------- Index of Articles

NUCLEAR
Sub Chief Given Letter of Reprimand
Navy Still Sees Need for Guests on Ships
Navy ducks scrutiny
Greeneville skipper given letter of reprimand
Chinese arsenal born in America
Clash With China Strengthens Hard-Liners
Scandal of the shawl
'Long term nuke waste site is years away'
Officials: Guilty in Nuke Accident
Star Wars Fraud
New Zealand urges US to drop plan for nuclear missile shield
Ten Year Study Reveals Nuclear Weapons Unlawful
Pentagon panel urges axing artillery system
New Nukes
Mini-nuke: Dangerous oxymoron
Pentagon Panel Urges Scuttling Howitzer System
Nuclear Power May Be Making A Comeback
Bush has 'realistic' approach to world
DOE not biased toward Yucca

MILITARY
Another Arms Dilemma
No Sale
Rumsfeld Against Arms Sale to Taiwan
Taiwan won't get Aegis destroyers
Weapons U.S. will sell to Taiwan
U.S. Crew Says It Tried to Block Attack in Peru
Fugitive Brazilian Drug Lord Captured by Colombian Army
As Survivors Return Home, Family Vehemently Deny Peru's Account
Tape shows missionary plane not evading
Missionary plane had landing clearance, relatives say
U.S. Response Guarded, Calls Downed Plane 'Tragic Error'
Iran Accused of Violating Cease-Fire
Taiwan prepares strategy for a battle
Of Human Wrongs
Massachusetts
Livestock groups claim harm by practice bombing

OTHER
An Unrepentant Nader Sees a Positive Side of Bush Policy
Save Money, and Trees
EPA chief says Alaska drilling remains option
Talks Tie Trade in the Americas to Democracy
Bush makes amigos in a nation of amis
Biggest Obstacle to Selling Trade Pact Is Sovereignty
In Aftershock of Unrest, Cincinnati Seeks Answers
POLICE VAN HURTS PEDESTRIAN
Book Says Israel Intended 1967 Attack on U.S. Ship
Bush's decision not to greet Navy detainees complex
Bush gets kudos on China crisis
Prosecutors drop Fischer investigation

ACTIVISTS
FTAA: For The Already Affluent.
Another Secret Tiananmen Document Is Leaked
N.M. inmates refuse to return to cells
Bush takes aim at protesters for isolationist tack


-------- NUCLEAR

Sub Chief Given Letter of Reprimand

New York Times
April 23, 2001
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/national/AP-Submarine-Collision.html

PEARL HARBOR, Hawaii (AP) -- USS Greeneville Cmdr. Scott Waddle was given a letter of reprimand Monday as punishment for the submarine collision that killed nine people aboard a Japanese fishing vessel, his attorney said.

The punishment also included a forfeiture of half pay for two months, but that was suspended for six months. Waddle said he will retire Oct. 1, meaning he will receive his full pay until the end of his career.

``While I regret that my Navy career has ended in this way, I know that I am one of the lucky ones because I survived the accident,'' Waddle said in a statement released by his civilian attorney, Charles Gittins.

The punishment was imposed by Adm. Thomas Fargo, Pacific Fleet commander, at an ``admiral's mast'' attended by Waddle, a military attorney and several officers at Pearl Harbor Navy Base.

Fargo concluded there was dereliction of duty and negligent hazarding of a vessel, Gittins said.

But he said the admiral did not mention allegations of negligent homicide in the deaths of nine Japanese students and adults aboard the Ehime Maru when it was rammed by the Greeneville Feb. 9 in waters off Hawaii.

``I understand and accept the punishment that Admiral Fargo imposed. He treated me fairly and with dignity and respect and I thank him for that,'' Waddle said.

Gittins, in an e-mail to news media shortly after the hearing ended, said Waddle explained his actions to the officers.

``Admiral Fargo thoughtfully considered Commander Waddle's presentation and decided, nonetheless, that punishment should be imposed under the preponderance of the evidence standard applicable to such hearings,'' Gittins said.

Gittins said Fargo indicated he would accept Waddle's forced retirement. If he had chosen not to retire, he would have had to show why he should be allowed to remain in the Navy.

Gittins said the admiral told Waddle he was proud of his decision to testify before a court of inquiry without immunity.

``My heart aches for the losses suffered by the families of those killed aboard the M/V Ehime Maru and the grief that this accident unfairly has thrust upon them,'' Waddle said, apologizing once again for the collision and urging U.S. government settlement of claims made by the families.

``I think about those lost at sea every day and I grieve for the families.''

Waddle has said he plans to travel to Japan to meet with the families of the victims. He previously has apologized and accepted responsibility for the collision.

Navy officials have acknowledged that the surfacing demonstration during which the collision occurred was done only for the benefit of 16 civilians aboard, three of whom were seated at the sub's controls at the time.

The hearing was conducted under Article 15 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Waddle could face other disciplinary action including fines and critical performance letters.

On Saturday, Waddle received a copy of the report of a three-member military panel that reviewed the case. Gittins declined to describe the panel's conclusions, but Pentagon officials have said Fargo is following the officers' recommendation in not calling for courts martial of top Greeneville officers.

Gittins said at the time if punishment is imposed and there is grounds for appeal, ``you can be sure we will pursue the appeal. He also said Waddle has ``a number of very good job offers'' to consider.

---

Despite Sub Inquiry, Navy Still Sees Need for Guests on Ships

New York Times
April 23, 2001
By JOHN KIFNER
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/04/23/national/23VISI.html

HONOLULU, April 22 - The Navy's inquiry into the submarine Greeneville's collision with a Japanese fisheries training vessel has sidestepped one factor in the fatal crash: a program hugely popular with the Navy brass in which thousands of civilians, many wealthy or influential, are invited on excursions aboard warships in hopes of bolstering support for the services and, ultimately, their financing.

Adm. Thomas B. Fargo, the commander of the Pacific Fleet, acting on the report of a three-admiral court of inquiry, is expected to recommend a review of the visitors program and suggest a few rules - some of which were already in place and violated by the Greeneville - but the program is regarded as so vital, not only by the Navy but by all the services that it is likely to continue virtually unchanged, military officials say.

"There is very strong support for this departmentwide," a Navy official at the Pentagon said. "There is no chance that bringing civilians to Navy units is going to stop. By no means."

The role of the visitors program in the accident that killed nine people aboard the Japanese vessel, the Ehime Maru, on Feb. 9 is still unclear for several reasons:

¶The court of inquiry was convened specifically because it was one of the few military panels that could compel civilian testimony, but none of the 16 civilians aboard the submarine were called before it.

¶The chairman of the panel, Vice Adm. John B. Nathman, said that part of his charge from Admiral Fargo was to look into "implementation of the distinguished visitor embarkation program," but there was little testimony about it.

¶Two targets of the inquiry - the Greeneville's captain and a sailor who failed to manually plot the location of the Japanese ship - have reversed their accounts on whether the presence of civilians in the control room was a factor in the crash.

"In my opinion the investigation is not complete," said Eugene R. Fidell, the president of the National Institute of Military Justice, in Washington. "Never to summon 16 witnesses jammed into that control room is bizarre.

"The Navy, I think, is collectively desperately concerned not to give up the distinguished visitor program," Mr. Fidell added. "They don't even want to talk about this. This is a real big deal to the Navy.

"It absolutely has to do with funding, weapons programs," he said. "They compete like crazy with the other branches."

Last year, the Pacific Fleet welcomed 7,836 civilian visitors aboard its vessels. There were 21 trips aboard Los Angeles-class nuclear attack submarines like the Greeneville, with 307 civilian guests, and 74 trips to aircraft carriers, with 1,478 visitors.

Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, embarrassed by the incident, said at the time that he would order a review of the program. Mr. Rumsfeld made his statement after disclosures that the sole reason for the Greeneville's cruise on the day of the incident was to give a tour to the civilians and that a Texas oil company executive was at the controls when the submarine shot to the surface, striking and sinking the Ehime Maru. Mr. Rumsfeld put a moratorium on civilians' handling controls, but otherwise the programs are continuing in all services.

A Navy official said that no review orders had yet been issued by the Pentagon and that the Navy was conducting a review on its own.

The submarine's skipper, Cmdr. Scott D. Waddle, is not expected to be court-martialed. Instead, Admiral Fargo, acting on the court of inquiry's report, is expected to announce an administrative punishment on Monday, under which Commander Waddle will resign from the Navy, ending his career at his current rank with an honorable discharge and a full pension.

On March 20, Commander Waddle's civilian lawyer, Charles W. Gittins, seemed to shift direction as he was winding up a rambling closing statement at the end of 12 days of hearings. Mr. Gittins raised the question of the 16 civilians with the retired admiral, Richard C. Macke, who made the arrangements for the submarine tour. Most of the civilians had been planning to take part in a golf tournament, which was later postponed, to raise money for restoration work on the U.S.S. Missouri, the World War II battleship on which the Japanese surrendered in 1945. Among them were oil executives, their wives and a Honolulu couple.

Mr. Gittins also wondered aloud about whether there was a business benefit for anyone involved in getting the civilians aboard. Admiral Macke, once a four-star commander in the Pacific, lost his job after he made remarks deemed insensitive, saying that three marines stationed on Okinawa, Japan, who raped a 12-year- old girl in 1995 were stupid because they could have simply hired a prostitute. Although he is retired, Admiral Macke remains active in social affairs related to the Navy, and he is prominent here as an executive of a telecommunications company based in Reston, Va.

To some people here, it seemed an implied threat that, if Commander Waddle were to go to a court-martial, Mr. Gittins would raise the presence of civilians as part of his defense and might produce embarrassing material about the visitor program.

Commander Waddle, in his testimony - given voluntarily after he had been denied immunity - said the 16 civilians crowded into the control room did not interfere with operations.

Asked twice by different admirals if the civilians were a factor in the accident, Commander Waddle each time replied, "No, sir."

But last Monday, the main article on the front page of The Honolulu Advertiser quoted Mr. Gittins as saying that Commander Waddle had changed his mind and now believed that the presence of the civilians broke the crew's concentration at a crucial time. The article also noted that the visitors program "could figure prominently in the unlikely event of a court-martial and prove an embarrassment for the Navy."

That same day, Time magazine published an interview with Commander Waddle that said the skipper had "reversed his previously benign view of the presence of civilians on board."

Time quoted Commander Waddle as saying, "Having them in the control room at least interfered with our concentration."

But Petty Officer First Class Patrick T. Seacrest changed his account in the opposite way.

Petty Officer Seacrest was the fire control technician, whose job involves keeping track of nearby ships as potential targets for a submarine's torpedoes.

On the day of the accident, an important piece of equipment, essentially a television monitor that displays the sonar soundings, was discovered to be broken soon after the submarine left Pearl Harbor. With the monitor down, Petty Officer Seacrest's old-fashioned plotting of the positions of vessels on paper became the crucial substitute. He was to have gotten up from his chair and gone to a nearby bulkhead to mark the positions on a scrolling device visible to the officer of the deck at intervals of about three minutes, a former submarine commander said.

But some of the visitors were crowded into the narrow path between his post and the plotting paper, and he did not push through them to update the positions.

Petty Officer Seacrest told the National Transportation Safety Board investigators and the preliminary Navy inquiry that the presence of visitors had interfered with his task.

John Hammerschmidt, the chief N.T.S.B. investigator, said Petty Officer Seacrest reported that "he was not able to continue his plotting."

But when Petty Officer Seacrest appeared before the court of inquiry, testifying under a grant of immunity, he said the civilians had no effect on his task.

"It was very dramatic," recalled Jay M. Fidell (the brother of Eugene R. Fidell), a lawyer and a former Coast Guard judge, who followed the proceedings as a commentator for the Public Broadcasting System. "There was this long, long pause and then he said `No.' "

Under questioning, Petty Officer Seacrest agreed when one of the admirals told him, "You just got lazy, didn't you?"

The main note on the visitors program was struck in the testimony of the submarine fleet commander, Rear Adm. Albert H. Konetzni Jr., a strong advocate of using the program to gain support for more nuclear submarines at a time of shrinking budgets. Admiral Konetzni remarked that attack submarines were named for cities rather than for fish because "fish don't vote." His views were echoed by the other admirals.

"The visitors program is the whole thing that's driving this," said Mr. Fidell, the former Coast Guard judge. "Every flag witness said the same thing. It was like something out of `The Manchurian Candidate.' They are desperate to protect this program."

---

Navy ducks scrutiny

USA Today
04/23/2001
http://www.usatoday.com/news/comment/2001-04-23-edtwof2.htm

As the Pacific Fleet commander today metes out punishment against the captain of the sub that collided with a Japanese fishing boat Feb. 9, the disciplinary action is secondary to a more critical point: That the Navy itself is likely to get off unscathed.

The commander already has decided to forgo a court-martial, according to news reports. That means Cmdr. Scott Waddle won't be imprisoned for the botched procedures and cut corners that contributed to the deaths of nine Japanese passengers. Even so, he faces punishment short of jail time.

Not so for the Navy, which ducked self-scrutiny during the public hearings into the collision and is now poised to do so again.

During a 12-day court of enquiry into the deadly transgressions by Waddle and his crew, the Navy failed to question any of the 16 civilian guests for whom that day's sub ride was conducted. And it did so despite the enquiry's written mandate to probe civilian-guest programs. The Navy thus obscured the degree to which its improperly organized public-relations outings distract crew from more important duties, and harm the service's reputation.

It will use the same obscuring tactic today, reading Waddle his punishment behind closed doors in a brief "admiral's mast" proceeding rather than a court-martial. The latter would have been public and lengthy, and might have triggered an appeal during which any dirty laundry from the Navy's guest program might have come out.

Regardless of the merits of the court-martial decision, no valid interest is served by the Navy's failure to confront hazardous practices. The Navy had until last week to call more witnesses to probe more deeply the civilian guest program. It did not do so.

There's still opportunity for a full accounting. The Navy could report on what went wrong with its civilian visit. Among the questions that remain unanswered are whether the visitors distracted the crew, as some members initially told the National Transportation Safety Board; why the unscheduled civilian ride was held, against guidelines; whether guests were favored because of personal connections; and how pervasive such problems are.

If the Navy stays true to form, such a public accounting won't be forthcoming. It'll be left to the Department of Defense Inspector General or the NTSB to draw conclusions. But these are unlikely to satisfy public and congressional questions as fully as the Navy could, and should.

Shortly after the accident, Waddle publicly took responsibility for it. It's high time his superiors demonstrate the same sense of duty.

---

Greeneville skipper given letter of reprimand

USA Today
04/23/2001
http://usatoday.com/news/nation/2001-04-23-sub.htm

PEARL HARBOR, Hawaii (AP) - USS Greeneville Cmdr. Scott Waddle was given a letter of reprimand Monday as punishment for the submarine collision that killed nine people aboard a Japanese fishing vessel, his attorney said.

The punishment also included a forfeiture of half pay for two months, but that was suspended for six months. Waddle said he will retire Oct. 1, meaning he will receive his full pay until the end of his career.

"While I regret that my Navy career has ended in this way, I know that I am one of the lucky ones because I survived the accident," Waddle said in a statement released by his civilian attorney, Charles Gittins.

The punishment was imposed by Adm. Thomas Fargo, Pacific Fleet commander, at an "admiral's mast" attended by Waddle, a military attorney and several officers at Pearl Harbor Navy Base.

Fargo concluded there was dereliction of duty and negligent hazarding of a vessel, Gittins said.

But he said the admiral did not mention allegations of negligent homicide in the deaths of nine Japanese students and adults aboard the Ehime Maru when it was rammed by the Greeneville Feb. 9 in waters off Hawaii.

"I understand and accept the punishment that Admiral Fargo imposed. He treated me fairly and with dignity and respect and I thank him for that," Waddle said.

Gittins, in an e-mail to news media shortly after the hearing ended, said Waddle explained his actions to the officers. It was not clear if Waddle would receive his pension, although Gittins has said in the past that he would keep full retirement pay.

"Admiral Fargo thoughtfully considered Commander Waddle's presentation and decided, nonetheless, that punishment should be imposed under the preponderance of the evidence standard applicable to such hearings," Gittins said.

Gittins said Fargo indicated he would accept Waddle's forced retirement. If he had chosen not to retire, he would have had to show why he should be allowed to remain in the Navy.

Gittins said the admiral told Waddle he was proud of his decision to testify before a court of inquiry without immunity.

"My heart aches for the losses suffered by the families of those killed aboard the M/V Ehime Maru and the grief that this accident unfairly has thrust upon them," Waddle said, apologizing once again for the collision and urging U.S. government settlement of claims made by the families.

"I think about those lost at sea every day and I grieve for the families."

Waddle has said he plans to travel to Japan to meet with the families of the victims. He previously has apologized and accepted responsibility for the collision.

Navy officials have acknowledged that the surfacing demonstration during which the collision occurred was done only for the benefit of 16 civilians aboard, three of whom were seated at the sub's controls at the time.

Waddle, in an interview with "Dateline NBC" taped before the hearing, described the shock he felt upon seeing the words "high school" through a periscope seconds after the collision.

"Those were the first words that I read and I thought, 'Oh my God, we've hit ... we've hit some kids."'

He said the Greeneville spent about 80 seconds at periscope depth before the surfacing.

In hindsight, he said, that was not long enough.

The hearing was conducted under Article 15 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Waddle could face other disciplinary action including fines and critical performance letters.

On Saturday, Waddle received a copy of the report of a three-member military panel that reviewed the case. Gittins declined to describe the panel's conclusions, but Pentagon officials have said Fargo is following the officers' recommendation in not calling for courts martial of top Greeneville officers.

Gittins said at the time if punishment is imposed and there is grounds for appeal, "you can be sure we will pursue the appeal. He also said Waddle has "a number of very good job offers" to consider.

-------- china

Chinese arsenal born in America

April 23, 2001
By Rowan Scarborough
THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/national/20010423-2670510.htm

A confrontation between U.S. and Chinese fighter jets would find China equipped with weapons rooted in American technology and sent via Israel, military analysts say. The White House is weighing the dramatic military move of providing fighter escorts for the normally solo EP-3E surveillance planes that routinely fly near the Chinese coastline in international airspace. When U.S. pilots are briefed on potential threats, they will study Chinese air-and land-based missiles that, weapons specialists say, could not have reached full potential without American know-how.

Chinese fighters carry Israel´s potent Python 3 heat-seeking missile, a weapon painstakingly developed by Israel based on the venerable Sidewinder missile that the United States sold to the Jewish states decades ago, say former intelligence officials. Reconnaissance photographs of Chinese F-8 fighters intercepting, and in some cases harassing, U.S. patrol planes clearly show the fast, short-range Pythons affixed under the fighters´ wings. China has bought the rights to domestically produce the Python 3, an early 1990s transaction that the Pentagon says it learned of only after the fact. "I think we would have preferred to know in advance, but we didn´t get that," said Rear Adm. Craig Quigley, the Defense Department´s chief spokesman, expressing Washington´s latest irritation with Israel over arms deals with communist China.

Richard Fisher, a China analyst with the Jamestown Foundation who is writing a book about the People´s Liberation Army (PLA), has traced the Python´s maturation. '´The first of the Israeli Python family of missiles was the American Sidewinder," said Mr. Fisher, a former aide to Rep. Christopher Cox, California Republican. Mr. Cox led a 1999 congressional commission that concluded China was engaged in an extensive campaign to steal U.S. military secrets and technology. "The Python 3 is completely different than the Sidewinder series,´´ Mr. Fisher said. "But without being able to copy the Sidewinder, the Israelis would not have been able to develop and produce the Python."

The April 1 emergency landing of the Navy EP-3E surveillance plane, after a Python-armed Chinese F-8 fighter flew into its propeller, once again has thrown the spotlight on the Israel-China arms connection. Larry M. Wortzel, a former U.S. military attache in Beijing and now an analyst at the Heritage Foundation, said the Israel-China arms channel has flowed for more than 50 years. "It grew and grew, and the United States just winked at a number of serious transfers," he said. "China is benefiting from reverse-engineering American technology provided to Israel," added Mr. Wortzel, a retired Army colonel who says he saw evidence of improper transfers while a counterintelligence officer in the 1980s.

When photographs surfaced of the Python 3 dogfight missile, it spurred China analysts to recall other Israeli sales -- or purported transfers -- of U.S. know-how to Beijing. None matched the seriousness of a 1992 U.S. intelligence report that said Israel, in the immediate aftermath of the Persian Gulf war, transferred Patriot anti-missile data to China. The United States had given Patriots to Israel for protection against Iraqi Scud missile attacks. Tel Aviv vehemently denied the intelligence report, first disclosed by The Washington Times. In fact, Israel has denied several other accusations that it violated agreements by exporting restricted American technology it buys with yearly U.S. subsidies.

Richard B. Cheney, the defense secretary at the time, said he had '´good reason" to believe the Patriot diversion occurred. The Pentagon´s Defense Intelligence Agency compiled evidence substantiating the transfer. Yet a special State Department team said it could find no evidence that Israel, a close ally of Washington and beneficiary of $3 billion annually in U.S. economic and military aid, sold China Patriot secrets. To this day, intelligence analysts in and out of government continue to stress that the transfer occurred. Mr. Fisher believes advanced technology from the Patriot, a ground-based anti-aircraft and anti-missile interceptor, found its way into China´s new advanced surface-to-air missiles now on watch. He also believes the PLA used illicit Patriot data to improve M-9 short-range missiles aimed at Taiwan, which China views as a breakaway republic and has vowed to reincorporate with the mainland -- by force if necessary. "They used the information from the Patriot for the M-9 to be able to evade Patriot interception," Mr. Fisher said.

Taiwan operates Patriot batteries. "Obtaining foreign technology and reverse-engineering technology is fundamental to the ongoing military modernization program," he added. "They´re looking to reverse-engineer advanced military technology from wherever they can get it." Not long after the Patriot brouhaha subsided, Israel again was denying charges that it illegally exported U.S. technology to the communist regime in Beijing. This time, the suspicions revolved around the ill-fated Lavi fighter. Israel spent more than $1 billion in U.S. aid on the aircraft, which was based on the U.S. F-16 Falcon. After Israel ditched the program at Washington´s insistence, intelligence reports said Tel Aviv was selling the F-16 avionics technology to China for incorporation into that country´s new F-10 ground-attack fighter.

The Cox report confirmed the suspicion in 1999, stating, "Significant transfers of U.S. military technology have also taken place in the mid-1990s through the re-export by Israel of advanced technology transferred to it by the United States, including avionics and missile guidance useful for the PLA´s F-10 fighter." One of Israel´s most detailed explanations of its arms policies came last year in an op-ed article in The Washington Times by Lenny Ben-David, deputy chief of mission at the Israeli Embassy here. "Israel´s ties with China do not and will not come at the expense of American national interests," Mr. Ben-David wrote. "Israel will not permit that to happen." He added: "A strong indigenous Israeli arms industry is vital to Israel´s national interest." His column was prompted by another heated debate on the Israel-China connection -- this one over Israel Aircraft Industries´ planned sale of the Phalcon early warning radar system that would be fitted inside Chinese patrol jets.

The Clinton administration objected. It feared a system much like the U.S. AWACS "over-the-horizon" radars would increase the danger to American aircraft that one day might be forced to confront China in defense of Taiwan. Israel denied Washington´s suspicions that U.S. technology was incorporated into Phalcon. Nonetheless, Tel Aviv canceled a deal potentially worth $2 billion in the long term, as some in Congress threatened to withhold aid. Mr. Wortzel said the Reagan administration approved limited arms sales to China during the Cold War to offset Soviet military buildups. However, he said successive White Houses never have condoned the illegal transfer of high-technology items meant for Israel´s use only. "It didn´t upset the security balance in the region. But now it does," he said. "I think China´s behavior has changed. China now has the advantage of some of the best American-provided technology that it may use against the United States or certainly against Taiwan."

--------

Clash With China Strengthens Hard-Liners

By Steven Mufson
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, April 23, 2001
http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A50050-2001Apr22?language=printer

The controversy surrounding the collision of a U.S. surveillance plane and a Chinese interceptor over the South China Sea has bolstered the position of those in Washington advocating a tougher stance toward China, who find the Bush administration listening to their opinions.

The first test of the hard-liners' ascendancy could come Tuesday, when the administration decides on a package of arms for Taiwan. That package, vehemently opposed by the Chinese government, will help set the course of U.S. relations with Beijing.

The United States has for years crossed items off Taiwan's weapons shopping list for fear of angering Beijing. This year, however, everything is under consideration.

Many conservatives fear Bush will buckle to business groups, whose top objective is trade with China, and moderate advisers from his father's administration, who put a premium on continued dialogue with the Chinese government. But the president's advisers are leaning toward a package that is likely to feature anti-submarine P-3 planes, Kidd-class destroyers with air defense systems, and promises of submarines.

These weapons would help protect the self-governing island of 23 million against the two greatest dangers from China, the threat of missile attack or embargo. China regards Taiwan as its own and has vowed to reunite it with the mainland.

Even before the plane incident, growing alarm about China's missile buildup on its southeastern coast had fueled support in Congress, the military and the administration for a big package of arms sales to Taiwan.

"The Chinese missile buildup is the single most destabilizing part of the balance" across the Taiwan Strait, said a senior defense official who has tried to persuade China to pull back its missile forces. "This will achieve significance over the next few years as the numbers and accuracy go up."

But the emergence of a tougher U.S. line toward Beijing -- and a more robust arms package for Taiwan -- owes much to China's 11-day detention of 24 U.S. military personnel who made an emergency landing at a Chinese airfield after their surveillance plane collided with a Chinese fighter jet over the South China Sea on April 1.

One hard-liner outside the administration called the incident "a gift." Just when rival GOP camps were jockeying for positions in the administration, the collision put policymakers favoring warmer ties with China on the defensive and gave those favoring a harder line an avenue to press their views. Many administration officials have spoken recently of making China "pay a price" for the standoff over the U.S. crew.

Former national security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski, who helped normalize relations with China under President Jimmy Carter, said the extra days China took to extract the words "very sorry" from the Bush administration before freeing the crew were not well spent. "Very sorry twice could turn out to be very costly two words," he said.

The mere possibility of selling Taiwan submarines shows how far the debate has shifted. Previous administrations deemed submarines offensive rather than defensive weapons, and thus violations of agreements with Beijing. Now the main obstacle is that the United States no longer makes diesel-powered submarines and would have to use German or Dutch plans, and obtain cooperation from those countries.

Some policy experts argue that the most controversial item under consideration -- four Aegis radar-equipped destroyers that China has loudly opposed -- would not be enough to protect Taiwan if Beijing continues to add missiles on its coast at the current rate of about 50 a year. Each Aegis destroyer can track and intercept more than 100 missiles and aircraft, but by 2008, China might have 800 missiles within range of Taiwan.

Among those who have devoted years to building U.S.-China relations -- and those who have invested millions or billions of dollars in China -- this is a sobering moment. Many business executives are wondering whether their own businesses might pay a price, too, if China pays a price for the standoff.

"We've all put so much of our lives into a stable relationship with China. This is a real moment of testing," said former diplomat Frank Wisner, who now works at insurance giant AIG, which has a substantial subsidiary in China. Describing AIG chairman Maurice "Hank" Greenberg, a strong behind-the-scenes voice for close Sino-American ties, Wisner said, "You can be certain that Hank is anxious and very troubled by what's going on. He hopes that a great deal of calm and reflection takes place before we make decisions and that we not paint ourselves into corners."

Chinese officials are anxious, too. The new Chinese ambassador in Washington, Yang Jiechi, and other embassy officials have been inviting people who helped establish Sino-American ties during the Nixon and Carter administrations to discuss the downward trend in relations. Though appointed because of his earlier contacts with former president George Bush, Yang suddenly finds himself without American allies who can act as dependable channels for expressing Chinese concerns.

Indeed, the administration has few China experts in key positions. The top Asia posts at the National Security Council and State Department are held by people who are primarily Japan experts. The top Asia post at the Pentagon is still unfilled, as are the top China slots at the NSC and State Department.

"This is an administration riven by deep divisions in the Republican camp about how to deal with China. Do we do business with China or confront it?" said a longtime expert on China policy. "I don't know of any China expert who would pass muster with both sides."

Instead of old China hands, the administration is stockpiled with people who view China as a potential threat and a "strategic competitor."

Foremost among them is Deputy Defense Secretary Paul D. Wolfowitz, a State Department official during the Reagan administration who has long argued that China was an important regional power, along with countries such as South Korea and Japan, but that the United States had exaggerated its strategic value to Washington.

The Wolfowitz position has profoundly influenced the Bush team. President Bush talks about paying more attention to Japan, is reluctant to gloss over differences and treat China as a special international case, and may be willing to more openly support Taiwan, now a flourishing democracy.

Many administration officials signed a 1999 open letter advocating an end to the "strategic ambiguity" about whether U.S. forces would protect Taiwan in the event of an attack by the mainland. The traditional posture has been that ambiguity would keep Taiwan from making a destabilizing declaration of formal independence while sufficing to prevent Beijing from using force to achieve reunification.

The letter was signed by Richard L. Armitage, now deputy secretary of state; John Bolton, the nominee for undersecretary of state for arms control and international security affairs; I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Cheney's national security adviser and chief of staff; and Paula J. Dobriansky, nominee for undersecretary of state for global affairs.

Other outspoken critics of China include Cheney aide and former Heritage analyst Stephen Yates, Pentagon official Steve Cambone and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld's new speechwriter, Marc Thiessen, the former spokesman for Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.).

Even so, many observers think the Republican Party's traditional pro-engagement wing -- led by Bush's father, his national security adviser Brent Scowcroft, former secretary of state Henry A. Kissinger and career State Department officers -- will keep the Bush team's policy close in line with past administrations.

-------- india / pakistan

Scandal of the shawl

The Washington Times www.washtimes.com
4/23/01
Embassy Row
James Morrison THE WASHINGTON TIMES
http://www.washtimes.com/world/20010423-29450290.htm

The term of U.S. ambassador to India is coming to an end this week with no solution in sight to an embarrassing episode involving a contraband shahtoosh shawl.

Two weeks after The Washington Times reported that Jacqueline Lundquist, the wife of Ambassador Richard Celeste, had inadvertently acquired the banned product, the couple still has been unable to dispose of it.

The shawls are illegal in India because they are made from the soft undercoat of an endangered Tibetan antelope species slaughtered by the thousands in China.

"Having a shahtoosh shawl is now the equivalent in India of killing and eating a tiger. Very bad," an Indian newspaper said.

The problem for the hapless diplomatic couple is that they are trying to give the shawl to Indian authorities, but no one will accept it.

"The shawl was taken to the Foreign Ministry, but they did not want it," the source told the Reuters news agency in the Indian capital, New Delhi.

"It has now been kept in a safe in the embassy and will be handed over to Indian authorities once some department is willing to take it."

Mrs. Lundquist first tried to turn in the shawl after Indian newspapers reported she had been wearing it for social occasions. She purchased it a year ago at a bazaar held in the ambassador´s residence.

Aside from the attempt to get rid of the shawl, Mr. Celeste is leaving India as U.S.-Indian relations are soaring.

In a farewell speech last week, Mr. Celeste predicted that the United States will soon lift the economic sanctions imposed after India conducted nuclear tests in 1998.

"I wouldn´t be surprised if it happens in the next three to six months," he told the India International Center.

"The president has made it clear that, in India, he intends to build on the framework constructed by President Clinton," Mr. Celeste said.

Mr. Bush plans to appoint Robert Blackwill, a senior State Department strategist on Chinese and nuclear issues, to replace Mr. Celeste.

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'Long term nuke waste site is years away'

Times of India,
April 23, 2001
http://www.timesofindia.com/230401/23hlth9.htm

ALIGARH: India is at par with countries like US and France in handling radioactive waste generated in the nuclear power plants while search is on for a long-term waste repository, according to Nuclear Power Corporation (NPCIL) chairman V K Chaturvedi said.

"Technologically, we are at the same level as US and France in handling this waste," he told reporters here on Saturday.

Waste generated at the sites of nuclear plants is of low radioactivity with half life of 30-40 years, Chaturvedi told reporters here on Saturday at the release of a report 'Effect of Low-Dose Ionising Radiation Among the Employees at the Narora Atomic Power station: A cross-sectional study'.

All the nuclear plants in the country have the facility to bury nuclear waste in an underground concrete tank while radioactivity in the surroundings is monitored for any leak, he said.

However, handling of highly reactive wastes coming from reprocessing plants, where spent fuel from the nuclear plants is reprocessed to obtain plutonium to be used further in second stage reactors, is most challenging, he said.

This reactive waste is to immobilised first so that it does not leak out from the storage site. "We have been successful in achieving this," he said, adding the solidified waste would be put in glass containers, surrounded by steel containers, and placed at a long term waste repository.

However, countries do not have such a site for waste repository and it will take about 60-70 years to select it.

Waste can be stored for thousands of years at such a site, he added. (PTI)

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Officials: Guilty in Nuke Accident

Excite News
April 23, 2001
http://news.excite.com/news/ap/010423/01/int-japan-nuclear-accident

TOKYO (AP) - Six former top officials at a nuclear fuel-reprocessing plant pleaded guilty Monday to charges of negligence resulting in death in Japan's worst nuclear accident, a court spokesman said.

Also, current JCO Co. president Tomoyuki Inami admitted to a charge that the company violated the nation's nuclear regulations law, said Mito District Court spokesman Michiru Sakurai.

The six, including the plant's general manager Kenzo Koshijima, each face a maximum penalty of one year in prison and a fine of 500,000 yen ($4,098). Inami was answering a charge made against the company itself and doesn't face any individual penalty.

JCO was accused of systematic security violations. The accident happened at the company's Tokai plant, 70 miles northeast of Tokyo, on Sept. 30, 1999. Two workers tried to save time by mixing excessive amounts of uranium in buckets instead of using special mechanized tanks.

The mix set off an uncontrolled nuclear reaction, exposing the two to massive doses of radiation from which they later died. A third worker, who was also hospitalized in critical condition, was later discharged from the hospital.

It was Japan's most serious nuclear accident. Authorities ordered 161 people evacuated from their homes, and another 310,000 were advised to stay indoors for 18 hours as a precaution. In all, 439 people were exposed to radiation.

The company was stripped of its license to operate the processing plant in March of last year.

The company has also agreed to pay $103.7 million in compensation to settle 6,875 complaints over the accident.

-------- missile defense

Star Wars Fraud

Salt Lake Tribune
Monday, April 23, 2001
http://www.sltrib.com/04232001/public_f/91246.htm

Sixty billion dollars down a rat hole. That's the next installment of tax dollars to be squandered on National Missile Defense. NMD (formerly Star Wars) was a fraud on the American people when Edward Teller and Ronald Reagan cooked it up in 1983. Now, 18 years and many spent billions later, it remains a fraud today.

Even if Donald Rumsfeld and the High Frontier scamsters can get their exoatmospheric ballistic missile interceptors to work -- a crap shoot at best -- Americans will still be vulnerable to edoatmospheric nuclear weapons, such as cruise missiles, submarine-launched missiles, airplane-delivered bombs, ship-delivered bombs, and a variety of land-delivered bombs.

And for all the mega-bucks wasted, what we get is a nuclear arms race with the Chinese, a reversal of Russian nuclear missile reductions, and strained relations with our NATO allies. Who but the defense industry stands to gain from this?

If President Bush and Congress really care about protecting Americans from nuclear attack, they will take real steps toward halting the proliferation of nuclear weapons. That means fulfilling our obligations under the Non-Proliferation Treaty, ratifying the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, and continuing to respect the Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty.

But if citizens remain silent, we'll get more of the Star Wars fraud and a new set of costly woes to go with it.

STANLEY HOLMES Salt Lake City

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New Zealand urges US to drop plan for nuclear missile shield

Yahoo News
Monday April 23, 11:39 PM
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/010423/1/njgi.html

New Zealand urges US to drop plan for nuclear missile shield

MOSCOW, April 23 (AFP) - New Zealand Foreign and Trade Minister Phil Goff, visiting Moscow, on Monday urged the United States to shelve its controversial plan for a missile defense shield.

"While New Zealand understands the stated American wish to protect itself from nuclear attack from a rogue state, we believe the best security against any nuclear attack is to fulfill the objectives of the non-proliferation treaty," said Goff after talks with Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov.

Russia has fiercely opposed the mooted US national missile defense (NMD) plan on the grounds that it would breach international disarmament treaties. Some Western governments have also reacted skeptically to the US plan, saying it was vague on details and could spark a new arms race.

Russia has proposed a European missile defense plan, which would apparently involve mobile anti-missile defense systems that would cover only part of the continent at a given time -- thus abiding by international law.

Goff said New Zealand would support any measure to reduce nuclear weaponry and "expressed the hope ... that missile defense would not provide a barrier to progress in all areas of nuclear disarmament," he added.

New Zealand has been a strong advocate of nuclear disarmament and has since 1985 rejected any protection from a nuclear umbrella.

-------- u.s. nuc weapons

Ten Year Study Reveals Nuclear Weapons Unlawful

US Newswire
U.S. Newswire
23 Apr 10:30
http://www.usnewswire.com/topnews/Current_Releases/0423-112.html

Ten Year Study Reveals Nuclear Weapons Unlawful According To U.S. And Military Documentation
Contact: Barbara Marx-Webber, 301-390-1114

NEW YORK, April 23 /U.S. Newswire/ -- New York litigator and former St. John's law professor Charles Moxley is catching the attention of leaders in the fields of politics, law and international relations due to the provocative conclusions in his recently released book, Nuclear Weapons and International Law in the Post Cold War World (Austin & Winfield, Publishers, University Press of America). Both the Professional's Network for Social Responsibility and the Middle Powers Initiative have invited Moxley to be their keynote speaker at upcoming events in New York (on April 29th and May 3rd).

Moxley will discuss the results of his ten-year study on the legality of nuclear weapons as well as implications of the U.S. Administration's Missile Defense Program. He says, "The use of nuclear weapons under established rules of international law is unlawful, even according to official U.S. and military documentation."

Moxley will be the keynote speaker at a private strategy conference for the Middle Powers Initiative (April 29th) as well as for the Professional's Network for Social Responsibility. (Thursday May 3, 2001 at 5:30 p.m. 15 Rutherford Place, East of Third Ave.) For press coverage, to arrange an interview or obtain a press copy of the book, contact Barbara Marx-Webber at 301-390-1114.

Experts in the fields of politics, law, and national security are calling Moxley's work groundbreaking, comprehensive and of the utmost importance. In an indictment that Columbia Law School Dean David Leebron concludes, "requires a response" and Robert McNamara says should call on the President and Congress to investigate, Moxley expertly challenges the U.S. position on legality. Moxley also reveals that, to stave off an ICJ decision recognizing such total unlawfulness, the United States, acting through State and Defense Department attorneys, resorted to misrepresenting the facts and law to the Court.

Robert McNamara describes Moxley's book as "the best exposition I have seen of the irrationality of the U.S. policy in this area, the irrationality of the policies of the other nuclear weapons states, and the irrationality of the human race in permitting the potential use of these weapons to continue." (Note: The April 29th event is closed to the press, however interviews can be arranged and copies of the speech can be made available.)

MPI is a campaign of international citizen organizations launched in 1998 to influence and assist middle power governments to encourage and educate the nuclear weapon states to commit to immediate practical steps to reduce nuclear dangers and commence negotiations to eliminate nuclear weapons. PNSR is a non-partisan network for professional organizations that share a concern about human and environmental needs and a desire to build a strong civilian economy through redirection of national priorities away from Cold War militarism and weapons protection.

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Pentagon panel urges axing artillery system
Recommendations will create conflict over weapons priorities and service traditions

St Paul Pioneer Press
Monday, April 23, 2001
NEW YORK TIMES
http://www.pioneerplanet.com/seven-days/mon/news/docs/031711.htm

WASHINGTON An advisory panel appointed by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has recommended canceling production of the Army's new mobile artillery system, the Crusader, along with an array of other weapons programs designed, in the panel's view, for Cold War-like battles, officials said.

The panel's recommendations -- outlined in a briefing for Rumsfeld on Saturday -- are expected to test the Bush administration's pledges to reshape the military for the 21st century, pitting supporters of overhauls against supporters of service traditions, defense contractors and jobs.

While President Bush has vowed to abandon programs that make only what he termed marginal improvements in existing weapons, the Crusader has powerful allies in the Army and on Capitol Hill. So does virtually every other program the Pentagon has, making any cuts politically difficult.

Rep. J.C. Watts Jr. of Oklahoma, the fourth-highest-ranking Republican in the House, already has made a personal appeal to Rumsfeld to preserve the Crusader, which would be assembled in a new factory in his district.

The Army plans to spend $11.1 billion to build 480 Crusaders, which are self-propelled 155mm howitzers that come with automated resupply vehicles, enabling them to fire farther and faster than the Army's existing artillery system, known as the Paladin.

Army commanders contend that the Crusader, the first of which is not scheduled to reach the field before 2008, is critical to ensuring combat superiority in land battles for years to come. It is built by United Defense LP, a contractor based in Arlington, Va., and owned by Carlyle Group, an investment firm led by Frank Carlucci, a secretary of defense under President Ronald Reagan.

Despite the Army's advocacy, the advisory panel concluded that the Crusader was ill-suited for a new military strategy focused on projecting military power over long distances with air and naval forces.

The panel also recommended scuttling plans to modernize other Army weapons, including the M1-A2 Abrams tank and the Bradley armored combat vehicle, as well as the Air Force's B-1 bomber.

And it proposed not moving ahead with the Navy's new destroyer, the DD-21, contending that the destroyer, like the Crusader, did not represent a technological leap forward but simply a modest improvement on today's so-called legacy force.

``The Crusader effectively got the ax from the panel because it didn't fit the agenda,'' one official involved in the panel's deliberations said.

Pentagon and administration officials emphasized that no final decisions had been made on any programs, including the Crusader.

An administration official acknowledged that the Office of Management and Budget had asked the Army to calculate the costs of killing the Crusader program but noted that proposed cuts were going on and coming off the table in a flurry of accounting adjustments as the Pentagon's budget was being completed.

The advisory panel -- led by David Gompert, a vice president at Rand Corp. and a national security aide in the first Bush administration -- is one of more than a dozen that Rumsfeld has assigned to review various defense strategies and programs, including nuclear weapons, missile defense and conventional forces.

All the panels are conducting their reviews virtually in secret, which underscores the political risks of proposed cuts in military programs. It is not clear how Rumsfeld -- and ultimately Bush -- will integrate the various panels' recommendations, which in some cases appear to be contradictory.

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New Nukes

Washington Post
Monday, April 23, 2001; 12:00 AM
By William M. Arkin Special to washingtonpost.com
http://washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/nation/columns/dotmil/A48726-2001Apr22.html

The Pentagon is now daring to utter words that were suppressed during the Clinton years: new nukes.

Air Force Maj. Gen. Franklin J. "Judd" Blaisdell revealed at a Capitol Hill seminar on April 6 that exploration of a new "Minuteman IV" intercontinental ballistic missile has begun. Meanwhile, the Navy is calculating the longevity of its own submarine missiles and the need for a Trident III.

With a Congressionally mandated nuclear posture review, and a nuclear "study" constituted by Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld barely beginning, one might think this talk signaled the ascendancy of nuclear forces in the U.S. arsenal. In fact, these blasts of honesty merely reflect the reality that if the United States is going to possess nuclear weapons in the future, current systems will eventually have to be replaced.

But some zealots are taking the opportunity to dust off proposals to develop "mini-nukes" for Third World combat. These advocates misread the Bush Pentagon and underestimate the degree to which their new found candor comes at a price. The military services are not likely to support spending lots of money on nuclear weapons because it will likely come out of their conventional weapons budgets.

Stagnation as Policy

The Clinton Pentagon conducted in its own nuclear posture review in 1994, concluding that they believed nuclear weapons would likely be with us forever. Thus the basic design of forces remained untouched, and a "hedge" force was built in reserve to ensure growth and resurgence were U.S.- Russian relations to sour.

Criticism of this de facto policy of nuclear stagnation mounted from all directions. Arms control advocates decried the absence of reductions and the lack of vision. Nuclear advocates denounced the contradiction of an avowed devotion to nuclear weapons while suppressing research and development of new weapons. But none of the flak had much impact.

Clinton's policy brilliantly turned nuclear weapons into a non-issue, though not necessarily by design. The American public largely forgot about nuclear weapons, at least American ones. And nuclear issues were more and more segregated, even within the U.S. military.

The Air Force, as the service most associated with nukes, has been most affected. The dominating days of the nuclear oriented Strategic Air Command are over. SAC was disestablished in 1991, replaced by U.S. Strategic Command (STRATCOM), a unified command of all the services. Today, STRATCOM lives or dies by nuclear weapons. The Air Force, on the other hand, is almost completely oriented towards warfare ala Iraq and Yugoslavia, and thus has a greater stake in denuclearization.

If some in the Air Force had their way, the hallowed design of the nuclear "triad," the force of land-based intercontinental missiles, strategic submarines, and heavy bombers which have been the core of U.S. nuclear forces since the 1960's, would get an update. B-1, B-2, and B-52 heavy bombers, which have shown their conventional military relevance in the Gulf War and Yugoslavia, would be unshackled from nuclear responsibilities.

According to officers on the air staff in the Pentagon, the new triad would include land- and submarine-based nuclear missiles as the first "leg," with missile defenses and non-nuclear forces as the second and third legs. New ways would be found to incorporate bombers armed with precision guided weapons, future "directed energy" weapons, and cyber-warfare techniques into the non-nuclear leg.

Resistance Ahead

Back in February, when about 60 nuclear specialists and contractors met in Crystal City, Virginia, just blocks from the Pentagon to kick off the Air Forces preparations for a nuclear posture review, there was much discussion about whether such radical redesigns were really going to happen.

Even representatives of Space Command, where there is a growing constituency for space weapons, did not use use the word "nuclear." "Nukes are not considered a usable viable weapon by anyone anymore," says a retired Air Force officer working under contract with Space Command. Various laboratory representatives did attend the meeting to market their new "mini-nuke," a low-yield nuclear weapon intended to "deter" rogue nation use of chemical or biological weapons. Their efforts were notable because the pitch went against the now-dominant view that nuclear weapons should be further reduced in number and prominence.

Many arms control advocates are expressing alarm that the Bush team is pushing nuclear renewal and mini-nukes. But Dr. Steven A. Maaranen, a Los Alamos laboratory political scientist who has been appointed chair of Donald Rumsfeld's nuclear study, has consistently written about and espoused the view of the importance of conventional forces.

"If the United States pursues a course of action that requires some continuing reliance on nuclear weapons," Maaranen wrote in a National Research Council study in 1997, "[it] should do its utmost to retain an adequate conventional force posture and superior conventional force technology." The United States should try to place nuclear weapons in the background, Maaranen said, adding that "few would disagree that conventional forces will play a greater part in deterrence in the future."

In a talk given at Los Alamos last December, Maaranen again expressed approval for the "silent role" nuclear weapons have assumed since the end of the Cold War, saying that the threat posed by North Korea and Iran has been overstated. This is not the kind of argument that is used to justify the development of mini-nukes.

Given the cost of the Bush administration's coveted missile defense system, hundreds of billions of dollars in nuclear expenses looms over the horizon. The "bill payer" for missile defenses and nuclear renewal, Air Force officers lament, will be conventional military capabilities. In that, nuclear advocates will face strong opposition from the new dominant thinkers in the military services.

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Mini-nuke: Dangerous oxymoron

Monday, April 23, 2001
Boston Globe
ELLEN GOODMAN
http://www.miami.com/herald/content/opinion/opcol/digdocs/057036.htm

And you thought it wasn't easy being green. It took President Bush a few days to change into a costume colorful enough for a St. Patrick's parade and an Earth Day charade.

The Bush folk had shocked environmentalists right down to their grass roots. He rejected the global-warming treaty, lusted after the Arctic refuge and chose arsenic as his favorite beverage. Carbon Dioxide `R Us became his motto.

Now, faster than a sprouting bean, the administration has taken its hands off the regulations for toxic lead and wetlands, and retreated on arsenic. On Thursday, the president even held a ceremony in the environmentally correct Rose Garden to sign a treaty reducing pesticides and industrial chemicals.

Frankly, I am happy to see any hint of celadon in Bush country. But, on this Earth Day, how did we manage to overlook the greatest environmental danger of all -- the mushroom cloud over the green space?

Did you miss the news report that the Defense Department is mulling over the development of mini-nukes? Supporters describe them benignly as ``precise,'' ``clean,'' low-yield'' and ``usable.'' These are little nuclear bombs designed to strike deeply buried targets. The story went through a news cycle and into oblivion.

We've seen how the White House deals with Russia. Today, says Joe Cirincione, director at Carnegie's Non-Proliferation Project, ``The No. 1 concern is still Russia. Not because it's strong, but because it's weak.'' In its post-Cold War chaos, Russia not only has the most nuclear missiles and materials but also many broke and alienated scientists. Nearly 14 percent of them are ready to work for a foreign country. Perhaps Iraq or Iran? Our biggest security bang for the buck -- or should I say ``nonbang'' for the buck -- has been the $500 million targeted to dismantle and secure Russian nuclear weapons and materials as well as to help their scientists find jobs. But the Bush budget would cut $100 million out of that piece of self-protection.

Instead, the same budget substitutes self-defense by fantasy. Funding for the Star Wars project would go up to $5.5 billion. The only practical success from the son-of-Reagan's shield would be to unravel international treaties.

And those chic little mini-nukes?

If you think a heavenly missile defense over America is a flight of science fiction, try an underground attack warhead.

In an imaginary world, mini-nukes, operating with ``pinpoint accuracy,'' could ``take out'' Saddam's bunker without taking out Baghdad. Well, let's not even talk about pinpoint accuracy. (Remember the 1999 bombing of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade?) Even if it hit the spot, a Federation of American Scientists report predicts, the so-called Earth-penetrating warheads could go only 20 feet down, spreading radiation hundreds of miles wide.

Mini-nukes can't ``safely'' hit the bull's-eye of, say, a chemical-warfare lab. But they could do lethal damage to such ancillary targets as treaties against nuclear testing and proliferation. After all, if the United States needs such tactical weapons, why doesn't every other country? But most important, minis would loosen the taboo and erase the bright line between nuclear and other weapons.

In many ways, the attitude of this White House toward new weapons is remarkably similar to its environmental policy. Whether making policy around energy or bombs, our new leaders seem to prefer acting alone. Yet, if there is anything that tribes and nations have in common, it's self-preservation. In fact, two great threats -- environmental pollution and nuclear war -- make us understand that we are one world.

Here, we share both a planet and the capacity to destroy it. Even after Earth Day, peace is also colored green, and humans are still the most endangered species.

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Pentagon Panel Urges Scuttling Howitzer System

New York Times
April 23, 2001
By STEVEN LEE MYERS
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/04/23/politics/23MILI.html

WASHINGTON, April 22 - An advisory panel appointed by Secretary of Defense Donald H. Rumsfeld has recommended canceling production of the Army's new mobile artillery system, the Crusader, along with an array of other weapons programs designed, in the panel's view, for cold-war-like battles, officials said.

The panel's recommendations - outlined in a briefing for Mr. Rumsfeld on Saturday - are expected to become a test of the Bush administration's pledges to reshape the military for the 21st century, pitting supporters of overhauls against supporters of service traditions, defense contractors and jobs.

While President Bush has pledged to abandon programs that make only what he termed marginal improvements in existing weapons, the Crusader has powerful allies in the Army and on Capitol Hill. So does virtually every other program the Pentagon has, making any cuts politically difficult, at best.

Representative J. C. Watts Jr. of Oklahoma, the chairman of the House Republican Conference, has already made a personal appeal to Mr. Rumsfeld to preserve the Crusader, which would be assembled in a new factory in his district. On Wednesday, Mr. Watts went to Arizona to watch a Crusader prototype in a firing demonstration at the Yuma Proving Grounds.

"I'm obviously sold on this system," Mr. Watts said in a telephone interview on Saturday. "And so is the Army."

The Army plans to spend $11.1 billion to build 480 Crusaders, which are self-propelled 155-millimeter howitzers that come with automated resupply vehicles, enabling them to fire farther and faster than the Army's existing artillery system, known as the Paladin.

Army commanders contend that the Crusader, the first of which is not scheduled to reach the field before 2008, is critical to ensuring combat superiority in land battles for years to come. It is built by United Defense L.P., a contractor based in Arlington, Va., and owned by the Carlyle Group, an investment firm led by Frank C. Carlucci, a secretary of defense under President Ronald Reagan.

Despite the Army's advocacy, the advisory panel concluded that the Crusader was ill-suited for a new military strategy focused on projecting military power over long distances with air and naval forces.

The panel also recommended scuttling plans to modernize other Army weapons, including the M1-A2 Abrams tank and the Bradley armored combat vehicle, as well as the Air Force's B-1 bomber.

And it proposed not moving ahead with the Navy's new destroyer, the DD-21, contending that the destroyer, like the Crusader, did not represent a technological leap forward but simply a modest improvement on today's so-called legacy force.

"The Crusader effectively got the ax from the panel because it didn't fit the agenda," one official involved in the panel's deliberations said. "It's a wonderful system - for a legacy world."

Pentagon and administration officials emphasized that no final decisions had been made on any programs, including the Crusader. An administration official acknowledged that the Office of Management and Budget had asked the Army to calculate the costs of killing the Crusader program but noted that proposed cuts were going on and coming off the table in a flurry of accounting adjustments as the Pentagon's budget was being completed.

The advisory panel - led by David C. Gompert, a vice president at the Rand Corporation and a national security aide in the first Bush administration - is one of more than a dozen Mr. Rumsfeld has assigned to review various defense strategies and programs, including nuclear weapons, missile defense and conventional forces.

A Pentagon spokesman, Rear Adm. Craig R. Quigley, said that none of the panels had submitted a final report, though some were expected to soon. A broad strategy review led by Andrew W. Marshall, director the Pentagon's Office of Net Assessment, is expected to be among the first to be made public. That review does not address specific weapons programs.

All the panels are conducting their reviews virtually in secret, which underscores the political risks of proposed cuts in military programs. It is not clear how Mr. Rumsfeld - and ultimately President Bush - will integrate the various panels' recommendations, which in some cases appear to be contradictory.

"Cross-fertilization is fairly ad hoc," one panel member said. "As a result, there is overlap - and confusion."

Another panel focused on "transformation" had endorsed nearly all the major weapons programs from the Clinton administration, though it made no recommendation on the Crusader. It did so despite Mr. Bush's pledges to "skip a generation" of technologies to devote resources to more advanced weapons.

"Our goal is to move beyond marginal improvements to harness new technologies that will support a new strategy," Mr. Bush said in a speech in February at the Norfolk Naval Station in Virginia.

The Crusader question is typical of the debate over which weapons the military will need in battles that are not expected to reflect cold-war-era strategies, like confronting the Soviet Union on the plains of central Europe or Iraqi forces in the Persian Gulf.

The Army describes the Crusader as a technological leap over its current artillery systems, which were developed some 40 years ago. It is designed to fire shells 24 to 30 miles - compared with 18 miles for the current system - at a rate of 10 to 12 shells a minute. The Paladin system, officials say, is too slow and cumbersome to keep up with the rest of an armored division, slowing the speed of its attacks.

The Crusader's problem is its size and weight. It is a heavy, track- driven armored vehicle designed at a time when the Army's chief of staff, Gen. Eric K. Shinseki, has proposed an ambitious shift to lighter, more agile forces fighting in a yet-to-be- designed "future combat system."

Under General Shinseki's plan, the Army has already cut the program in half and redesigned the system, reducing the weight of the howitzer along with its resupply vehicle to 76 to 84 tons from 110 tons.

A senior Army officer said the Crusader would remain an important part of a division's firepower in combat until General Shinseki's "objective force" becomes a reality.

"It's a poster child for what's wrong with the Army," the officer said. "It's heavy. It's tracked. All that's well and good. If you assume we're not going to go to war for the next 20 years, or if you're willing to take the risk, then that's a fair argument."

Intense lobbying has already begun, along with interservice jockeying. The senior Army officer complained, for example, that Mr. Rumsfeld's panels had a disproportionate representation from advocates of the Air Force.

"We have this romance with air power that blinds us to everything else," the officer said.

As the panels complete their work, the battles over specific programs are expected to spill into the open. "Everybody's going to think their system has a strong story to tell," Representative Watts said.

-------- u.s. nuc facilities

Nuclear Power May Be Making A Comeback
Energy Crunch Helps Ease Industry's Image as Outcast

Washington Post
Monday, April 23, 2001; Page A01
By Peter Behr Washington Post Staff Writer
http://washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A50222-2001Apr22.html

The owners of the Vermont Yankee nuclear power plant on the Connecticut River were about to sell their 27-year-old facility last year when something remarkable happened -- remarkable at least for that long-shunned industry.

A new bidder for the plant showed up, ready to double the purchase price, followed by another bidder, and another. Vermont officials halted the sale and have now put the plant up for auction.

Only recently the nuclear industry seemed dead in this country. No new U.S. nuclear power plant has been built since the 1979 accident at Three Mile Island in Pennsylvania and the Chernobyl disaster 15 years ago had left a cloud of public fear over the industry.

But with the escalation of competitive energy prices and a friendlier regulatory environment, the U.S. nuclear option has awakened, underscored by the outburst of bidding for generating plants like Vermont Yankee.

U.S. nuclear plants have increased their overall output by 25 percent over the past 10 years by reducing accident rates and shutdowns. The plants now deliver 20 percent of the nation's electricity and do so without discharges of greenhouse gases or air pollution, industry officials say.

Just a few years ago, industry analysts predicted that many nuclear plant owners would not renew operating licenses, choosing instead to shut down the facilities in favor of more economic natural gas-fired plants. Now, about 40 percent of the plants have announced plans to seek renewed licenses and twice that may apply, according to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.

"We have even seen the first stirring of interest in the possibility of new [nuclear plant] construction in the United States -- a thought that would have been unthinkable even a year ago," Nuclear Regulatory Commission Chairman Richard A. Meserve said last month.

The revival of the nuclear power industry has set the stage for a critical debate about energy policies that will hold the key to its future. The Bush administration said nuclear power should be one of the cornerstones of the new national energy plan the White House is preparing.

Industry opponents, led by the Union of Concerned Scientists, said that the advancing age of U.S. plants and the difficulty in recruiting skilled operators create constant issues of operational safety. Control of nuclear plants is passing from traditional utilities to competitive generating companies, creating a risk that corners will be cut to boost profits, critics contend.

But a re-energized nuclear industry says its safety record since Three Mile Island speaks for itself. It sees an opportunity and now is pressing the administration for tax incentives and regulatory help that would make old plants more profitable and future construction easier.

White House officials would not disclose what nuclear power initiatives will be adopted by the task force headed by Vice President Cheney.

But industry leaders expect the Bush administration to give a go-ahead late this year to a long-delayed, politically charged proposal to store hazardous radioactive wastes permanently in an underground site at Yucca Mountain, Nev. The project, widely opposed in the state, could be authorized by Congress over Nevada's objections.

The administration would support renewal of the Price Anderson Act, which limits generators' liability from nuclear accidents, industry executives believe. The federal law is to expire next year.

The industry also is asking that nuclear plants receive valuable financial credit for not emitting the kind of greenhouse gases discharged by fossil fuel plants.

The shift in fortunes for nuclear power has several causes, most importantly, the sudden escalation of natural gas prices last year. In the late 1990s, gas had become the fuel of choice for new power plant projects because it burns much more cleanly than coal or oil and its low price made it the first choice on economic grounds, too.

But shortages of the fuel caused wholesale gas prices to rise more than $10 per 1,000 cubic feet at the beginning of winter, triple the levels of a year ago. Prices have since eased to about $5, but that still make gas-fired electricity pricey enough for nuclear plants to compete with, said Angelina Howard, executive vice president of the Nuclear Energy Institute.

"We're very economically competitive," added Corbin McNeill, chairman of Chicago-based Exelon Corp., the nation's largest operator of nuclear plants. "And the more natural gas prices go up, the more competitive we'll be."

The industry's prospects have also been helped by what Howard calls a more "predictable" and "effective" oversight by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission over the last year and a half.

The NRC has sped up procedures for relicensing existing nuclear power plants and last year, granted a renewed, 20-year license to the Calvert Cliffs Nuclear Power Plant in Calvert County operated by Baltimore Gas and Electric Co., taking a relatively short two years. The NRC process was upheld last year in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District.

The impact of higher gas prices and improved regulatory environment is apparent in the run-up in nuclear power plant prices that so surprised Vermont Yankee's owners.

Two years ago, buyers were paying about $100 per megawatt to buy nuclear power plants, said Paul Dabbar, vice president of J.P. Morgan & Co., which is handling the Vermont Yankee auction.

In March, Dominion Resources Inc., the Richmond-based energy conglomerate, paid $1.3 billion to buy the Millstone Nuclear Power plant from Northeast Utilities in Connecticut. The price for one of the Millstone units hit $791 per megawatt, eight times the average of just a few years before, Dabbar said.

Dominion and Constellation Energy Group Inc., BG&E's parent, both have indicated an interest in bidding on the Vermont Yankee plant.

"Power companies are beginning to see that nuclear plants provide a good source of diversity to mitigate the natural gas price risk," Dabbar said. Increasingly stiff air-quality regulations lie ahead for conventional power plants. "Nuclear power doesn't have to worry about that."

If nuclear industry is willing to bet on a longer, more profitable future for existing plants, a bigger question remains unanswered: Will the industry attempt to build new plants?

The NRC has streamlined consideration of new nuclear projects, creating separate reviews for plant designs and sites. Several plant designs have been pre-approved and if a generator adopts one of these designs, it does not have to cross that regulatory hurdle again.

The most likely scenario for a new project would be to add a unit, using an approved design, on an existing power plant site, said James Lake, president of the American Nuclear Society. "There is quite a lot of interest" in new projects, he said, among companies such as Exelon and Duke Energy, with existing or new designs.

Critics charge that under the new NRC approach, activists lose a lot of opportunities to challenge a project, especially if a proposed plant is to be sited next to an existing nuclear power plant. If the NRC goes forward with a proposal that could limit activists' access to confidential company data, "the public can jump up and down, but there would be no leverage for meaningful dialogue," said David Lochbaum, a nuclear safety engineer with the Union of Concerned Scientists in Washington.

Industry executives said the financial risks of building new nuclear plants have been markedly reduced and the odds would improve even more if the Bush administration and Congress approve changes in environmental policy sought by the industry.

Nuclear companies want to receive valuable financial credit for generating power without the discharges of carbon dioxide greenhouse gases and pollutants that come from conventional oil, coal and natural gas plants.

Such a proposal would prompt a battle with many environmental advocates and nuclear power critics. Rather than support a new round of nuclear plant construction, Lochbaum said, Congress and the administration should be promoting an increase in energy from solar, wind and other renewable sources.

"The existing fleet of reactors, if operated safely, help serve as bridge to energy technologies of the futures -- fuel cells, solar, biomass," Lochbaum said. "We don't think that new nuclear plants should be part of that answer."

Although the administration has not committed to endorsing a pollution credit for nuclear, Cheney said earlier this month: "If you want to do something about carbon dioxide emissions, then you ought to build nuclear power plants."

The Bush administration also is being asked by the industry to help fund the development of new plant technologies.

One of those technologies, based on 1950s German designs, the "pebble bed" technology uses uranium fuel packed in individually shielded canisters the size of tennis balls. In the case of a plant accident, the reactor would come to a standstill, gradually releasing heat but not radiation, Exelon officials said. The design does not require an emergency cooling system, the officials said.

Exelon is supporting construction of a pebble bed reactor in South Africa, which it hopes will be a model for plants in this country.

"It answers every criticism but long-term waste disposal. There is no conceivable way you get a Three Mile Island accident out of that design," Exelon's McNeill said.

Opposition to the pebble bed reactor has not formed because the venture is so new, Lochbaum said. "Our concerns are early at this stage. The designs are still evolving . . . you can't really do a plus and minus analysis."

The level of public concern about nuclear power, a generation after the accident at Three Mile Island, would be hard to judge until new projects are proposed. And in the case of pebble-bed technology, that may be at least five years away.

-------- us nuc politics

Bush has 'realistic' approach to world

The Washington Times www.washtimes.com
4/23/01
Ben Barber
http://www.washtimes.com/world/20010423-764427.htm

President Bush is maintaining a pragmatic distance in his approach to the world, analysts said after watching his performance in four vital areas: China, the Middle East, the Balkans and Russia.

The effort to be less directly involved in daily events in every corner of the world reflects a desire to separate this administration from the Clinton team´s nannylike involvement in crises from the Middle East to Asia, said Ivo Daalder, a former Clinton administration official now working at the Brookings Institution.

Kim Holmes, vice president of the Heritage Foundation, said the Bush foreign policy team was "more realistic, more professional than what we were seeing before."

Mr. Holmes discounted those who said Mr. Bush´s lack of engagement overseas was a mistake, saying Mr. Bush was wise to stay in the background during the crisis over China´s detention of 24 U.S. servicemen and women after the collision of their surveillance plane with a Chinese fighter jet.

Mr. Bush brought in a team of "adults" with experience at decision-making in foreign policy, but they had been out of power for eight years during which the world had greatly changed, said Mr. Daalder.

Bush foreign policy aides such as National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice and Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld brought with them a world view embedded in the Cold War. Miss Rice, for example, said in an interview shortly before taking office that she viewed Russia as a threat to Europe.

Indeed, the administration´s relationship with Russia started badly, the low point being the U.S. expulsion of 50 Russian diplomats for spying. The Russians expelled 50 Americans in return.

The Bush team has largely viewed Russia as a proliferater of weapons to Iran, and its economy as a basket case. Only last week did the picture improve with planning for a direct meeting between Mr. Bush and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

U.S.-Russian relations "are back on track," State Department spokesman Richard Boucher said.

On the Balkans, Mr. Bush said during the campaign that he might pull U.S. troops out of Bosnia and Kosovo. But when an ethnic Albanian rebellion threatened Macedonia recently, the United States played an active role in supporting the Macedonians.

Mr. Bush also said during the campaign that he would treat China as a "strategic competitor," shifting away from the Clinton view of China as a "strategic partner." Some analysts said that set the stage for testy negotiations following the midair collision off China´s coast.

"The Bush foreign policy is still emerging," said Robert Gallucci, dean of Georgetown University School of Foreign Service.

"But it seems to be fulfilling a promise to be less engaged - whether in the Middle East or in cooperation with other countries to deal with climate change," he said, "There´s less of an internationalist tone so far, it seems.

"While I may be unhappy about the Middle East and [the global warming treaty signed in] Kyoto, I am unambiguously unhappy about his decision not to engage the North Koreans and not to find out what is on their mind."

Mr. Gallucci was the principal U.S. negotiator of the 1994 U.S.-North Korean Nuclear Framework Accord in which the North froze its suspected nuclear weapons program in return for fuel oil and a promise of twin nuclear energy plants from the United States, South Korea and Japan.

Mr. Daalder said the Bush team sees the outside world as full of threats and sees engagement abroad as a way to deal with those threats, not as a way to take advantage of opportunities to improve the world.

The one exception is Mr. Bush´s support for free trade, which was the focus of his weekend trip to Quebec City for the Summit of the Americas.

Aside from free trade, the Bush foreign policy team largely views Russia and China as threats, the Balkans as a drain on U.S. troops and the Middle East as a potential powder keg that could cut oil supplies and spark anti-American terrorism, said analysts.

When real crises struck, however, such as China´s detention of the 24 crew members aboard the U.S. surveillance plane, the Bush team dropped its ideology in favor of pragmatism, said Mr. Daalder.

After Mr. Bush made early, public and strident demands that China return the fliers, he retreated and allowed the secretary of state, Colin Powell, to carefully craft expressions of "regret," which resolved the crisis and led the Chinese to return the crew.

Mr. Holmes said the Bush team has made a major shift in the way it deals with foreign policy by using the machinery of the State Department instead of special, high-level envoys favored by Mr. Clinton.

"You keep the president in reserve and don´t engage his prestige or escalate unnecessarily. You use one person such as Colin Powell to speak to the public," he said.

-------- us nuc waste

DOE not biased toward Yucca

From: "Bill Smirnow" <smirnowb@ix.netcom.com>
April 23, 2001
By Jeff German <german@lasvegassun.com>
and Mary Manning <manning@lasvegassun.com>
LAS VEGAS SUN

This DOE "science" sounds like something out of the USSR. LIE, LIE, LIE.

Abraham said the department had objected to the statements, and they were removed from subsequent drafts.

A four-month investigation by the Energy Department's inspector general has found no bias on the part of the DOE in the Yucca Mountain site selection process.

Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham issued a statement today, saying the inspector general has concluded "that there was no evidence to substantiate the concern that bias compromised the integrity of the site-selection process."

In the wake of the inspector general's conclusion, Abraham said he remained committed to moving forward with the process in a fair manner.

"Accordingly," he said, "I am today reaffirming our commitment to a site suitability evaluation process which is objective, unbiased and based on sound science, and conveying that reaffirmation of policy to all relevant parties."

The inspector general's investigation was prompted by a Dec. 1 Sun story suggesting documents showed the DOE was collaborating with the nuclear industry to recommend Yucca Mountain as the site of the nation's first high-level nuclear waste repository. Yucca Mountain, the only site under study, is 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.

Federal law prohibits the DOE from taking sides in the selection process.

Abraham said the inspector general absolved the DOE of any wrongdoing following more than 200 interviews in the past four months.

He acknowledged that the DOE did not get a total clean bill of health.

The investigation, he said, found that some statements attached to DOE documents in the selection process "could be viewed as suggesting a premature conclusion regarding suitability of Yucca Mountain."

Those statements were made by a DOE contractor in a two-page memo attached to a 60-page draft overview that concludes Yucca Mountain is safe to store the deadly radioactive waste even though scientific studies of the site aren't complete.

Abraham said the department had objected to the statements, and they were removed from subsequent drafts.

The memo, obtained by the Sun last year, suggests the overview could be used to help nuclear industry officials sell the Yucca Mountain Project to Congress.

Members of Nevada's congressional delegation, who voiced outrage over the memo and pushed for the inspector general investigation, could not be reached this morning.

They were expected to be briefed on the investigation today.


-------- MILITARY

-------- arms sales

Another Arms Dilemma

ABC News
April 23, 2001
By David Ruppe ABCNews.com
http://abcnews.go.com/sections/us/DailyNews/taiwansub_010423.html

April 23 - Attention has mostly focused on whether the White House will allow the export of advanced Aegis radars to Taiwan. But the Bush administration could soon approve for Taiwan an equally controversial technology likely to enrage Beijing: diesel-powered submarines.

Taiwan for years has requested diesel subs from the United States to counter China's increasingly advanced naval capabilities. And each year Washington, facing Beijing's fierce opposition as well as reluctance from the Navy on exporting diesel subs in general, has turned it down. Foreign governments similarly have been pressured by Beijing not to allow the exports, under threat of punitive trade sanctions.

But government and independent experts say the Navy has recently changed its policy on sub exports, and there are signs the Bush administration may be ready to let Taiwan obtain eight to 10 foreign-designed subs that would be co-produced in the United States. U.S. and Taiwanese military officials meet April 24 in suburban Washington, D.C. to discuss Taiwan's requests. President Bush could make a decision this week, officials say.

Analysts say pressure on the Bush administration to approve advanced arms for Taiwan increased with the recent EP-3E U.S. surveillance plane incident. But they note Bush may not be inclined to approve the most advanced Aegis, leaving the subs as a distinct possibility.

"It looks as if the administration is going to defer a decision on the Aegis destroyers and probably on the PAC-3 [anti-missile] system, but the diesel subs, that's probably the one item that's up in the air at the moment," says defense analyst Ted Galen Carpenter, of the CATO Institute.

Taiwan's Defense Needs Recognized

The Navy gave an indication it favors exporting the subs earlier this month when a confidential review by officers of the U.S. Pacific Fleet concluding Taiwan needs diesel submarines, as well as the Aegis and other equipment, was reported by the New York Times.

The study echoed a Pentagon report to Congress last June on China's military capabilities, which characterized Taiwan's submarine shortcomings as a threat to the island's defense.

"China's numerical superiority in submarines constitutes a threat to the Taiwan Navy," that report said. China could use its sub and ship advantages to blockade the island, unless an outside party intervened on Taiwan's behalf, it said.

While China is believed to have more than 60 submarines of varying sizes and capabilities, including two modern Russian Kilo-class subs and two more on the way, Taiwan has only four. Two are U.S.-built World War II-era Guppy-class diesel subs, obtained in the 1970s and used for training. The others are Dutch subs purchased in early 1980s over Beijing's objections.

Offensive or Defensive?

But while the Pentagon may have concluded Taiwan needs the submarines, opposition from Beijing may prevent Taiwan from ever getting them.

"There is a worldwide Chinese economic embargo on selling submarines to Taiwan," says Charles Meconis, an East Asian security analyst with the Institute for Global Security Studies in Seattle. "The whole reason for the U.S. connection here would be that only the United States has enough clout to get away with it."

After the Dutch sale in the early 1980s, China recalled its ambassador and downgraded its relations in protest, he notes. Diplomatic ties were later restored with an agreement barring further arms exports to Taiwan.

The Dutch government in 1992 turned down an application for two additional boats after Beijing protested. The German government reportedly blocked a similar deal in 1993, bowing to pressure from Beijing.

The Chinese leadership, which considers Taiwan a renegade province, has singled out the submarines, the Aegis and the land-based PAC-3 anti-missile system as particularly objectionable. The submarines, Beijing has argued, are offensive weapons, and so shouldn't be sold since only defensive weapons are allowed by several U.S.-Chinese agreements. Offensive arms exports also are barred by the U.S. 1979 Taiwan Relations Act.

Taiwan argues the subs are needed for defense against the Chinese submarines and a bill in the House of Representatives last year specifically advocated exporting diesel subs and a host of other equipment for Taiwan's defense. But in testament to the power of Beijing's opposition, the controversial language was removed. The final version, approved overwhelmingly, only recommended the administration "take into account the special status of Taiwan, including the defense needs of Taiwan in response to the military modernization and weapons procurement efforts by the People's Republic of China."

The bill was never voted on in the Senate.

Traditional U.S. Opposition

Another possible obstacle to exporting diesel submarines to Taiwan has been the U.S. Navy itself. For at least two decades, the U.S. Navy, which operates nuclear-powered subs, has opposed diesel submarine exports from U.S. shores for a number of reasons, experts say.

"The main concern," says a U.S. government analyst who has tracked the issue closely, "is that technologies for U.S. submarines might be transmitted, if only inadvertently, from the U.S. submarine program into a non-nuclear powered submarine construction program intended for another country."

Navy officials also have worried they may be forced to buy the generally cheaper diesel subs themselves once a production line is under way, says Douglas Paal, who heads the Asia-Pacific Policy Center in Washington, D.C. And they don't "want to have to have to hunt for any more subs out there than there already are," he says.

In the past two decades, the Navy successfully blocked potential U.S. sub export deals with South Korea and Israel, says independent submarine expert Norman Polmar. A mid-1990s deal to co-produce two foreign-designed submarines for Egypt also foundered.

"The Navy's long-term policy has been that the Navy has precluded American shipbuilders from building non-nuclear submarines," says Cynthia Brown, president of the American Shipbuilding Association. "There's not a law that's been precluding us, it's a policy."

Signs of Approval

But, in a move experts say is a major shift in policy, the Navy is confirming it does not now object to exporting diesel submarines.

"While the U.S. Navy has no requirement for diesel submarines in its force structure, it does not object to U.S. industry participation in the diesel submarine market, as long as sensitive U.S. submarine technology is not compromised," said the Navy in a statement released to ABCNEWS.com.

The Navy's position had a real effect last year, when the State Department joined the Pentagon in approving a deal for the Mississippi company Ingalls Shipbuilding to co-produce two Dutch-designed subs for Egypt. The decision cleared the way for the first diesel sub production in the United States since the early 1970s, though a contract has not yet been signed.

The Navy's resistance has softened in recent years, possibly because of arrangements worked out with Ingalls to prevent the leakage of sensitive "quieting" technologies and other secrets, says the U.S. government analyst. Such an arrangement might include using foreign sub designs, and workers who have never worked in the U.S. sub industry.

Chinese Hardball

But the very fact the U.S.-exported subs would need to be built on a foreign design and include foreign content, to address Navy concerns, could make it difficult for Taiwan to ever get them, experts say.

"It's all probably moot anyway," says Paal, "because the only way you can build them is with a Dutch or a German license and the Chinese are very unlikely to let the Germans or Dutch off lightly if they provide those licenses to the U.S. to build."

He says there's been a debate in Washington over whether an approval would amount to a false promise.

"There is a strong desire to do it. And there's a distinct recognition that it's very hard to follow through if you decide to do it. Some people say 'promise this, because you don't have to deliver.' And other people say don't promise what you can't deliver."

An alternative would be for Taiwan to continue to invest in other modern anti-submarine capabilities, and Taiwan, in fact, is also asking for P-3 anti-sub planes and U.S. Kidd-class destroyers.

"Providing them with the four Kidd-class destroyers is a good move," says Meconis. "Its primary capability is anti-submarine warfare and they are far better [for it] than anything the Taiwanese Navy possesses at this time."

---

No Sale

ABC News
April 23, 2001
http://abcsource.starwave.com/sections/us/DailyNews/taiwan_pm010423.html

WASHINGTON, April 23 - Despite increasingly tense U.S.-China relations, President Bush has decided he will not let Taiwan buy super-sophisticated naval destroyers this year, sources say.

According to a senior White House official, Bush decided today to take the advice of Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and Secretary of State Colin Powell and forgo sales of missile destroyers with advanced Aegis systems to Taiwan.

Fearing an invasion from mainland China, the Taiwanese government has been asking for the most high-powered new destroyers and radar gear.

While Taiwan will not be allowed to buy Aegis systems, the Navy's topflight air defense computer equipment, Bush will endorse the sale of less sophisticated items, the White House official said.

Visiting Taiwanese officials have been summoned to get the word officially from Rumsfeld on Tuesday.

Topping the list of less controversial items on Taiwan's shopping list that Bush has approved for sale are four Kidd-class destroyers and advanced missiles for Taiwanese air defense fighter jets.

Bush also has decided to help Taiwan get eight diesel-powered submarines, which the United States has not produced in three decades, and PC 3 Orion submarine-tracking aircraft.

China Crisis

Bush toyed with reporters earlier today, telling reporters he had made a decision but would keep it to himself.

"You'll find out when I make my decision clear," Bush said today after a White House event. "I haven't made it clear yet. We'll let you know soon." Relations with China have suffered a major setback in recent weeks, with Beijing's 11-day detention of the crew of a U.S. surveillance plane that made an emergency landing on China's Hainan Island after a collision with a Chinese fighter jet. The pilot of the Chinese aircraft was lost.

Many lawmakers, especially Republicans, had been pressuring Bush to provide Taiwan with more and better weapons. The lawmakers say the surveillance plane incident demonstrated a need to counter Chinese aggressiveness and expansionism.

Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., a member of the House International Relations Committee, told ABCNEWS the incident is likely to boost congressional support for Taiwan's request to buy advanced weapons.

"We have to send more and better arms, more sophisticated weaponry to Taiwan," King said. "I think that you will see a greater degree of weaponry going to Taiwan now than you would have if there had not been this terrible incident."

Still, Senate Intelligence Committee member Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., said the Aegis systems were too tall an order.

"If we were to sell them Aegis cruisers or destroyers, for example, it would be a decade before we could deliver those," Kyl said. "That's obviously not acceptable, given the kind of buildup of the Chinese."

Downplaying Decision

A National Security Council official said one of the main criteria for the decision is the Taiwan Relations Act, which requires the United States provide enough arms to Taiwan to maintain the island's self-defense capability. Another factor is the sense that China is building up its forces near Taiwan, which Beijing considers to be a renegade province.

But there is the sense that the White House wishes to downplay the decision, describing it as a routine, annual decision. White House spokesman Ari Fleischer repeatedly told reporters, "This decision is an annual one. It has been faced by previous decisions ever since, I believe, 1982. And so I think you can view this as an annual occurrence that took place last year, it will take place next year.

"It's part of an ongoing obligation of the United States government to help Taiwan secure its defensive needs," he said.

ABCNEWS' Ann Compton, Vic Ratner and Tamara Lipper contributed to this report.

---

Rumsfeld Against Arms Sale to Taiwan

New York Times
April 23, 2001
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/04/23/national/AP-US-Taiwan.html

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush is expected to accept the recommendation of his defense secretary and not sell Taiwan high-tech destroyers equipped with the Aegis combat radar system, two government officials said Monday.

The officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the Pentagon has recommended that Taiwan get four Kidd-class destroyers. Those vessels have a much less potent ship-borne radar system but would still be a step forward for Taiwan's navy.

The officials did not disclose Bush's decision, but said it was expected that he would follow Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld's lead.

It is Bush's first major action involving China since the country detained 24 U.S. airmen for 11 days after the collision of a U.S. surveillance plane and a Chinese fighter jet over the South China Sea.

Beijing fears the high technology eventually could serve as a platform for a regional missile that would provide a shield for Taiwan against China's growing arsenal of short-range ballistic missiles.

China considers Taiwan a breakaway province that must be reunited with the mainland. The Taiwan Relations Act, enacted in 1979, calls for the United States to provide Taiwan with ``such defense articles and defense services ... as may be necessary to enable Taiwan to maintain a sufficient self-defense capability.''

Key lawmakers were expected to be notified late Monday, and Taiwan would be given formal notification of Bush's decision Tuesday, officials said.

Sen. Craig Thomas, R-Wyo., who chairs the Senate Foreign Relations' East Asian and Pacific panel and was briefed on Bush's decision, said the proposed arms sales to Taiwan ``will be a robust package, I believe. But I don't think they're going to go all out to try to make the tension higher.''

One source said Rumsfeld's recommendation included several other defense systems besides the four Kidd-class destroyers. He would not say what they were.

Taiwan wants to buy other major weapons, including diesel-powered submarines, the new PAC-3 version of the Patriot air defense missile, M1 tanks, P-3 submarine-hunting planes and JDAMS satellite-guided bombs.

White House spokesman Ari Fleischer played down any implications for strained U.S.-China relations, calling the Taiwan decision ``an annual event'' and insisting that China's recent detention of an American spy plane crew will not be the sole factor in making the decision.

``Of course, the president's going to consider all factors that go into Taiwan's defense needs,'' Fleischer said.

Earlier, Bush told reporters his decision would soon be announced.

``You'll find out when I make my decision clear,'' the president said.'' I haven't made it clear yet. We'll let you know soon.''

Rumsfeld is scheduled to relay Bush's decision to a visiting Taiwanese delegation on Tuesday after notifying senior members of Congress.

Taiwan had asked for permission to buy warships equipped with the sophisticated Aegis radar systems.

Kidd-class destroyers are no longer in use in the U.S. Navy. Adm. Dennis Blair, the commander of U.S. Pacific Command, told Congress last month that the Kidd-class destroyers have ``plenty of useful life yet.''

At the State Department, spokesman Richard Boucher said the arms sale decision would not be influenced by recent, problems with China, including China's continued detention of the U.S. surveillance plane.

---

Taiwan won't get Aegis destroyers

USA Today
4/23/2001 - Updated 08:49 PM ET
http://usatoday.com/news/washdc/2001-04-23-taiwan.htm

WASHINGTON (AP) - President Bush rejected Taiwan's request to buy high-tech U.S. destroyers equipped with the Aegis combat radar system, but left open possibility of future sales if China continues to pose a military threat to the island.

Beijing had objected to its rival's bid for the Aegis system, and the sale could have worsened U.S.-China relations already strained by the collision between a U.S. spy plane and a Chinese jet that led to the 11-day detention of 24 American airmen.

A senior White House official, speaking to reporters on condition of anonymity, said Bush approved the sale of a number four Kidd-class destroyers, which have a much less potent ship-borne radar system that Aegis radar but would still be a step forward for Taiwan's navy.

The Kidd-class system could be available by 2003, providing more immediate defense than the Aegis system which would take until 2010 to build. The White House official said the Aegis system would still be available to Taiwan in 2010 if Bush decided at a later point to offer it.

The White House also said Bush agreed to sell Taiwan up to eight diesel submarines and 12 P-3 aircraft, along with various helicopters, assault vehicles and other arms. Along with the Aegis, the U.S. deferred sales of Apache helicopters and tanks requested by Taiwan.

The White House said the package was designed to bolster Taiwan's defenses against the mounting Chinese threats from the air. The U.S. is bound by law to help Taiwan defend itself. "We think there is nothing in this package for China to fear," the senior White House official said.

Officials said Bush would not characterize his decision as a rejection of Taiwan's request for the Aegis system, choosing the word "defer" to signal that the arms could still be sold if Beijing does not improve relations with the U.S.

Indeed, the White House official told reporters that China could decrease the chances of Taiwan getting the Aegis system if Beijing becomes less aggressive militarily.

It was Bush's first major action involving China since the country detained the U.S. servicemen and women. The Chinese still hold the U.S. surveillance plane.

Beijing fears the high technology eventually could serve as a platform for a regional missile defense system that would provide a shield for Taiwan against China's growing arsenal of short-range ballistic missiles.

China considers Taiwan a breakaway province that must be reunited with the mainland. The Taiwan Relations Act, enacted in 1979, calls for the United States to provide Taiwan with "such defense articles and defense services ... as may be necessary to enable Taiwan to maintain a sufficient self-defense capability."

Although 102 members of Congress recently signed letters to Bush supporting the Aegis sale, its deferral sparked little immediate criticism on Capitol Hill.

Rep. Christopher Cox, R-Calif., who co-wrote the House letter with Rep. David Wu, D-Calif., said he was confident Monday that Bush made his decision "based upon the best interests of the United States, Taiwan's defense needs and peace in the region."

"It is not Congress' role to micromanage decisions, only to ensure that adequate consideration is given consistent with the Taiwan Relations Act," Cox said.

And Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman John Warner gave a thumbs up to delaying Aegis sales before he was briefed Monday.

Bush "is going to have my strong support," said Warner, R-Va.

The decision came after Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld recommended the package, and Bush's national security team agreed with the assessment, the White House official said.

White House spokesman Ari Fleischer played down any implications for strained U.S.-China relations, calling the Taiwan decision "an annual event" and insisting that China's recent detention of an American spy plane crew will not be the sole factor in making the decision.

"Of course, the president's going to consider all factors that go into Taiwan's defense needs," Fleischer said.

Rumsfeld is scheduled to relay Bush's decision to a visiting Taiwanese delegation on Tuesday after notifying senior members of Congress.

Kidd-class destroyers are no longer in use in the U.S. Navy. Adm. Dennis Blair, the commander of U.S. Pacific Command, told Congress last month that the Kidd-class destroyers have "plenty of useful life yet."

At the State Department, spokesman Richard Boucher said the arms sale decision would not be influenced by recent problems with China, including China's continued detention of the U.S. surveillance plane.

---

Weapons U.S. will sell to Taiwan

USA Today
04/23/2001
By the Associated Press
http://usatoday.com/news/washdc/2001-04-23-taiwan-weapons.htm

The United States will sell the following to Taiwan, according to the White House. Unless specified, it is unclear how many of each item Taiwan will receive.

Four Kidd-class destroyers ready by 2003.
12 P-3C Orion aircraft.
Eight diesel submarines designed to counter blockades and invasions.
Paladin self-propelled artillery system.
MH-53E minesweeping helicopters.
AAV7A1 Amphibious Assault Vehicles.
Mk 48 torpedoes without advanced capabilities.
Avenger surface-to-air missile system.
Submarine-launched and surface-launched torpedoes.
Aircraft survivability equipment.

The United States also will give Taiwan a technical briefing on the Patriot anti-missile system the island has been developing.

-------- drug war

U.S. Crew Says It Tried to Block Attack in Peru

New York Times
April 23, 2001
By LIZETTE ALVAREZ
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/04/23/world/23PLAN.html

WASHINGTON, April 22 - The crew of an American surveillance plane tracking suspected drug-runners in Peru objected as the Peruvian Air Force rushed to attack a small plane carrying American missionaries, United States officials said today.

The attack, on Friday, killed one missionary, Veronica Bowers, and her 7-month-old daughter, Charity.

The surveillance plane's crew, who were American contract employees of the Central Intelligence Agency, raised repeated objections that the missionaries' plane had not yet been identified, the American officials said.

Despite their objections, a Peruvian officer aboard the American tracking plane called in a Peruvian interceptor jet, which moved quickly to attack the small plane.

In their account, the officials said the Peruvian military might have broken the rules of engagement arranged by the two countries for anti- drug operations.

The Peruvian A-37 jet flew close enough to the missionaries' plane, a single-engine Cessna equipped with pontoons, to get its identifying tail number before opening fire, but it apparently did not relay the registration number to the authorities on the ground, and it is not known whether it fired warning shots, the officials said.

"Our people attempted to slow down the intercept," a senior official said. "They asked them to get the tail number of the plane. There were a number of concerns by our crew that procedures may not have been followed or may have been rushed."

During the interception, the American plane was about a mile away, one official said.

The unarmed American tracking plane - a Cessna Citation jet owned by the Air Force - was flown by a crew of three Americans under a C.I.A. contract; they were a pilot, a co-pilot and a technician, officials said. Also on board was the Peruvian officer, whose job was to direct Peru's military interceptors to suspicious planes.

The tracking aircraft, one of many United States planes that are used in a longstanding program to help Peru and Colombia choke off the cocaine trade, played a crucial role in spotting the missionaries' plane and raising suspicions about its flight, according to the American officials. But they insisted that Peru's military was in command and control of drug interceptions, despite considerable support from the American military, anti-drug and intelligence agencies.

A statement issued by American officials said that "the U.S. crew was not in the Peruvian military chain of command, and had no authority or operational control over" the Peruvian officer on the Citation or over those in the attacking plane.

As the administration officials released their first, sketchy version of what happened, survivors of the episode said they had been in communication with Peruvian air traffic controllers during the flight and insisted that they had had no warning that they were about to be attacked.

A round of shots killed Ms. Bowers and her newly adopted baby. Ms. Bowers' husband, James; their son Cory, 6; and the pilot, Kevin Donaldson, who crash-landed the plane in the Amazon River, survived.

Friends of the survivors said they had learned that the Peruvian jet swooped in low and strafed the survivors as they clung to burning wreckage after the plane crashed in the river.

One of the friends, Pastor William Rudd of the Calvary Church in Muskegon, Mich., which supported the work of the Bowers family, said today after talking to Mr. Bowers on the phone that "there was no radio contact" with the Peruvian Air Force before the attack. He said the downed plane carried standard markings, as well as a large dove painted on the fuselage.

American officials, describing the hour between the time when the missionaries' plane was first sighted and when it was shot down, said the Peruvian authorities might not have followed established procedures.

The officials said the Peruvian officer on the tracking plane did try three times, using different frequencies and speaking in Spanish, to talk to the plane that was being followed, but had heard no response.

President Bush said today that the United States' role in assisting Peru's forces is simply to "pass on information" about possible drug smuggling.

Speaking at the conclusion of the Summit of the Americas in Quebec, Mr. Bush said he would withhold judgment until an investigation was completed. American tracking missions have been suspended pending the investigation.

"Our government is involved with helping, and a variety of agencies are involved with helping, our friends in South America identify airplanes that might be carrying illegal drugs," Mr. Bush said. "These operations have been going on for quite a while."

He said the American government's role was to "provide information as to tail numbers" or "help identify planes that fail to file flight plans."

United States officials said the American tracking aircraft notified its base of a radar sighting of the plane at about 9:43 a.m. local time Friday. The plane crossed a few miles into Brazil and then meandered back into Peruvian airspace. The tracking aircraft asked Peruvian officials on the ground if there was a flight plan for the plane, and were told that none could be located.

At that point, the Peruvian authorities decided to launch an armed interceptor to investigate. That plane shot the missionaries down.

According to the American officials, under standard procedures the Peruvian Air Force takes control of operations from the time it decides to launch interceptor aircraft. The American crew's only role, they said, is detection and tracking of suspect planes.

Peru several years ago began shooting down smugglers' planes if they refused to land when intercepted. But the United States refused for a time to provide tracking and targeting information to their militaries, fearing that the United States could be held culpable for killing civilians. Peru has shot, forced down or strafed more than 30 planes and seized more than a dozen on the ground since 1995.

The American operational support resumed that year after Congress passed a law absolving the United States and foreign authorities and contractors of liability for downing aircraft "reasonably suspected" of drug trafficking in foreign countries. Under the law, the United States may assist countries only once there were "appropriate procedures in place to protect against innocent loss of life in the air and on the ground in connection with interdiction, which shall at a minimum include effective means to identify and warn an aircraft before the use of force."

American officials said that the interception rules had been practiced extensively, and that since an incident in 1997 when the rules were broken, ground schools review them frequently.

Whether the warning and identification requirements were met on Friday remained in dispute today, as the Peruvian government, the United States officials and the missionaries offered varying accounts of what happened.

The Peruvian Air Force has said the missionaries had flown into Peruvian airspace from Brazil without filing a flight plan, an omission that raised suspicions about its cargo. In a communiqué issue on Saturday, the Peruvian Air Force said it had opened fire on the missionaries' plane after it failed to follow in-air directions to land.

An airport official in Iquitos, Peru, where the missionaries' plane was headed, told The Associated Press that the plane had established a flight plan by radio when it was in the air and had radioed the control tower several times.

Relatives and friends of Mr. Bowers, 37, and Mr. Donaldson, the Cessna's pilot, said today that they had filed a flight plane and had reported to Peru's air traffic authorities by radio before the attack.

Phil Bowers, who was not on the missionaries' plane but sat in on an interview between his brother James and a Peruvian air force colonel, told The Associate Press that his brother said the Peruvian military had made no attempt to communicate over the radio before two or three jets opened fire. The American officials spoke only of a single Peruvian interceptor.

Mr. Bowers, his son, Cory, and Mr. Donaldson, who was seriously wounded in both legs, arrived in the United States today from Peru. The adults on board the missionaries' plane were members of the Association of Baptists for World Evangelism, based in Harrisburg, Pa.

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Fugitive Brazilian Drug Lord Captured by Colombian Army

New York Times
April 23, 2001
By JUAN FORERO
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/04/23/world/23COLO.html

MARANDUA AIR FORCE BASE, Colombia, April 22 - With hundreds of Colombian troops in close pursuit, Luiz Fernando da Costa, Brazil's biggest cocaine dealer, raced across 150 miles of jungle with help from Colombia's biggest rebel group before being captured on Saturday, top army officials said today.

After Mr. da Costa's two months on the run, his dash to freedom ended not far from this military outpost near the Venezuelan border. Today, military officials hailed the capture, saying the Colombian Army had dismantled a sophisticated operation in which Mr. da Costa funneled arms to the rebels in exchange for a steady flow of cocaine that he then smuggled into Brazil and beyond.

But officials fell short of calling the rebels, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, a drug cartel. It underscored the delicate relationship between military officials, who believe the rebels have been granted too many concessions, and a president who has staked his office on reaching a peaceful settlement with the rebels to end Colombia's 37-year-long conflict.

In Canada today at the Summit of the Americas, President Bush expressed solidarity with Colombia's struggle against cocaine producers. He said President Ándres Pastrana is a strong leader. "It's going to be up to President Pastrana to make the peace," Mr. Bush said. "Once he does, we'll stand by his side."

Mr. da Costa, 33, who went from running drugs in a slum to become Brazil's most notorious drug cartel chief, denied working with the rebels when he was paraded before television cameras. "I don't have connections with the FARC," he said. "The FARC did not protect me."

Military officials who have been tracking Mr. da Costa said his association with the rebel group, which was apparently solidified when he moved to Colombia in 1999 to escape Brazilian justice, resulted in the transportation of thousands of sophisticated arms through the jungle to the rebels. In return, Mr. da Costa was permitted to transport cocaine by air and sea to the heart of Brazil, to be smuggled on to Europe and the United States.

The rebel group has said it taxes coca cultivation and other aspects of the coca trade but does not traffic in drugs. And some drug experts and government officials here and elsewhere say they have not seen evidence that the group is a drug-trafficking operation.

The army's effort to dismantle Mr. da Costa's operation and capture him began on Feb. 12, when troops raided a series of coca-producing laboratories and arrested several Brazilians. Mr. da Costa escaped, but on Feb. 18 he was wounded in a shootout with troops at a farm the military said belongs to Tomás Molina, a rebel leader.

Army officials said Mr. da Costa, with a handful of rebels, melded into the jungle, traveling by small river boats and on foot. Eventually, the army lost contact with him.

Then, on Thursday, a Cessna plane in which Mr. da Costa was traveling was forced down by a Colombian OV- 10 air force plane. He fled on foot with four other men. One of the men, Nicasio Angulo, identified as a rebel, was caught on Friday. And then on Saturday, exhausted and wounded from three gunshot wounds suffered in February, Mr. da Costa was arrested, along with a Brazilian bodyguard. The military said the two who escaped were also rebels.

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As Survivors Return Home, Family Vehemently Deny Peru's Account

New York Times
April 23, 2001
By ROBERT D. McFADDEN
http://www.nytimes.com/2001/04/23/world/23MISS.html

Three survivors of a missionary plane shot down in Peru after being mistaken for drug smugglers returned to the United States yesterday as details of their ord