. Walter Pincus, "Questions Raised on Trident Subs," Washington Post, January 3, 1999, p. A22.
12. Robert Aldridge, "Trident Updates Useless: Arguments Against D-5 Backfit and SSGN Conversion," Pacific Life Research Center, PLRC-990610A.
13. Nanos, "Strategic Systems Update."
14. DOE, Stockpile Stewardship and Management Plan: Third Annual Update, March 1999, p. 5-14.
15. DOE, "Stockpile Stewardship/Future Stockpile Activities," FY2000 Congressional Budget Request.
16. Ibid., pp. 4-12.
17. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), "Slbm Warhead Protection Program Pit Reuse Project Proposed Tier-0 Project Overview," draft, September 15, 1995. The first part of this document repeats concisely the program requirements given to LLNL: "The technical objective of the project will be a Data Package. It will be a collection of information that defines the SLBM WPP pit reuse warhead design option and its integration into the Mk5 RB and that provides the rationale, from both experiments and calculations, that this design option would meet requirements and could be fabricated rapidly and entered into the stockpile with high confidence. It will include a summary of the certification study and a Product Realization Plan." These deliverables did not significantly change over the next few years.
18. DOE, Second Annual Update, p. 6-39.
19. Ibid., p. 5-9.
20. Ibid., p. 6-40.
21. Ibid., p. 5-16.
22. James Tyler, "The SLBM Warhead Protection Program Has Been Authorized," memo, LLNL, November 20, 1995.
23. SNL, "Replacement Warhead Summary and Status Charts for SWPP Program Review Meeting," May 1997.
24. JASON, "Science Based Stockpile Stewardship," Mitre Corporation, November 1994, p. 81.
25. JASON, "Nuclear Testing," Mitre Corporation, August 4, 1995.
26. DOE DP Interagency Working Group, Stockpile Stewardship Program Plan for Fiscal Years 1995 through 1997, draft, February 27, 1995, p. 27.
27. Cliff DeJong of Kaman Sciences, memo, re "Slbm Warhead Protection Program," June 15, 1995.
28. Ibid.
29. LANL X-6, "Inrad Implications for Mk5 Reuse Proposals," WTU-91-49 (CRD), January 31, 1991; LANL Nuclear Weapons Technology Program Office, "Slbm Designs Reviewed," Weapons Insider, May 1994; also see Tyler, "Slbm Warhead Protection Program."
30. LANL Nuclear Weapons Technology Program Office, Weapons Insider, January/February 1996.
31. Jeff Cuneo, DOE DP-12, "Meeting Minutes, SLBM Warhead Protection Program Executive Working Group," December 6, 1995.
32. DOE and United States Navy, "Draft Memorandum of Understanding between Department of Navy, Strategic Systems Programs, and Department of Energy (Defense Programs) for the SLBM Warhead Protection Program," December 19, 1995. The final memorandum of understanding was not provided with the Freedom of Information Act documents.
33. DeJong, "Slbm Warhead."
34. DOE, "First Annual Update," p. 7-34.
35. DOE, "Second Annual Update," p. 6-42.
36. Elaine Grossman, "Navy, Energy Department Seek Back-Up Warhead Design for Trident Missiles," Inside the Pentagon, May 9, 1996, p. 1.
37. Glenn Bell, DOE DP 17, "Meeting minutes, DOE Team Meeting for the SLBM WPP, Germantown, June 6, 1996."
38. SNL, "Replacement Warhead Summary and Status Charts for SWPP Program Review Meeting," May 1997.
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NIRS CHALLENGES OYSTER CREEK LICENSE TRANSFER
SAYS REACTOR IS UNSAFE AND AMERGEN IS UNQUALIFIED OPERATOR
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
January 6, 2000
Contact: Paul Gunter or Michael Mariotte 202-328-0002
The Nuclear Information and Resource Service (NIRS) January 5, 2000 filed a formal petition with the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission challenging the proposed transfer of the Oyster Creek nuclear reactor's operating license from GPUN to AmerGen Energy Company (LLC). The petition requests an adjudicatory hearing before a three-judge Atomic Safety and Licensing Board (ASLB).
NIRS charged in its 40-page petition that AmerGen is financially unqualified to operate Oyster Creek. AmerGen has few assets of its own and as a Limited Liability Corporation, the assets of its corporate parents, PECO Energy of Philadelphia and British Energy of the United Kingdom, cannot be touched in the event major repairs are needed or financial setbacks occur. PECO Energy and British Energy have jointly committed only $110 million for operating costs at all of AmerGen's recently-purchased reactors, including Three Mile Island-1, Clinton, and Oyster Creek. AmerGen also has committed to purchasing the Vermont Yankee reactor, and is involved in a disputed purchase of the Nine Mile Point-1 and -2 reactors in upstate New York.
"This type of arrangement puts incredible pressure on the company to operate a reactor even when it should be closed for maintenance or repairs. The NRC long has said that 'placing power production above safety' is a utility's greatest sin, but since its only revenues will come when the plant operates-and it has virtually no cushion-the pressure on AmerGen to run Oyster Creek will be paramount," said Michael Mariotte, executive director of NIRS.
"Running a nuclear reactor is not like starting a new dot.com business," added Mariotte, "it takes real resources, not the possibility that revenue might come in later. Even when shutdown, a reactor requires substantial funds to operate-and to prevent a meltdown-and AmerGen can't guarantee it has those funds."
NIRS also charged that AmerGen partner is unfit to own or operate a reactor in the United States. Citing a recent investigation by the U.K. Nuclear Installations Inspectorate (NII), and reports on still-secret British Energy documents, NIRS said that since its inception in 1996, British Energy has engaged in deliberate and massive cost-cutting measures and worker layoffs that have compromised public health and safety. At least nine safety-significant events occurred at British Energy reactors just from mid-August to mid-November 1999.
A copy of a 101-page NII investigation of British Energy, still formally unreleased, was submitted by NIRS as evidence. The report charges that British Energy's cost-cutting has resulted in situations where key safety personnel simply are not of staff; other personnel working 20 to 60% overtime, and still other critical positions being filled by contractors unfamiliar with the workings of the reactors.
"British Energy is a relatively new company that is trying, rather unsuccessfully, to operate 11 nuclear reactors in the United Kingdom. Its only real areas of expertise are in laying off workers, cutting costs, and flouting the U.K.'s nuclear regulations. British Energy has demonstrated that it is uniquely unqualified to operate atomic reactors in the United States. And, as a 50% partner in AmerGen, this makes AmerGen unqualified as well," said Mariotte.
The NIRS filing also argued that because GPUN had been preparing to close Oyster Creek in 2000, rather than continuing to operate the reactor, the utility has deferred making numerous necessary safety-related improvements to the facility. These include replacement of Thermo-Lag fire barrier material-declared "inoperable" by the NRC in 1992 and a host of other issues. In addition, in order to continue operations, Oyster Creek would have to make a highly controversial and dangerous expansion of its irradiated fuel pool-a proposal that is currently under investigation by five separate NRC offices.
"Two years ago, GPUN was asking $700 million for Oyster Creek and finally settled with AmerGen for $10 million," said Paul Gunter, Director of the Reactor Watchdog Project for NIRS. "They are basically paying AmerGen to take this dilapidated and dangerous reactor off their hands," said Gunter. "After planning to permanently close the reactor for the past two years by deferring all sorts of corrective action and maintenance, GPUN now plans a hasty 'come-from-behind strategy' that endangers the public safety," continued Gunter. "We think GPUN must now follow through on all their cost savings towards decommissioning the reactor in 2000 and permanently close it," he concluded.
NIRS also filed contentions relating to antitrust issues, and on AmerGen's deletion of material related to Oyster Creek's Decommissioning Trust Fund. It is NIRS' belief that this material would demonstrate that AmerGen intends to keep any remaining funds after decommissioning, rather than return these funds to ratepayers. The Decommissioning Trust Fund is entirely ratepayer-funded.
The NIRS filing is available on NIRS website (www.nirs.org) in the Reactor Watchdog Project section. Copies of supporting documents, such as the NII report on British Energy, are available to the media upon request.
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The National Ignition Facility at the New Millennium
by Marylia Kelley
from Tri-Valley CAREs' January 2000 newsletter, Citizen's Watch
As the curtain descends on 1999, we look back at one of Tri-Valley CAREs' top issues - and we offer you, our readers, this pop quiz on the National Ignition Facility (NIF) currently under construction at Livermore Lab. Each of these questions has been covered in prior editions of Citizen's Watch, and we will send you back issues, fact sheets or a copy of our NIF report on request.
Here is your test. The NIF is:
(1) a nuclear weapons project?
(2) the largest weapons facility ever to be built at Livermore?
(3) a means to "compensate" weaponeers for the "loss" of underground nuclear testing?
(4) intended to advance nuclear weapons design capabilities?
(5) a nuclear proliferation risk?
(6) cited by India as a reason for that nation's nuclear tests?
(7) at odds with both the Comprehensive Test Ban and Non-Proliferation treaties?
(8) unneeded for the task of merely maintaining the arsenal?
(9) wildly over budget and behind schedule?
(10) beset by serious underlying technical problems?
(11) under scrutiny from Congress and the Dept. of Energy?
(12) draining funds from civilian science initiatives at the Lab?
(13) a source of more radioactive waste and pollution?
(14) a project that ought to be cancelled?
(15) a focal point for peace activists around the globe?
Answer: all of the above are true.
Still, at year's end, our Congresswoman, Ellen Tauscher, visited the Lab and vowed to continue supporting NIF, calling it a "have to have" project. "Technically, NIF is very sound," she opined to reporters.
Energy Secretary Bill Richardson, speaking at a whirlwind, two-hour visit to the Lab on Dec. 21, seemed unwilling to fundamentally rethink the question of building NIF. We're (DOE) going to fight the criticism," he told reporters. "The project is sound, it's just badly managed."
In contrast, the public is neither fooled nor in denial of reality. At the Dec. 8 public hearing in Livermore on DOE's draft supplemental review for the NIF, numerous people spoke clearly and eloquently about the necessity of stopping the project and choosing instead a future without nuclear weapons, proliferation and more environmental contamination.
The year's end saw additional detail come to light regarding NIF's technical difficulties.
As we reported previously, employees at the three weapons labs say NIF is suffering severe problems in developing the three necessary laser components - optics, diagnostics and targets.
At the meeting of the Secretary of Energy Advisory Board Task Force on NIF, held in Livermore on Dec. 13, 1999, Lab scientists told the panel they had not yet found a material out of which to make targets - which are the BB-sized pellets that will hold the frozen radioactive fuel NIF's laser beams are supposed to blast into thermonuclear ignition. Three types of materials, two plastics and a beryllium shell, are being pursued, scientists said. As yet, while research on targets has gone on for many years, no target has been perfected, and each material is still presenting its own unique problems. The Lab scientists proclaimed they are "close" to developing a target.
Neither have scientists figured out how to load the targets - of whatever material - into the NIF's reactor vessel. Serious, unresolved problems exist with alignment and timing.
Further, presentations made to the SEAB Task Force on NIF publicly revealed some of the problems with diagnostics that workers have discussed with us. Diagnostics, in sum, are the devices needed for researchers to understand what is actually going on in a NIF shot. No diagnostics means no data.
To begin, diagnostics for NIF have not been designed. Lab scientists postulated they might have a "core package" of diagnostics ready for "acceptance" by 2003. This would trigger the next phase of diagnostics development, which would extend from "'04 onwards," according to the Lab's vugraphs.
None of the costs associated with developing and creating NIF's diagnostics are included in the price of the project, Lab scientists revealed. It is becoming clear that multi-billion dollar NIF is a bit like buying a car and finding out the engine and tires are extra.
The Lab struggled to put the best possible face on NIF, insisting that everything can be taken care of by "rebaselining" NIF to include more time and money. To underscore their point, the Lab made a lengthy presentation of NIF's external reviews. In so doing, Lab scientist Joe Kilkenny violated a court order obtained by three organizations -- Natural Resources Defense Council, Tri-Valley CAREs and Western States Legal Fopundation -- to prohibit the use by DOE or its contractors of a report prepared by the 1997-98 National Academy of Sciences panel on NIF due to the biased make up of the panel and its egregious noncompliance with the Federal Advisory Committee Act. Our attorney is following up.
Note: for more on NIF, visit our website at http://www.igc.org/tvc
Marylia Kelley Tri-Valley CAREs (Communities Against a Radioactive Environment) 2582 Old First Street Livermore, CA USA 94550
http://www.igc.org/tvc/- is our web site, please visit us there!
(925) 443-7148 - is our phone (925) 443-0177 - is our fax
Working for peace, justice and a healthy environment since 1983, Tri-Valley CAREs has been a member of the nation-wide Alliance for Nuclear Accountability in the U.S. since 1989, and is a co-founding member of the international Abolition 2000 network for the elimination of nuclear weapons.
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Dear peace and enviro groups
Tri-Valley CAREs and Allies File Lawsuit Over Lab Hazardous Waste
by Sally Light, Marylia Kelley and Jackie Cabasso
from Tri-Valley CAREs' January 2000 newsletter, Citizen's Watch
On December 23, 1999, environmentalists filed suit in Alameda County Superior Court in Oakland against the California state Department of Toxic Substances Control (DTSC), the Regents of the University of California and the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).
The groups claim that a final permit issued by DTSC earlier this year for the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory to treat hazardous and radioactive wastes, including the construction and operation of new facilities, violates the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). CEQA requires preparation of an Environmental Impact Report (EIR) when a project may cause significant impacts to the environment and surrounding community.
In the Lab's case, the DTSC inexplicably decided to forego an EIR, and, instead, to issue a Negative Declaration, which is basically an unsubstantiated assertion by the state agency that the Lab will not harm the environment.
Offering a Negative Declaration for something as complex as a hazardous waste facility at a nuclear weapons laboratory is inappropriate and illegal. According to the lawsuit, the Livermore Lab certainly has the potential to cause significant environmental harm.
DOE documents specify that, in 1997, Livermore Lab generated 2,769,600 pounds of hazardous waste and 243,200 pounds of mixed hazardous and radioactive waste. The Lab also discharges hundreds of thousands of gallons of wastewater each year into the Livermore municipal sewer system.
Livermore Lab operations and hazardous waste management activities have resulted in releases of hazardous and radioactive materials into the air, soil and groundwater - including releases of radioactive tritium, plutonium, uranium, high explosives and other chemical pollutants like TCE, PCE, Freon and carbon tetrachloride.
Both the Livermore Lab main site and site 300 are on the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency's "Superfund" list of most polluted areas in the nation.
Over the years, numerous Lab workers have been contaminated with radioactive and hazardous materials. Such exposures continue up to the present. Last year, a chemist was injured when a temporary waste container ruptured. This year, a hazardous waste management contractor was sprayed with a slurry of Radney nickel when the cap on a waste container blew off.
As a regular reader of Citizen's Watch, you may recall other recent incidents as well: in July of this year, the Lab suffered a uranium waste fire, in which the material was "glowing and starting to expand," according to DOE documents. That incident forced the temporary shut down of three buildings. Also in July, the Lab failed a waste audit conducted by DOE, and had to suspend all shipments to the Nevada Test Site. Thirty-three corrective action orders were issued.
According to DTSC records, the agency knew of the Lab's pattern of abuse - and yet still cut corners to grant the permit without conducting an environmental review or putting mitigation measures into place.
The three groups bringing the suit -Tri-Valley CAREs, Western States Legal Foundation, and the San Francisco Bay Area Chapter of Physicians for Social Responsibility - had filed an administrative appeal earlier this year asking DTSC to reverse its decision to issue the permit. DTSC denied the appeal. This led to the filing of the current lawsuit.
Plaintiffs are represented by attorneys Michael Veiluva, of Alborg, Veiluva and Cannata, Phyllis Olin of Western States Legal Foundation, and Alan Ramo and Anne Eng with the Environmental Law and Justice Clinic, Golden Gate University School of Law.
Stay tuned!
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USA Today is organizing a web-based "Post your opinion" on national missile defense.
It is at: http://www.usatoday.com/news/comment/debate.htm
Speak your piece!
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MASTER OF SPACE
BY KARL GROSSMAN
The Progressive
January 6, 2000
ON NOVEMBER 1, THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY of the United Nations voted to reaffirm the Outer Space Treaty--the fundamental international law that establishes that space should be reserved for peaceful uses.
Almost 140 nations voted for the resolution entitled "Prevention of an Arms Race in Outer Space." It recognizes "the common interest of all mankind in the exploration and use of outer space for peaceful purposes," reaffirms the will of all states that the exploration and use of outer space "shall be for peaceful purposes and shall be carried out for the benefit and in the interest of all countries," and declares "that prevention of an arms race in outer space would avert a grave danger for international peace and security."
Only two nations declined to support this bill--the United States and Israel. Both abstained.
For the United States, the issue goes way beyond missile defense. The U.S. military explicitly says it wants to "control" space to protect its economic interests and establish superiority over the world.
Several documents reveal the plans. Take Vision for 2020, a 1996 report of the U.S. Space Command, which "coordinates the use of Army, Navy, and Air Force space forces" and was set up in 1985 to "help institutionalize the use of space."
The multicolored cover of Vision for 2020 shows a weapon shooting a laser beam from space and zapping a target below. The report opens with the following: "U.S. Space Command--dominating the space dimension of military operations to protect U.S. interests and investment. Integrating Space Forces into warfighting capabilities across the full spectrum of conflict." A century ago, "Nations built navies to protect and enhance their commercial interests" by ruling the seas, the report notes. Now it is time to rule space.
"The medium of space is the fourth medium of warfare--along with land, sea, and air," it proclaims on page three. "The emerging synergy of space superiority with land, sea, and air superiority will lead to Full Spectrum Dominance."
The Air Force publishes similar pamph-lets. "Space is the ultimate 'high ground,' " declares Guardians of the High Frontier, a 1997 report by the Air Force Space Command. Proudly displayed in that report is a Space Command uniform patch and motto: Master of Space.
Nuclear power is crucial to this scenario. "In the next two decades, new technologies will allow the fielding of space-based weapons of devastating effectiveness to be used to deliver energy and mass as force projection in tactical and strategic conflict," says New World Vistas: Air and Space Power for the 2lst Century, a 1996 U.S. Air Force board report. "These advances will enable lasers with reasonable mass and cost to effect very many kills. . . . Setting the emotional issues of nuclear power aside, this technology offers a viable alternative for large amounts of power in space."
Corporate interests are directly involved in helping set the U.S. space doctrine--a fact the military flaunts. In its 1998 "Long Range Plan," the U.S. Space Command acknowledges seventy-five participating corporations--including Aerojet, Hughes Space, Lockheed Martin, and TRW.
The P.R. spin is that the U.S. military push into space is about "missile defense" or defense of U.S. space satellites. But the volumes of material coming out of the military are concerned mainly with offense--with using space to establish military domination over the world below.
"It's politically sensitive, but it's going to happen. Some people don't want to hear this, and it sure isn't in vogue, but--absolutely--we're going to fight in space," General Joseph W. Ashy, the former commander-in-chief of the U.S. Space Command told Aviation Week and Space Technology in 1996. "We're going to fight from space, and we're going to fight into space. That's why the U.S. has development programs in directed energy and hit-to-kill mechanisms. We will engage terrestrial targets someday--ships, airplanes, land targets--from space."
Space is "increasingly at the center of our national and economic security," agreed General Richard B. Myers, current commander-in-chief of the U.S. Space Command, in a speech entitled "Implementing Our Vision for Space Control," which he delivered in April 1999 to the U.S. Space Foundation in Colorado Springs, Colorado.
"The threat, ladies and gentlemen, I believe is real," he said. "It's a threat to our economic well-being. This is why we must work together to find common ground between commercial imperatives and the President's tasking to me for space control and protection."
"With regard to space dominance, we have it, we like it, and we're going to keep it," said Keith Hall, Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Space, in a 1997 speech to the National Space Club. "Space is in the nation's economic interest."
In Congress, one avid booster of U.S. space dominance is Senator Bob Smith, Republican of New Hampshire. Smith believes that national security depends on "space supremacy." He is interested in breaking up the Air Force and creating a "Space Force."
Even the Council on Foreign Relations--usually characterized as centrist--has come on board. In 1998, it published a booklet entitled Space, Commerce, and National Security, written by Air Force Colonel Frank Klotz, a military fellow at the council. "The most immediate task of the United States in the years ahead is to sustain and extend its leadership in the increasingly intertwined fields of military and commercial space. This requires a robust and continuous presence in space," says the report.
The U.S. government is pouring massive amounts of public money--an estimated $6 billion a year, not counting what is secretly spent--into the military development of space. And the United States has signed a multimillion dollar contract with TRW and Boeing to build a Space-Based Laser Readiness Demonstrator. The military's poster for this laser shows it firing a ray into space while above it an American flag somehow manages to wave.
THE GLOBAL NETWORK AGAINST WEAPONS & NUCLEAR POWER IN SPACE is challenging these plans. Next April, the Global Network will come to Washington, D.C., for a protest, including a demonstration at the U.S. Treasury to stress how much money is being spent by the United States on military activities in space.
"If the U.S. is allowed to move the arms race into space, there will be no return," says Bruce Gagnon, coordinator for the Global Network, based in Gainesville, Florida. "We have this one chance, this one moment in history, to stop the weaponization of space from happening. The peace movement must move quickly, boldly, and publicly."
"Above all, we must guard against the misuse of outer space," said Kofi Annan as he opened the 1999 U.N. conference on space militarization in Vienna. "We must not allow this century, so plagued with war and suffering, to pass on its legacy, when the technology at our disposal will be even more awesome. We cannot view the expanse of space as another battleground for our Earthly conflicts."
But, as the new century dawns, that is exactly what the U.S. military is doing.
Karl Grossman, professor of journalism at the State University of New York/College at Old Westbury, wrote "The Wrong Stuff: The Space Program's Nuclear Threat to Our Planet" (Common Courage, 1997) and produced the video documentary"Nukes in Space: The Nuclearization and Weaponization of the Heavens" (EnviroVideo, 1-800-ECO-TV46).
To reach the Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space, call (352) 337-9274, or e-mail globalnet@mindspring.com, or visit its web site at http://www.globenet.free-online.co.uk/.
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Space Command Plans for Computer Network Attack Mission
By Paul Stone
American Forces Press Service
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Jan2000/n01102000_20001101.html
WASHINGTON -- If Y2K was the first major battle of the information age -- and by all accounts it was -- then it may have given the world a glimpse into how war could be waged in the future.
Oh ... and by the way, the future has arrived.
The U.S. Space Command, which only last October took over responsibility for DoD's computer network defenses, will assume the flip-side attack mission beginning in October 2000. Air Force Gen. Richard Myers, commander in chief of the Space Command, said DoD is moving forward to make computer network attacks part of the military arsenal.
Although Space Command is still in the early stages of developing a concept of operations and implementation plans, the goal of information attacks will focus on denying, disrupting and degrading systems, Myers said during a Jan. 5 Pentagon briefing.
"In the area of air defense, for instance," he said, "if you can degrade an air defense network of an adversary through manipulating ones and zeroes, that might be a very elegant way to do it as opposed to dropping 2,000-pound bombs on radars."
Myers sees Space Command as a natural choice for further developing the emerging capability. However, he does not envision computer attacks being launched by Space Command headquarters in Colorado Springs, but rather by warfighters on the battlefield.
"This is an issue of bringing certain tools to the operational and tactical level," he said.
He said Space Command's mission will be to coordinate the services' computer expertise, determine what network attack tools are available or could be developed, test capabilities and get those tools to the warfighters.
The Space Command chief, who will leave his post March 1 to become vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, on March said computer network attack will augment, not replace, "kinetic" weapons, such as bullets, and bombs. It'll provide commanders with "one more arrow in the quiver," he said.
Myers acknowledged that computer network attack has already been used "on a case-by-case basis." The Pentagon considered using the new warfare techniques in Kosovo last year, but, he said, opportunities were limited because Serbian military forces were not heavily dependent on information systems.
In addition, he pointed out that just as with warfare involving conventional weapons, DoD must analyze policy and legal implications and establish rules of engagement. So- called dual-use targets and secondary and tertiary implications of computer network attacks are examples of legal and policy sticking points, Myers noted.
For instance, attacking a communications network may do more than shut down an adversary's air defense systems. What are the consequences when that network supports other needs having no direct impact on the conflict, he asked.
"We understand the effects of a 2,000-pound bomb. We know the laws of armed conflict, so we're much more comfortable in that realm," Myers said. It'll be a while before DoD warfighters are as comfortable with computer network attacks, he predicted, and keystrokes won't soon replace bullets and missiles.
"We are on the cusp of this," he said. "A lot of the existing capability is very immature, has not been tested."
Related Sites of Interest:
DoD News Briefing: Special Briefing on Current Activities of the U.S. Space Command,
Presenter: Richard Myers, General, USAF, Commander-in-Chief, U.S. Space Command, Jan. 5, 2000
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Jan2000/t01052000_t104myer.html
United States Space Command
http://www.spacecom.af.mil/usspace/
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DoD News Briefing
Wednesday, January 05, 2000
Presenter: Richard Myers, General, USAF, Commander-in-Chief, U.S. Space Command
Special Briefing re: Current Activities of the U.S. Space Command
Also present: Kenneth H. Bacon, ASD PA
http://www.defenselink.mil/news/Jan2000/t01052000_t104myer.html
Mr. Bacon: Our briefer today is General Richard Myers, who is the commander-in-chief of our Space Command in Colorado. He is a command pilot with more than 4,000 hours in the cockpit. I don't think he's ever flown in space, but he spends a lot of time thinking about space --
General Myers: But he's willing to fly in space --
Mr. Bacon: He's willing to fly in space.
General Myers: Nobody's offered me the opportunity.
Mr. Bacon: Well, maybe we'll get you to go up with John Glenn some time. At any rate, I'll turn you over to General Myers.
General Myers: Well, good morning, everybody, and it's -- thank you for the opportunity, and Happy New Year. Before we start, I'd like to just make a couple of comments and outline where we've been in space and where we think we're heading, at least in a brief format here.
Truly, space is becoming very important to our military, a center of gravity, if you will, a very important aspect of how we conduct our operations. It's also an economic center of gravity for this country and I would say most people probably don't realize how important space is to their daily lives. It is definitely, to use a phrase, a growth industry, and I think we're just beginning to tap its potential.
I would point to Kosovo operations as a place where space was very important in enabling our ability to conduct our response there. It set a new benchmark. You know, since Desert Storm we've been working very hard to bring space capabilities to the war fighter at the operational and tactical level, and I think in Kosovo we finally got there, even though that was limited in scope, to some degree. But we provided, I think, unprecedented support to our forces there.
It was truly a space-enabled war. You think about the global positioning system and the precision-guided munitions that were GPS-aided, enabling us to do things we have not been able to do before, and that is not just use precision-guided munitions, but use them -- that could go through the weather, and as Admiral Ellis said, after the conflict, that it's not good enough just to have precision-guided munitions. You have to have munitions that can go through the weather, because the weather was such a factor over there.
For the first time in combat, we pushed what I would call real-time information to the cockpit. We put some strap-on systems on the B-52s and the B-1s that enabled them to get the latest intelligence, the latest tactical situation, if you will, overlaid with lots of digital products, maps and so forth and some imagery, and we pushed that to the cockpit. And it's being reviewed right now by the Air Force and Air Combat Command to determine if that's something they want to do in a permanent modifications sort of basis.
We also used some very old technology we have, the Defense Support Program satellite, the satellite that looks for infrared energy, or "hot spots," on the earth, initially designed to pick up strategic ballistic missiles. We used after the first time for battle strike indications.
And sometimes it was the only indication of strikes that had been ongoing. And we had an outfit, a squadron at Schriever Air Force Base, that was in direct support of the Combined Air Operations Center in Vicenza, Italy, and would provide these strike indications. Of course, the squadron at Schriever had to have the flight routing and the targets and so forth, and that cooperation was the first time we had done something like that. And it provided useful information to the folks that were actually executing our involvement there.
And we did all that with just pushing very few people into theater. We actually deployed only 91 folks into the European theater to support the Kosovo conflict, so our tooth-to-tail ratio is very favorable. We can bring space assets and space capability to the war fighter with very few folks forward that leverage all that capability and that tremendous investment that we have on orbit.
Let me shift now to Y2K for just a minute. We've probably over-Y2K'd ourselves at this point, but, you know, everybody in the Department of Defense worked very hard on that particular issue. We in U.S. Space Command and Air Force Space Command and North American Aerospace Defense Command worked extremely hard. And our view is it was really worth the effort because we had no mission impact on any of our systems from the Y2K rollover end of year date. It proved essentially to be a non-event.
As you know, we are sitting side by side at Peterson Air Force Base today, and we will until the middle of this month, till the 15th of this month, in the Center for Y2K Strategic Stability with our Russian partners out there, sharing early warning on missile launch events around the world, the idea being, of course, just to ensure there is no miscalculation or misperception of what's happening in the world with the two nuclear superpowers that would lead to some bad judgments. That's working very, very well. And I think it's a good precursor to the agreement that President Clinton and former President Yeltsin agreed to, to set up a shared early warning center, a permanent one, in Moscow. And so this is a good test case of how that all ought to work, and it's working very, very well.
In terms of other growth areas, we can talk about computer network defense. As you know, 1 October of this year, we picked up the computer defense mission at U.S. Space Command. And again, we've been working on the implementation of that. It will follow 1 October of this year to pick up the computer network attack mission. We are just in the beginnings of drawing up our implementation plans and our concept of operations. It will be some time before we can be more definitive in that particular area. But we think it's a logical fit with our command structure and what we do on a daily basis, and the fact that we have a global perspective, which is needed for both those new missions.
The last thing I'd like to talk about is the launch broad area review, to study the launch problems that we had in the previous year. As you probably know, there were 19 recommendations that came out of that, 10 for legacy systems, the systems that we're going to use to launch into the early end of this decade, and then nine recommendations that went towards the new system, the Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle.
The secretary of the Air Force jumped on the recommendations. We are building action plans as we speak. I think, philosophically, we have no disagreement with any of the recommendations. We think they're very useful. And it was a very timely study of our launch process. And in fact, we have already made some changes because of the broader review.
So we think in the end, that's going to prove to give us more reliable launch capability. We know EELV is going to give us a less-expensive launch capability. And the first launch of the new rocket will be in fiscal year '02.
Well, those are a few of the issues, I think, that talk about the past and a little bit about the future. And with that, I'd turn it over for questions.
Yes, sir?
Q: General, could I ask how safe are U.S. military computers from cyberattack? And what do we know about -- the Chinese, I understand, are developing the ability for cyberattack. What other countries are doing that?
General Myers: I think there -- in general, cyberattack is deemed useful by those countries that perhaps don't have the conventional military capability the United States does. And so it's a way of, asymmetrically perhaps, attacking adversaries, not just the United States but potentially other adversaries. So you can read in a lot of the military literature that people more and more, of most of the world, are looking at this as a potential area for some growth.
We think that the Joint Task Force for Computer Network Defense, which was fully operational this past June, June of '99, has done a good job. You know, we anticipated that over the Y2K rollover, that that might be used as a cover for computer network attack. And in fact, we didn't see any evidence of that. We had plans in place, and the activity was absolutely normal during the rollover.
And I think we are pretty well prepared. We have invested a lot of resources in defending our capabilities. And it's not just the JTFCND, and it's not just the intrusion software and the firewalls and so forth; it's also the training of our people. And we are working on all pieces of it.
I think Dr. Hamre talked yesterday about the public key infrastructure, which is another part of ensuring that our information gets to the right place and is secure en route.
So I think we're in reasonably good shape, but it will be like everything else we do, you know, we come up with the defense, somebody else comes up with a different offense and back and forth. And so it's not that we're going to sit back and rest on our previous work; we're going to continue to work it.
Yes, ma'am?
Q: I understand that it's still in the formative stages, but could you amplify the computer network attack mission? What will it look like to the American public? There's a war and you folks out at Space Command are the ones doing the keystrokes that take down an adversary's power system?
General Myers: Probably a little different focus than that. We did not envision that U.S. Space Command in Colorado Springs is going to be the focal point where the keystrokes are made. This is an issue of bringing certain tools to the operational and tactical level. The analogy to space is a very good analogy. This is not something that's going to be kept behind in Cheyenne Mountain and only be turned on by that level. These are tools that need to go to the operational and tactical level.
So our first job is to figure out what our capabilities are out there. Every service has some capability in this area. We need to round those up, focus them, apportion them to the war fighters and then ensure that they are tested and that we work through the policy and legal implications, which there will be, and there are. And that will be a very big part of what we do is to work through the policy and legal parts of that.
But we see our job more as focusing what we currently have, giving confidence to the war fighter that these tools are available, that they have been tested, that they have some assurance that they will work, and that we have worked through the policy and legal implications of using them and hopefully, they'll be able to count on these kind of tools. So that's where we're headed.
Q: Can you give us an example of the tools?
General Myers: Well, I think there's -- I mean, in the open-source, there are several examples of things that you might want to do, but it gets into the ability of denying, disrupting, degrading systems. It could be in the area of air defense, for instance. If you can degrade an air defense network of an adversary through manipulating ones and zeros, that might be a very elegant way to do it as opposed to dropping 2,000-pound bombs on radars, for instance. So that's -- you know, the whole idea would be that we can do this, as you mentioned before, perhaps with keystrokes, preventing casualties on our side and collateral damage on the adversary's side.
So, you know, it has -- it's an elegant solution in some cases, and as I said, there are going to be some policy and legal ramifications of all this that we have yet to work through, for the most part, and that's going to be one of our --
Q: One more.
Is it simply a matter of appropriating the tools now in use by hackers against DOD systems? Or is it something --
General Myers: No, it's more sophisticated than that. And when I said the first part will be focusing what capability we have today; it will also be developing new capabilities, as things change.
So we see that as one of our major responsibilities at the unified command level, at the U.S. Space Command level, is trying to articulate that requirement for the other war-fighting commanders, like we do today for space systems, and then -- and having the services actually execute the budget that would bring those tools on board.
Yes, sir?
Q: I know the Navy exercises -- sort of does Red Team exercises with -- hacking into their systems before every battle group deploys. I assume -- you can probably tell me if the other services do the same sort of exercises. And is this the pool of where you'll draw your cyberwarriors from for CNA?
General Myers: A lot of that is to be determined. Of course, we "Red Team" essentially everything we do. In fact, we have a Space Aggressor Squadron that we are just standing up at Schriever Air Force Base to do that for the exercises that we run traditionally, to bring a force in there that would try to disrupt our ability to take advantage of these space resources. So that's another analog.
And we would do the same thing of course for computer network attack. And that is being done -- it's a very prudent thing to do. But it's -- a lot of the other issues are to be determined, as we work through our implementation plan this year.
Q: This would be a logical place to look for talented people?
General Myers: Yes. Oh, absolutely.
And you bring up a very good point. People are what is going to make all this work. It's not the software, it's not the hardware; it always boils down to competent people. And that's a real issue for us in U.S. Space Command and for the Department of Defense as a whole.
Now, the services are trying to attract the best and the brightest to come into this area. We think we can do that because we are going to be working on leading-edge technology, we'll give them the right tools, and they'll be doing something for their country. So we think all of that will make it appealing.
Yes, ma'am?
Q: What do you think the major policy and legal implications are that you still really have to address in this area? And is part of it whether or not you can attack the so-called dual-use target? Is that what needs to be resolved?
General Myers: Well, I think that's absolutely part of it. And then it's the secondary and tertiary implications of an action; you know, "What will the reaction be?" and, "How can you assure that?" And there's just a lot of things we are going to have to work through.
And I think we're off to a good start, but to say we have a process in place to look at that and work it on a very timely basis, or even perhaps pre-approval in some cases, that's not the case today, we're still working with that, but we're getting good cooperation.
Q: Would the concept of the U.S. military undertaking information attacks be -- how fundamentally different or what kind of fundamental direction would that take the U.S. military in, where it's never been before?
General Myers: Well, I think it's just going to be one more arrow in the quiver, if you will, in terms of the tools we can use. You know, today, if you -- I'll use the air defense analogy again. If you want to take down an air defense system, we know how to do that kinetically. We know that we can drop bombs, we can send cruise missiles against it, we can use attack helicopters against that kind of system. And as I suggested, there might be other ways to do that, and I don't know, I mean this is premature, but there might be other ways to do that similar job. And I don't think it's going to fundamentally take us in too different a direction, although I would say that I think the ones and zeros part of this equation will be more important in the future than it is today, I mean dramatically more important; will never supplant, probably, kinetic weapons. But --
Q: Then in terms of a reaction -- just my last question is, if we sort of start attacking on a ones and zeros basis, what's the implication, and how vulnerable do we become to retaliatory attacks with somebody attacking us on a ones and zeros basis?
General Myers: Well, that's obviously a very big worry. We are probably, I think without question, the country that is most dependent on information technology, so we know we have those vulnerabilities. It's just like in space, we know we are the most dependent on space-based capabilities and we're vulnerable there as well. And we have a mission that we're assigned in U.S. Space Command, called Space Control, to deal with that. And we'll deal with this piece just like that. But obviously, all that plays. And much of this is premature. We have just been -- we haven't got the mission; the mission comes 1 October of this year. We're doing implementation planning and the execution planning, and we're going to have to wait until a lot of that gets done before we can be more definitive.
Q: But it is the cutting edge, which is why, as you may detect, we're interested in it. Can you help me understand what are the legal issues, for example, if you're going to take down an enemy's air defense system, dropping bombs versus doing it in an IO kind of fashion? What's the --
General Myers: It's -- again, it's the --
Q: -- (off mike).
General Myers: It might be. There may be unintended consequences, depending on how you work that.
If you're working on a communications network, for instance, it does more than just air defense. They use it for other things. Then there is the question of what are the consequences of perhaps taking down a communications system that may support other needs that may have no direct impact on the conflict, and then you'd have to study to see if that's --
Q: The same thing happens when you take out a power grid with a graphite bomb.
General Myers: Yes. And so -- absolutely right, and so I think as we work through that, one of the questions I got earlier today was, is this going to put war fighters at odds with their legal advisors? And I don't think anything like that at all. I think it's going to be the legal advisors and the war fighters thinking our way through this. And it's just something we haven't spent an awful lot of time doing, and we just need to do that.
Yes?
Q: I want to ask you an industrial base question on the space side. Export policy right now. Because of our export policies, the Germans have said don't -- industries have said don't use U.S. contractors, or use them less. The RADARSAT contract from Canada just went to a European company, not two of the U.S. bidders. I know these are commercial programs, but are you at all concerned that our export policy is undermining our space industrial base?
General Myers: Clearly, it's in our best interest to have a very robust space industry in the United States. That helps not only the commercial side, but it helps the Department of Defense and specifically our missions out at U.S. Space Command. So we're -- our policy is, and it has been for some time, it aligns with -- the national policy is to have policies that encourage our industry and enable our industry to be world leaders in this area. And we support that.
Q: The process is clearly broken.
General Myers: Well, there are some instances where there are some issues, and the Canadian issue was wrapped around ITAR and probably nothing more than that. And we just need to continue to work that. We think a healthy industry is really good for us, so we don't want to do anything that would impede that.
Yes, sir, in back.
Q: Can you tell us more about that satellite base where intelligence systems went down over the weekend?
General Myers: I can't tell you any more than Dr. Hamre told you yesterday. I went through the transcript. There were 14 or 15 pages, and most of it was on that subject. That system belongs to the National Reconnaissance Office, it does not belong to U.S. -- I'm sorry?
Q: Who does it belong to?
General Myers: The National Reconnaissance Office. It does not belong to the U.S. Space Command. And I just refer you back to Dr. Hamre's comments yesterday.
Yes, ma'am?
Q: There's been some discussion of building an information corps or a cybercorps. Is that an idea still being kicked around?
And would the CND and CNA be the basis for that?
General Myers: I have not heard that. I know we want to build not a corps, but a group of individuals that can work in this area. And you know, in the way it's kind of grown up is that this had been a sort of a pick-up ball game. I mean, we don't have specialties in the Air Force; it's a you-are-an-information-warrior. And that's one of the things, I think, that we will bring to the table are, should we create specialties that encourage, you know, a career path in this kind of work. Right now it's, for the most part, it's those that are most inclined or like to do it, and that's fine for the time being, at least on the active duty side. Of course, on the contractor side, which we use heavily, we can get real specialists and real expertise.
I guess my overall comment would be that creating a special corps would tend to put this in a stovepipe that would not be -- would tend to revolve in its own world and not -- the product of their work would not necessarily get pushed down to the operational and tactical level like we're trying to do for information operations. That needs to be -- everybody is -- for instance, in computer network defense, U.S. Space Command has the overall mission for DOD that does not relieve the unified commanders in PACOM, EUCOM, CENTCOM and so forth. They have their own responsibilities to protect their networks. We are the ones providing the global view and trying to coordinate all that, but it's not our responsibility alone. I see the same thing in the total realm of information operations. At least the attack and the defense piece would be similarly worked.
Yes, sir?
Q: Can you give us a sense with this computer network attack, do you need new funding for it? Have you already received some new funding for it? And is this something that will save money over time, over using conventional weapons?
General Myers: Again, we are in the middle of our implementation plan, so we have not identified our resources yet. We have just finished that process for computer network defense and in the budget deliberations that are ongoing right now, in the budget that will go to Congress and so forth, they are deciding how many resources, manpower and dollars we're going to put to that mission.
We'll do that similar exercise, probably, next year for computer network attack in terms of what we're going to need at U.S. Space Command to discharge our duties, so that's a little bit premature. But clearly we're going to need some resource help to make this happen if we want to make it happen in the right way.
Q: Over time, will it save money over -- in some instances -- (inaudible) -- weapons?
General Myers: We think -- for instance, in computer network defense -- we think the focus that was brought to that by the Joint Task Force for Computer Network Defense here in Washington that now reports to us, that that will help and save resources. They will probably be on the margin in most cases.
I would say in the computer network attack area, we will probably wind up spending more resources because this is a growth area. And so in the end, we may -- we'll save ourselves in terms of organizing ourselves better for it, and so there may be some savings there. But in the long run, it's probably going to be a growth area, like I mentioned.
Yes, sir?
Q: During last year's war in Yugoslavia, was there any consideration of using computer network attack tactics? And if not, was it because this policy hasn't matured yet?
General Myers: In many cases -- you know, we are just -- again, this is relatively new stuff for us. And I would like to say that -- without giving you a lot of detail -- that we worked through some policy and legal issues during Kosovo that will hopefully help us in the future because we addressed some issues like you suggested and, I think, came up with a good resolution. And I think that portends well for our future capability in this area.
But, as you know, the opposing forces in Serbia were not reliant, for instance, on space systems. They were not reliant on systems that were heavily involved with information technology; so limited opportunities there.
Plus again, we are on the cusp of this. And a lot of the existing capability is very immature, has not been tested. And we need to operationalize this like we do for everything else. It needs to be thought of like that. And the planning for that needs to happen up front and early, so people like General Clark can say, you know, "I have got this arrow in my quiver, and I'd like to use it here." We are short of that capability right -- (inaudible) -- today.
Q: So for this to work then, the enemy or the opponent would have to also be reliant on information technology like, to the extent the United States is or some --
General Myers: Well, or perhaps you know, have some reliance. And I think that's -- most everybody, you know, is using information technology more and more every day. We seem to be in the lead in that area, but -- of reliance.
Yes, ma'am?
Q: You said that there were some limited opportunities in Serbia. Did we take advantage of them?
General Myers: I'd rather not comment on that, for -- reasons.
Yes, sir?
Q: The perception of cyberwarfare is that it's bloodless, that it's sort of like a video game and so forth. That perception may be wrong, but do you worry that the threshold for committing acts of war in cyberspace is maybe lower, and that policymakers might be more inclined to use this weapon than they would be to use 2,000-pound bombs? And does that trouble you?
General Myers: I'm not sure we can say that. I think our experience to date has almost been the opposite, that we understand the effects of a 2,000-pound bomb. We know the laws of armed conflict and all that, and so we -- we're much more comfortable in that realm than we are in the other realm, and I think it's going to be a long time before the reverse is true. That's my personal opinion on that.
But again, we're just starting to wade into this, and so --
Q: If you drew an analogy to the early days of aviation, when, you know, people in biplanes were flying around and they were plinking at one another with pistols and dropping an occasional hand grenade on the enemy --
General Myers: Right.
Q: Is that where we are?
General Myers: Well, I think that's a pretty good analogy. I think that's where we are and, you know, that the potential here is much greater than has been realized, probably, but -- that's probably a pretty good analogy.
Yes, ma'am?
Q: Could you just explain the bureaucracy a bit, here? So, what has to happen? Does this all have to go to President Clinton for some sort of presidential decision directive? Is it a secretary of Defense decision? What would get you to the decision point that you could go ahead and use this stuff?
General Myers: Well, it's -- any time we prosecute war, decisions, certain decisions, have to migrate up to the national command authorities, and I think certain aspects of this would. I think our hope in the future is that we've thought through it, and for certain capabilities that we might want to use that it would become understood what the effects are and that that would be something that would be very easily approved. Other capabilities might have to go all the way to the president for approval. That would not be unusual. We do that today in a conventional sense, as you know.
Q: But when you say that the policy and legal implications have to be resolved, it sort of suggests that you're not quite there yet and --
General Myers: Well, I think I said that. We're working through that piece of it right now.
Q: So, what is sort of the next step? I guess that's what I'm trying to ask.
General Myers: Well, the next step is to -- you know, we are just trying to get ourselves organized for it. That's why the mission comes to us 1 October, we're working through, again, the implementation plan, the concept of operations. That'll all have to be approved here on the joint staff and by the office of the secretary of Defense staff and folks that say, "Yes, you're on the right track," and that's the first thing we have to do to get organized.
And part of that, getting ourselves organized, it'll be a further step to say, okay, what tools are out there that can be used? I mean, what's been developed? And then to bring that into the tool kit and then at that point start working through the policy and legal ramifications.
Q: If the policy and legal implications haven't yet been resolved, it sort of strongly suggests that perhaps we -- the infrastructure, or the framework, is not in place to have ever done any of this in the past, because you're saying we're not there yet.
General Myers: Well, we have -- I think it's fair to say that we have done this in the past on a case-by-case basis.
And of course if you're in the middle of a conflict, you'd prefer to not work this on a case-by-case basis; that usually takes longer. So, you know, we would look to a process to be a little more robust in that area where we could have, like I said before, pre-approval of some capabilities -- I'm not talking -- this is all very notional -- of some capabilities, and then there will still be -- no doubt there will still be some case-by-case issues.
It's a lot like the space business today too. I mean there's issues there that we still haven't operationalized and normalized, if you will, and we don't treat the same as we treat other capabilities. And there's no reason not to, I mean, we ought to be able to do that. But it's just new enough and different enough.
Q: So information attacks have occurred on a case-by-case basis, then, when you say we have done "this"?
General Myers: We have done certain things on a case-by-case basis; yes.
Q: Yeah, a couple of questions. With the CNA, who has the mission now, anybody? Because you've assumed the CND from DISA.
General Myers: Yes, it's -- you know, the story on CND is pretty good. It was after Eligible Receiver where we found out we had all these vulnerabilities. And I think it was Dr. Hamre who tells the story, he looked around the room and he says, "Well, okay, who's responsible for Computer Network Defense?" And nobody raised their hand. And so that obviously pointed out the problem, and that's why we tried to organize ourselves to address that, and that's why Unified Commander got the mission.
The same thing is true today on Computer Network Defense. It is -- or Computer Network Attack -- excuse me. For the programs that we have, most of those are -- if there are programs, and I don't even -- I mean, I don't have a window into most of that, but they're service programs and they reside in service channels to work fleet issues or air issues or ground issues. And what we hope to do is bring some focus of that and make those capabilities -- operationalize that capability.
Q: And why Space Command? How did you guys draw this?
General Myers: I think for -- first of all, a lot of the information we're dealing with in warfare is either space enabled or travels through space. We have a global perspective, and you need that for the defensive mission; in particular, you need to have the global perspective because you may have an attack originating in one theater that's having an effect in another theater, and there has to be somebody in the middle there that has that view and can coordinate responses, and so forth.
And the other reason I would say is that we're used to working in the virtual world.
You know, we control satellites with keystrokes. We never see the effect other than the data coming back down that said, yes, the command was taken. So we think it fits nicely. I was there when the decision was made. I was brand new on the job. I'd been in the job one month, came to a meeting where the service chiefs and the other unified commanders all said, "We think we need a war-fighting commander in chief to be responsible for this mission area."
Q: (Off mike.)
General Myers: I was -- again, I was new. I was very quiet. I didn't -- I made no comment. I just was listening. But I thought, at the same time, and I had given it some thought previously and had some discussions with people that were influencing this area, that it probably was the right thing to do. And we think it's fit in -- the computer network defense piece has fit in very nicely.
Q: And one more. On the space maneuver vehicle and space attack vehicle, could you give us an update of where those two stand?
General Myers: Space Command has a lot of interest in the concept of a space maneuver vehicle. We think you can do lots of things with that. You could service satellites. You know, one of the limiting features of most our satellites is they eventually run out of fuel. And otherwise, they may be perfectly fine. Not in all cases, but in some cases. So you could use a space maneuver vehicle for that. You could use it for other applications. And so that's in the area of reusable vehicles. That is primarily NASA's role. And so we partner with NASA. Partnership's very important to us, as you know. We partner with NASA, and the United States Air Force puts money into that program to ensure that as NASA moves along its business with the X-37 and so forth, that we are part of that, and if it turns out to have military utility, that we can take advantage of it. So we are partnering with that.
Q: What about space attack vehicles?
General Myers: Only conceptually. You know, one of our missions in U.S. Space Command is force application. But we have no capability today from space to apply force from space. And before we do, it's going to require, you know, a national decision by the president and the Congress and the rest of the national command authority. So we're only in the conceptual area there.
Q: One more. You said this morning -- you talked a little bit about how you need to maybe red team satellites to see what effect ground-based lasers could have on them. Do you see any plans for that sort of program in the future, or is it just your wish list?
General Myers: No, I think that is a program that needs to be developed and fleshed out. We're not there yet. But we know the need's there.
Yes, sir?
Q: I just want to follow up on Pam's question on space maneuver vehicle. Given that NASA is having major problems with their single-staged orbit program, in a general sense, technically and programmatically, is it time to revisit that gentlemen's agreement on EELV and RLV, splitting those two between the agencies?
I mean, are they really serving DOD's needs at the pace that they are going right now?
General Myers: I think they are, and we are pleased with that.
We have got -- you know, there is a Partnership Council, where Dan Goldin from NASA and Keith Hall from NRO and myself sit down semiannually to work through lots of issues. This is one issue -- and we have lots of them -- where we have mutual interests. Maybe the end product or the end effect is different, but the basic science and technology is the same. And so there is no -- I don't think there is any other way to do this. We have to partner with NASA. There is no budget big enough.
Q: Thank you, sir.
General Myers: Thank you.
Thanks everybody.
This transcript was prepared by the Federal News Service, Inc., Washington, DC. Federal News Service is a private company. For other defense related transcripts not available through this site, contact Federal News Service at (202) 347-1400.
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Mission Creep-labs play war games to protect commercial interests!
From Don Moniak, editor of STANDpoint a periodic electronic news and commentary service from Serious Texans Against Nuclear Dumping, Amarillo, Texas. 806-358-2622.
One of the headlines in the December 31, 1999 edition of "The Prosperity Times" read "China Seizes U.S. Assets." The story told how:
In the first case of expropriation since China opened to the outside in 1979, all US investments were nationalized under the "special" circumstances clause of the joint venture law. Government representatives cited: the deliberate policy of the US in undermining state industries to foster the collapse of the "socialist market" economic structure of the PRC; espionage and sabotage of recent PRC Army activities and installations by "CIA spies" using industrial ventures as a cover;
The Prosperity Times was a pseudo futuristic tool for participants in the May 6-8, 1996 conference at the Hyatt Dulles Hotel in Herndon, Virginia titled "Future@Labs.Prosperity Game"(4) sponsored by the Los Alamos, Livermore, and Sandia Industrial Advisory Boards, Lockheed Martin, the University of California, etc. etc. Prosperity Games are a trademarked enterprise that "are an outgrowth and adaptation of move/countermove and seminar War Games."
In this particular session, "The primary objectives were to explore ways to optimize the role of the multi disciplinary labs in serving national missions and needs, explore ways to increase collaboration and partnerships among government, laboratories, universities, and industry, and create a network of partnership champions to promote findings and policy options."
Suffice to say, the participants were presented with the Chinese asset seizure following years of Chinese-American problems regarding Taiwan and the World Trade Organization. Fortunately, they did manage to avert the following scenario on December 31, 2001: Chinese Missile Tests off the Coast of Southern California. That edition of the Prosperity Times was not distributed.
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Labor urges no-nuke stance
By JANINE MACDONALD CANBERRA
'Melbourne Age'
Monday 17 January 2000
From: Kate Dewes kate@chch.planet.org.nz
Australia had abandoned its role as a nuclear disarmament leader and risked becoming an apologist for nuclear weapon states, the Opposition's foreign affairs spokesman, Mr Laurie Brereton, said yesterday.
He has called for the Foreign Minister, Mr Alexander Downer, to use today's meeting with his New Zealand counterpart to lead the disarmament debate.
Mr Brereton said in a statement that Australia had a strong record of activism on disarmament and non-proliferation, but the Howard Government had effectively abandoned the role.
"Last week New Zealand's new Minister for Disarmament and Arms Control, Matt Robson, affirmed the intention of Prime Minister Helen Clark's administration to vigorously pursue the cause of nuclear disarmament," he said. "Sadly, the Australian Government shows no sign of doing likewise." His call comes amid international fears that the impetus for disarmament had gone and the effort to create a world without nuclear weapons was unraveling.
A spokesman for Mr Downer, said Australia had "regular and quite extensive series of bilateral nuclear policy discussions every year" with countries such as the United States, Canada, France, Japan and South Korea.
He disputed the claim that Australia was not active, but said he did not know if Mr Downer planned to raise the issue in talks today, which he described as a "get to know" session for the leaders.
"The only person seeking relevance and credibility is Mr Brereton, on any issue," the spokesman said.
Mr Brereton said Mr Downer had rejected the need for a new momentum to be injected into the process.
The United Nations Under Secretary-General for Disarmament, Jayantha Dhanapala - who last November warned of a breakdown of global agreement over nuclear arms proliferation - said last week that the political will to tackle disarmament must be rekindled.
Russia has failed to ratify the START II treaty with the United States, which would have meant a deeper reduction in stockpiles of weapons.
New Zealand's Mr Robson said there was a stalemate on nuclear disarmament, partly brought about by nuclear tests by India and Pakistan, delays in negotiations over US-Russian reductions, and foot-dragging by the Geneva-based conference on disarmament.
Australia is not a member of the New Agenda Coalition, a group of like-minded "middle power" countries pushing for tougher international action on disarmament.
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Last week the US Government announced it would return 84,000 acres of land to the Northern Ute tribe on land near Fort Duchesne, about 110 miles southeast of Salt Lake City. This is after they have severely contaminated portions of the land!
In the Pacific, after exploding 193 nuclear bombs, and severely contaminating the atolls and compromising the fragility of the atoll ecology, France is pulling out of Mururoa and Fangataufa.
We should applaud the fact that the lands are being returned. But how should Indigenous peoples begin to seek reparations to assist in human health work and healing and environmental restoration?
Richard Salvador Honolulu, Hawai`i
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French pull-out may leave 'timebomb'
by John Henzell and NZPA
http://www.press.co.nz/2000/03/000117n13.htm
The French may be leaving an environmental timebomb behind when they finally abandon Mururoa and Fangataufla atolls.
The French have announced that after 37 years, they will pull their military forces out of the area, including three supporting frigates, and abandon the Hao base, where the Rainbow Warrior bombers were briefly imprisoned.
Environmental campaigners welcomed the decision to leave but warned that the 193 nuclear tests between 1963 and 1996 had left a legacy of fractures which could cause a major tsunami.
French nuclear officials declared last year that no long-term damage had been caused by testing.
However Admiral Jean Moulin, the commander of French forces in Polynesia, voiced fears that the cracks could collapse, causing tidal waves.
Greenpeace described the statement, reported by Agence France Press, as an "extraordinary admission".
Admiral Moulin was quoted as saying "the situation is uncertain for the next 20 years since several superficial fractures in the coral reef at Mururoa" were detected last summer by an international commission of geologists and specialists in hydrology.
There were two possible scenarios, he said.
"Either the collapse of the outside coral cliffs with the risk of creating a major tsunami or tidal wave, or an internal consolidation causing the fractures to disappear."
Greenpeace New Zealand executive director Margaret Crozier said the international community was not satisfied that the tests had been safe.
"Last year they said there would be no long-term damage (on the atolls)," she said.
"So ... there is a quite extraordinary admission and what provision is being made there? I just feel they've washed their hands of the problems they have created."
Rod Donald, the Greens' co-leader and a leading protester against French nuclear testing, said he wished this was "the final chapter in a very bad story". "But I'm afraid the legacy of French irresponsibility will live on," he said.
"Typically, the people who pay the price and will continue to do so live half a world away from Paris."
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[From: Dealert99@aol.com -- Does anyone have any ideas as to how we can get this into the debate among all the candidates and public awareness?]
Getting De-Alerting Into The Presidential Debate
By Mary McGrory,
Washington Post,
December 12, 1999.
An issue worthy of national consideration was discussed by a panel of serious people at the National Press Club last week. The subject: taking U.S. nuclear weapons off hair-trigger alert. They hope it will make its way into the presidential debates.
The coalition of nuclear experts and environmentalists pushing this project calls itself Back From the Brink. The group's members are taking their campaign to the grass roots. They are armed with videos, a Web site and plans for mobilizing the campuses in the cause.
They hope that public pressure will force the presidential candidates to take a stand in favor of measures that would make it less likely for the planet to be incinerated by mistake. Of course, the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty had 80 percent support in the polls but went down to ignominious defeat, anyway. Former senator Dale Bumpers, the Arkansas Democrat who is now director of the Center for Defense Information and a participant in the "Brink" campaign, says "de-alerting" is much less controversial and easier to understand. "It's just a question of giving the presidents of the two nuclear powers more than 10 minutes before deciding to blow up the world," he says.
The GOP candidates have so far discussed nuclear matters solely on the basis of what the United States should do about other countries' missiles, not about our own. All the talk has been about building a defense system to deflect nuclear strikes launched at us by rogue nations. The idea that we are in mortal danger of a nuclear attack from North Korea, a country that cannot feed its people, seems exaggerated, rather like Ronald Reagan's alarms about the danger of invasion from down-at-the-heels Nicaragua. That nation's capital, he told us solemnly, is but two-an-a-half days' drive from Harlingen, Tex.
Many scientists also believe that a national missile defense system won't work. But President Clinton opted to develop one. The decision on deployment is scheduled to be made next summer. Advocates of de-alerting repeatedly tell the harrowing story of a 1995 episode when Russian President Boris Yeltsin came within two minutes of starting a nuclear war because of a false alarm. A U.S.-Norwegian research rocket appeared on Russian radar, looking like a multiple-warhead missile hurtling toward Moscow. Russian missiles -- which, like ours, are on hair-trigger status -- were put on higher alert. Two minutes before the deadline, the mistake was discovered and Yeltsin saved the world from what the coalition called "an unimaginable nuclear disaster."
Since that time, conditions in the Russian military and Russia's nuclear arsenal have deteriorated almost as much as U.S.-Russian relations. The fear of accidental attack has increased accordingly. At the news conference, Bruce Blair of the Brookings Institution, a former Air Force missile control officer, said that the situation makes the case for removing the hair triggers from our nuclear arsenal, and for persuading the Russians to follow suit. "If the bomb's not on the missiles, if it takes a day to put the bomb back on the missiles, there can't be any unauthorized launch by demoralized, disaffected nuclear units out in Siberia who are finally fed up," Blair said.
Bill Clinton's history is that he does not oppose the Pentagon. In 1997, Sam Nunn, the former chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, was invited to the Pentagon with Blair, his collaborator on a Post op-ed article in favor of de-alerting. The Joint Chiefs seemed receptive, but when the idea got to the Strategic Air Command, Omaha objected, and that was the end of it.
Surprisingly, the most likely Republican candidate to take up the cause would be Texas Gov. George W. Bush, whose father had to cope with the heart-stopping possibility that nukes in the disintegrating Soviet Union could be launched by its provincial governors. In September 1991, a shaken President Bush withdrew virtually all U.S. tactical weapons from deployment and ordered the de-alerting of many large strategic missiles. Gorbachev reciprocated a week later. Blair said it was "the most important arms control step of the '90s."
The younger Bush desperately needs more heft in his fluffy debate appearances. He is alarming and dismaying Republicans who think he looks less and less as if he is up to the job. During his latest debate gig in Arizona, it was clear he had worked on his smirk. But another part of his anatomy needs attention -- his feet. The GOP front-runner is not fast on his.
He was a fall guy for, of all people, Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch, the high-collared Mormon elder who provided the laugh riot of the evening by offering to make Bush his vice president. Bush's handlers had not anticipated such a bold and preposterous sally. George W. could not think of a rejoinder.
If he were to espouse an issue of cosmic significance, W. could get out of Texas, where he seems rhetorically stuck. Taking up the de-alerting cause would give him a hold on "the vision thing" that so plagued his father.
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Please would you include as much or as little of the following Notice in the diary section of your publication
LLR200 CONFERENCE
The Primacy of Public and Environmental Health
Friday 14th July - Sunday 16th July 2000,
Leighton Park, Reading, Britain
Conference Outline
LLR 2000 is the 15th in a series of annual conferences on Low Level Radiation held in different parts of Britain.
The purposes of the conference are:
to enable the public to keep up-to-date with new developments in the scientific world
to maintain a focus on the dangers of Low Level Radiation and to counteract the official line that it is harmless
to break down the barriers between the public, environmentalists, health workers,regulators and the nuclear industry to transform our differences into positive action
In each of the following topic groups there will be speakers, a panel discussion and workshop giving an opportunity for an exchange of information and views between all the conference participants.
PUBLIC HEALTH - Life at the Sharp End - How to Achieve a Health Audit?
Local Authority Environmental Health Responsibilities
Speakers
"The Incidence of Childhood Leukaemia in West Berkshire" - Dr. Carol Barton, Consultant Haematologist, Royal Berks. Hospital, Reading "Suppressed Hazards - Risk Factors in German NPPs the Authorities Prefer to Ignore" - Helmut Hirch German BUND Environmental Health Officer, Reading BC.* Panel: Dr Chris Busby + others
*THE REGULATORS - NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL Is regulation working? Risk Assessment Modelling Appropriate legal sanctions
Speakers Ian Jackson, Environment Agency Inspector, AWE Stephen Kaiser, Radiation Protection Unit, European Commission Dr. Rachel Weston Friends of the Earth Dr. Roger Clarke, Director, NRPB / Chairman ICRP Panel: Dr. Ian Fairlie, Dr. Helen Wallace, Greenpeace, Jamie Woolley + others
*SAFEGUARDING FUTURE GENERATIONS Political responsibilities Community responsibilities Personal responsibilities
Speakers Dr Caroline Lucas MEP Solange Fernex Martin Salter MP* Stephen Tindale DETR
*Panel Members: Paul Mobbs, Jane Hunt
+others invited, but not confirmed
CONTACT: NAG Tel:+44 (0)118-978 0148 E-mail: nis@gn.apc.org
Di McDonald
Nuclear Information Service (NIS)
30 Westwood Road Southampton SO17 1DN Britain
Tel/Fax: +44 - (0)23-80554434
e-mail: nis@ gn.apc.org (from 17/12/99)
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TSK, TSK PIKETON WORKERS SUSPICIOUS, AND RIGHTLY SO
Date: Monday, January 17, 2000
Columbus Dispatch Section: EDITORIAL & COMMENT
If mistakes are good for nothing else, they should at least be learned from. Past transgressions -- or just plain bad policies -- can be lessons for how to improve and what actions to avoid.
Why some misguided souls and institutions choose instead to repeat wrong and foolish behavior is beyond understanding.
A case in point involves the cleaning of the grounds at the Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant in Piketon, Ohio, for which the company Bechtel Jacobs was hired. During the Cold War, the plant produced highly enriched, weapons-grade uranium, to which employees were exposed for years.
Between the 1950s and 1970s, without workers' knowledge, deadly plutonium and other highly radioactive materials were introduced into the plant as part of an attempt to recycle spent nuclear-reactor fuel. At the time, the government claimed uranium-processing plants were safe work environments, even while knowing workers were handling extremely hazardous substances.
Now, in a small attempt to make up for this past secrecy, which is thought to have cost many former workers their lives and health, government officials have agreed to provide medical screenings for current and former Portsmouth workers, many of whom have lost colleagues to cancer and other ailments.
They also are investigating the current cleanup effort to make sure problems of the past won't continue to be problems. But in recent meetings with Bechtel Jacobs, some workers felt they were told, in effect, to "look busy and shut your mouth.'' They were told to inform company management about the types of information sought by investigators, a request Bechtel Jacobs has since rescinded.
Bechtel Jacobs scheduled more meetings two days later to assure employees that they should cooperate with the investigation, but the damage was done. Workers who are understandably suspicious and bitter over past secrecy felt they were being asked to contribute to further secrecy over matters that could affect their health.
Maybe Bechtel Jacobs did not intend to sound threatening in telling employees to discuss with investigators only matters they could document or of which they had firsthand knowledge. Maybe the company didn't mean to give the impression that workers should stay silent about safety problems at the plant. But it did. And in so doing, Bechtel Jacobs has earned the distrust of workers and the wrath of Energy Secretary Bill Richardson, who has vowed to wage an independent and credible investigation.
Which all serves to illustrate the importance of engaging brain before opening mouth. And of learning, whenever possible, to avoid repeating errors.
----------- renewable energy
Ballard power shares surge on new fuel cell plans
CANADA: January 11, 2000
http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=5364
TORONTO - Shares in Ballard Power Systems Inc drove to record highs at the open on Monday after the company unveiled its new advanced environmentally friendly fuel cell, the Mark 900, at the Detroit Auto Show this weekend.
The Mark 900 offers the same power as Ballard's Mark 700 fuel cell in half the space, thus allowing the engine of a "green" car powered by a Ballard cell to fit into the same space as other automobile engines.
"Everything fits under the hood," said Paul Lancaster, Ballard vice-president of corporate development and chief financial officer, said in a telephone interview from Detroit.
Ballard had been working on shrinking the size of the fuel cell to make it more commercially viable for the auto industry which has taken a keen interest and plunged money into the company's efforts.
Ballard, based in the Vancouver suburb of Burnaby, is a leading developer of fuel cells that produce electricity from hydrogen, with water and heat as the only byproducts. Fuel cells have been hailed as a potential power source for everything from cars to submarines.
Lancaster said the company will open its Burnaby, British Columbia, manufacturing facility - which it is calling Plant One - in the fourth quarter of this year. This plant will have the capacity to fulfil commercial orders for all Ballard's fuel cell lines until 2004.
Ultimately, the company intends to invest an estimated $350 million to $400 million in a high-volume manufacturing facility near its automotive customers to produce the units, which are lighter, smaller and more powerful than the previous version. But such a plant, which would be capable of rolling out 250,000 to 300,000 fuel cells annually, is unlikely to be necessary before 2004, Lancaster said.
Ballard shares surged to a record C$65 in Toronto before pulling back slightly to trade up C$6.85, or 12.20 percent, to C$63. On Nasdaq, the stock was up 5-7/16 at 43-11/16 after earlier rising to a lifetime high of 46-1/4.
Long-term hopes are high for Ballard. One analyst, who declined to be identified, said the stock will eventually be of a calibre to be one of the major shares in a sensible investor's holdings - alongside such mainstays as Intel, IBM and Ford.
"This will be a core holding in your portfolio," the analyst said.
Lancaster declined to give concrete revenue forecasts for the company in the years to come, but said Ballard's prospects look good.
"The markets we are going after are very large and so for even a moderate success in terms of penetration of fuel cells in any of those markets, Ballard will have very healthy revenues," he said.
The Mark 900, which weighs about 30 percent less than Ballard's prior fuel cell - the Mark 700 - and occupies half the space, the Mark 700, is designed to be produced in volumes usable by the automotive industry, Ballard said.
The Mark 900's power density is nearly 30 percent higher at 1,310 watts per litre. It also 75 kilowatts of power.
Ballard's Mark 700 is currently used in several prototype "green" automobiles, including DaimlerChrysler's Necar 4, Ford's P2000, Honda's FCX V1, and Nissan's FCV.
"The architecture of the Mark 900 fuel cell incorporates low-cost materials, provides high performance, utilizes volume-manufacturing processes, and forms the foundation for fuel cells for transportation, stationary and portable applications," Kip Smith, Ballard president and chief operating officer said in a statement.
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Ballard power, sunbeam unit in generator venture
CANADA: January 17, 2000
http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=5427
VANCOUVER - Fuel cell developer Ballard Power Systems Inc. and Sunbeam Corp.'s Coleman Powermate Inc. unit, a leader in portable electric generators and air compressors, yesterday announced a tie-up to use Ballard fuel cells to develop new portable and back-up power generating products.
The two companies said they will produce 50 prototype units for initial product testing using Ballard's recently launched Mark 900 fuel cell. Ballard said portable generators powered by its fuel cells will be clean, quiet and reliable.
Vancouver-based Ballard, whose zero-emission fuel cells are being used by automakers in prototypes as they race to create environmentally-friendly engines as well as in electrical equipment and portable power product manufacturers, launched the smaller, lighter and more powerful Mark 900 at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit last week.
The companies said demand for portable and standby power generation products is growing partly because of increasingly severe weather patterns and times of heavy demand on electric power grids.
The companies plan to offer any products developed as a result of the venture to consumers through Coleman Powermate's retailers and distributors. Colemate Powermate is a unit of Boca Raton, Fla.-based Sunbeam Corp.
"As a leader in portable power products, Coleman Powermate has a substantial share of the portable power generation market in North America. Their expertise, combined with Ballard's leadership in fuel cells and fuel cell systems, will allow rapid development of products for this growing market," Ballard chairman and chief executive Firoz Rasul said in a statement.
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Taiwan lead - electric car growth won't help demand
TAIWAN: January 5, 2000
http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=5278
TAIPEI - Taiwan's consumption of lead is unlikely to grow despite rising demand for battery-powered cars, and the lead market will be hurt further once the island joins the World Trade Organization, metals traders said.
A shift to electric vehicles should be expected to increase demand for lead, a key component of today's batteries.
But traders said the opposite is likely to be the case in the longer term as environmentalists and regulators press manufacturers to adopt lead-free battery technologies.
The cabinet's Environmental Protection Administration said it was enforcing an electric motorcycle sales quota to help curb pollution. From this month, manufacturers are required to sell two electric motorcycles for every 100 gasoline-powered bikes.
Traders said the requirement was driving innovation in lead-free batteries.
"Mounting concern over the environment has pushed manufacturers to develop new technology for non-lead batteries," said one trader in a Japanese metals trading house.
Battery making accounts for some 70 percent of Taiwan's total lead consumption and demand is closely linked to the vehicle sector.
"From a long-term viewpoint, Taiwan's lead consumption will largely fall as other materials replace lead in batteries," said an executive of Taiwan Yuasa Battery Corp.
As local appetite for electric vehicles grows, traders said demand would not rise significantly for lead acid-based batteries but rather for alternative lithium-ion or lithium-polymer batteries, still in development.
Taiwan's appetite for lead is estimated at 100,000 tonnes in 2000, little changed from 1999, metals traders said, but consumption of refined lead is seen declining in coming years.
Traders said another major factor slowing lead demand was Taiwan's accession to WTO, which could happen soon now that China has largely cleared its own path into the WTO. China has long insisted it must enter before Taiwan.
Taiwan carmakers, major consumers of lead, are likely to be hurt by the increasing competition arising from WTO membership, resulting in waning demand, traders said.
"Taiwan's entry to WTO will squeeze the local car-making sector, which, in turn, will slacken lead demand," said another trader.
Taiwan's automobile makers are protected by import duties that will shrink sharply once it joins the world trade body.
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Clinton wants to boost spending on biofuels
USA: January 17, 2000
http://www.planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=5425
WASHINGTON - President Bill Clinton proposed more than doubling federal spending on development of new technologies that use crops, corn stalks and trees to make cleaner, renewable fuels for cars and buildings.
The White House said Clinton's Fiscal Year 2001 budget request to Congress would propose an increase of more than $240 million over the 2000 budget for such efforts, with $49 million earmarked for the Department of Energy (DOE) and $194 million for the Agriculture Department.
"This initiative will increase the viability of alternative energy sources, help meet environmental challenges like global warming, support farm incomes, and diversify and strengthen the rural economy," the White House said in a memorandum.
Clinton in August stepped up a federal drive to use crops, grasses and trees to develop fuels such as ethanol, electricity and industrial products, aiming to triple their use by 2010. That would help meet Clinton's goal to have 7.5 percent of U.S. electricity to come from renewable energy sources by 2010.
Congress approved a budget of $196 million for similar efforts in 2000.
Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman welcomed the proposed funding increase, saying it marked a "significant" advance over the initiative announced in August.
"During these difficult times in American agriculture, farmers need all the new market opportunities they can get," Glickman said in a statement. "This kind of diversification will not only help protect our environment, it will also strengthen the farm and rural economy."
The administration said its goal was "making biomass a viable competitor to fossil fuels as an energy source and chemical feedstock," building on fermentation and gasification and other biomass-related activities currently funded by DOE.
The White House last summer said adoption of the fledgling biomass industry could mean up to $20 billion in new farm income, less reliance on oil imports and less risk of global warming.
At present, biomass accounts for three percent of U.S. energy use, mostly in the wood industry and in ethanol distilled from corn as a clean-fuel additive.
If the goal of tripling biomass use is met, it would equal 348 million barrels of oil a year, equal to 158 super tankers, the White House said in August. Emission of greenhouse gases would drop by 100 million tons, the amount emitted by 70 million cars.