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Bush Ignores History Of Verification |
Current rating: 0 |
by Mike Lehman, Urbana-Champaign IMC
Email: mlehman (nospam) students.uiuc.edu (unverified!) |
08 Jul 2001
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In rebuttal to the Bush Adminitration seeking to renounce the CTBT, I offer a paper I wrote for my Spring, 2001 Physics 180 class at the University of Illinois detailing how lack of public knowledge about our past experience in monitoring nuclear weapons impedes a rational discussion about the present situation regarding verification of treaties limiting the spread of nuclear weapons.
Reference to this U-C IMC Article:
http://urbana.indymedia.org/active/news/display.php3?article_id=1369 |
Air Force Technical Applications Center:
The Ways and Means for Verification
Mike Lehman
Physics 180
April 6, 2001
Abstract
The name of the Air Force Technical Applications Center (AFTAC) is one that is unfamiliar to most Americans. Its organizational title is a purposely vague one, as its mission of nuclear intelligence and surveillance during the Cold War was classified Top Secret. Because of this secrecy, the public has been led to believe that the U.S. has only very limited and possibly ineffective means with which to verify treaties that seek to control and limit nuclear arms. Arguments by lawmakers in opposition to implementation of such important treaties as the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) are made based on either ignorance of AFTAC’s capabilities or unwillingness to admit that the U.S. possesses effective and reliable means to enforce such treaties. This report makes the case that continued secrecy about AFTAC’s history and accomplishments no longer serves the public interest or national security.
Section 1: Introduction
The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) was rejected by the US Senate in 1999. Many critics of the CTBT claimed that the treaty would be subject to cheating and thus unenforceable. Yet, the US has an effective and skilled intelligence unit, the Air Force Technical Applications Center (AFTAC), which has more than half a century of experience in using technology to detect nuclear explosions and verify arms control agreements. The public is, for the most part, unaware of the successes of the AFTAC mission in managing the US Atomic Energy Detection System (USAEDS), due to the classified nature of its work over most of its period of operation.
A public unaware of AFTAC’s successful history in fulfilling its mission is subject to manipulation by those who oppose treaties such as the CTBT. It is in the public interest that a more complete history of AFTAC’s work be released. Knowledge of the cost-effective nature of AFTAC’s work will build support for full funding of essential research, development, and operational costs in its work of managing US participation in the International Monitoring System (IMS) which is essential to monitoring the CTBT. This will further enhance the USAEDS and the national security of the US, as the IMS will put additional monitoring resources at AFTAC’s disposal.
Section 2: A Short History of AFTAC
AFTAC is the successor organization to a long legacy of US military support for nuclear intelligence gathering and surveillance. The first efforts in this area were carried out by the Manhattan Engineer District, in coordination with Army Intelligence and Army Air Force, in the fall of 1944 against possible German efforts to develop nuclear weapons. Low-flying A-26 aircraft carried gaseous sampling gear that attempted to collect the isotope xenon-133, which is emitted by operating nuclear reactors. The results showed no such emissions, indicating that Germany probably did not have a near-term capability to build a nuclear weapon. (1)
With the formation of the U.S. Defense Department from the Navy and War Departments and the organization of the U.S. Air Force as a separate service, Major General Curtis LeMay urged that the new Air Force be given the task of what was by then referred to as Long Range Detection (LRD). General Dwight Eisenhower concurred and the Air Force has been the lead agency of the U.S. government in managing the mission of collection of data regarding nuclear weapons ever since.
The first great success of LRD was the detection of Joe-1, as the first Soviet nuclear test was known in the U.S.. Despite the interim nature of the system at the time, the Air Force was able to pinpoint the first Soviet explosion to within 100 miles and the occurrence of the blast to within 10 minutes of the actual place and time. On Sept. 23, 1949, President Truman announced that \"within recent weeks\" a nuclear explosion had occurred within the Soviet Union. (2) The vagueness of his announcement was intended to mislead about the accuracy, sources, and methods that the U.S. had used to detect the Soviet bomb.
To monitor nuclear weapons developments in the Soviet Union, AFTAC’s predecessor organizations established and expanded the U.S. Atomic Energy Detection System (USAEDS), as LRD became known. A wide variety of methods were used to
support the USAEDS, all of them involving leading edge science and technology. The primary methods of detection were aerial sampling of particulates and gases, seismic monitoring, and infrasound and hydroacoustic monitoring of the atmosphere and oceans. A wide variety of other methods have also been used, with varying degrees of cost-effectiveness. Worldwide networks of monitoring stations were established as scientific research and development perfected ever more accurate techniques. One measure of the extent of effort put into nuclear intelligence is that spending for LRD was 9% of the total military research and development budget in 1947. (3)
Most of the history of the USAEDS is still classified, but an unclassified official history states that the USAEDS \"won respect and high-level support within the U.S. government.\" (4) At the least, the funding and expansion of AFTAC through the 1950’s and 60’s during a time of numerous tests was an indication that the organization was successful. Its methods are well-regarded and trusted as vital sources of intelligence to the present day.
The signing of the Limited Test Ban Treaty (LTBT) in 1963 brought a new mission to AFTAC, that of verifying compliance with arms control agreements. It also brought new challenges, as the banning of all nuclear testing, except for underground tests, expanded the need for accurate methods of verifying that such testing complied with the LTBT. Cooperation with other nations expanded the worldwide network of seismic and other detection method stations. Unfortunately, most of AFTAC’s record of accomplishment is still classified, with the result that the public is unaware of the success that the U.S. has had in monitoring nuclear weapons testing.
Later agreements to limit nuclear weapons have encouraged a more open approach to monitoring. The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), when it goes into force, will be supported by the International Monitoring System (IMS). (5) The U.S. component that feeds and receives information from the IMS is the National Data Center (NDC), which is operated by AFTAC. Ironically, the information and data collected since 1996 through the NDC is available online, with daily updates. (6)
Section 3: Technology of Verification
AFTAC tested and put into use a wide variety of technologies to accomplish its Cold War mission. The following well-tested techniques will be put to use in the IMS.
Aerial Techniques: These consisted primarily of sampling for gaseous and particulate matter, up to and including space. Gases were analyzed and particles examined in ways that enabled investigators to determine the actual construction of bombs. Although used less now that all testing has moved underground, aerial sampling can still be useful in identifying gases that escape from underground blasts that vent into the atmosphere.
Surface-based Particulate Sampling: Similar to some airborne techniques, this approach used ground-based units to filter high volumes of air in order to identify radionuclides present in the atmosphere. Automated units about the size of a refrigerator have been developed that will be linked into detection networks. (7)
Seismic Techniques: This is a mature technology that will be even more effective with data from the expanding IMS. A key technology for monitoring compliance of underground testing, seismic analysis has been at the root of disputes about the verifiability of the CTBT. Mining and other activities create a noisy background environment which makes it difficult to distinguish innocent activities from potential concealed, low-level nuclear testing. Only coordinated dense regional networks of seismic stations, as proposed in the CTBT, along with more research on localized geological structures, can provide coverage that will effectively rule out concealment of nuclear testing. (9)
Infrasonic Technique: This technology monitors pressure changes in the Earth’s atmosphere caused by explosions. Although it’s use was superseded by satellite methods in the U.S. intelligence community, this technology is undergoing a revival in preparations to implement the CTBT. (10)
Hydroacoustic Technique: This technology monitors sound transmissions underwater. It is important because of the large percentage of the Earth’s surface which is covered by water. (11)
Satellite Techniques: Piggybacked onto other satellites, AFTAC has a space-based network of sensors that detect visible, infrared and x-ray emissions from any explosion in the atmosphere or near-Earth space. (12)
Other Techniques: A variety of other technologies were utilized, either operationally or experimentally, by AFTAC. These primarily monitored changes in various electrical and magnetic fields associated with the Earth and its atmosphere caused by nuclear explosions.
Section 4: Issues of Verification
The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) that awaits Senate ratification has been derided as \"unverifiable\" by critics. (13) These critics are counting on exploiting widespread public ignorance of the historical capabilities of the secret USAEDS to defeat the CTBT when another vote is taken on its ratification.
While the USAEDS has certain limitations, better knowledge about its history would do much to reinforce public support for the effective supplementation of this system by the integration of the new International Monitoring System (IMS) with the mature technology that AFTAC has traditionally used. Since 1996, the U.S., through AFTAC’s role as the lead U.S. government agency in the National Data Center (NDC), has helped to link together seismic, infrasound, hydroacoustic, and radionuclide monitoring stations that feed into the Prototype International Data Center (PIDC, which will eventually become the IDC once the CTBT is in force.) The IDC will support the IMS that will be set up under the CTBT. (14) While the U.S. would benefit greatly from the additional data received from the IMS, the CTBT provides that the IDC will not make determinations of the meaning of the data itself. U.S. intelligence agencies will still make their own determination of whether or not a violation of the CTBT has occurred. (15)
This new network effectively overcomes the limitations of the USAEDS network, which focused primarily on Russian and Chinese testing sites, by adding new coverage zones. (16) The linking of regional seismic arrays allows much more precise location of suspect incidents. Worldwide, the new IMS will reliably detect explosions as small as one kiloton. In many areas of the world, seismic detection will be effective to explosive levels as low as 200 tons. The hydroacoustic coverage in the southern hemisphere will be as low as a few pounds of dynamite. This represents a substantial reduction in the minimum size of explosions that AFTAC has been able to detect. (17) Finally, when the CTBT goes into force, it will allow On-Site Inspections of suspect incidents, a important capability which AFTAC has never had before. (18)
An improved monitoring capability does not solve all problems potentially associated with nuclear proliferation. Weapons or weapons grade material could still be acquired on the black market. The creation of anything other than a crude, difficult to deliver device is considered highly improbable, however. Fashioning a thermonuclear weapon or a compact, weaponized fission weapon requires extensive testing. While there is the possibility of concealing testing in a number of ways, the knowledge of such techniques has so far been dependent on extensive prior experience with testing, something which only the declared nuclear states have. (19)
Even if testing was somehow concealed, U.S. intelligence agencies rely on a variety of other sources and methods to complete the evaluation of potential nuclear threats. Delivery system testing, which can reveal much about another nation’s capabilities and intentions and which are difficult to conceal, are monitored by a variety of other intelligence methods that supplement AFTAC and IMS systems. Detection of the extensive industrial infrastructure that is required to produce weapons grade materials is another aspect where the overlapping coverage of other U.S. intelligence agencies avoids the need to rely solely on monitoring to detect proliferation of nuclear weapons.
AFTAC monitoring capabilities are being tapped to build the IMS, but not all monitoring capabilities that AFTAC possesses will be made available to the IMS. Potential violators will not be able to be sure that they have escaped detection by relying on the publicly available IMS data. (20)
Seismic data is at the heart of the IMS system, but it is supplemented by infrasound, hydroacoustic, and radionuclide techniques that AFTAC has proven to be effective in the last half-century. Combined with classified techniques that AFTAC will retain and supplement with information available from other U.S. government intelligence agencies, AFTAC is well placed to help build an IMS that will have the confidence of the international community, and should have the confidence of the U.S. public, while it maintains its historic national security mission .
Section 5 : Conclusions and Recommendations
Opponents of agreements such as the CTBT have now taken up a hew and cry against U.S. participation in the IMS. Speaking in the name of national security, they are undermining support for an expanded monitoring system as a way of building support for an unneeded and unrelated resumption of nuclear testing by the U.S.. (21) Decision makers should carefully separate the fact from the fiction. The U.S. has an unparalleled and unchallenged military position of supremacy in the world today. There are no effective defenses against nuclear weapons, except to reduce the numbers that potentially threaten the U.S..
The CTBT, with its ban on the nuclear testing that could advance other nation’s nuclear capabilities and its accompanying system of verification, the IMS, is the key to the future security of the U.S.. At the same time, it allows the U.S. to retain the military strength that makes the U.S. the dominant force in the world today. The believability of arguments about the alleged shortcomings of nuclear monitoring is built on public ignorance of the U.S.’s successful use of proven technology in monitoring the development of other nations nuclear weapons over the past half century. The expansion of AFTAC’s system capabilities by incorporating select parts of it into the IMS is an unprecedented opportunity for the U.S. to retain its leadership position in the military arena with diplomatic leadership of an international consensus against the further spread of nuclear weapons.
No amount of money spent on such ill-conceived notions as National Missile Defense can buy us the security of a world that has joined together to oppose and detect further expansion or possession of nuclear capability. Achieving further reductions in weapons whose employment may threaten the user nearly as much as the target can only be based on a world that has reached a consensus that there will be no new possessors of nuclear weapons. If there are violations detected, then that is the time to consider use of military force. The IMS, with the support of AFTAC, is the surest way of detecting such violations and building a consensus to take military action against substantiated future threats of this nature. (22)
Support of the existing USAEDS has been less than fully funded in recent years. Gen. John M. Shalikashvili noted this lack of support in January:
\"In recent years, support for arms control and non-proliferation intelligence has not kept pace with support for other intelligence priorities... Since non-proliferation is
an enduring national security challenge, intelligence support for current military activities should not reduce support for more long-term elements of an integrated non-proliferation strategy.\" (23)
Full funding of research into verification, and of AFTAC’s mission itself, both secret and within the IMS, is necessary to increase the accuracy and coverage of the USAEDS to fully cover all areas of the world with the potential for use for clandestine nuclear testing. This research will make AFTAC an even more effective organization for its traditional intelligence and surveillance mission, while advancing important national goals in deterring nuclear proliferation.
Humankind’s knowledge of what to do about the future is often determined by how much we understand the past. This brings us to potentially the thorniest problem holding up release of a more complete history of AFTAC (it should be noted that a classified history already exists.) (24) AFTAC’s mission has required a number of diplomatic agreements to allow it to operate in specific areas of the world necessary to detect phenomenon associated with nuclear testing. Governments have traditionally avoided making their cooperation with a secretive U.S. government agency public to avoid domestic embarrassment.
In the spirit of building on the already existing international consensus against nuclear proliferation, it is important that governments consider the need to demonstrate their resolve to prevent further nuclear proliferation by letting the historical record of their work to make the world a safer place speak for itself. While this will need to be handled on a case by case basis, I feel that a vital part of an effective international movement to reduce the threat of nuclear weapons is to expand the bilateral nature of previous agreements to reflect the international consensus to control nuclear weapons by revealing the historic roots of international cooperation to avoid nuclear war.
Sources and References
AFTAC U.S. National Data Center website: http://www.tt.aftac.gov/
accessed: April 1, 2001
The Center for Security Policy, http://www.security-policy.org/papers/2001/01-F26.html
accessed: April 2, 2001
Richard Monastersky, \"Policing the Peace,\" Science News Online, May 11, 1996
www.sciencenews.org/sn_arch/5_11_96/bob1.htm
accessed: April 1, 2001
National Academy of Sciences, Committee on International Security and Arms Control, The Future of U.S. Nuclear Weapons Policy, (National Academy Press, 1997)
National Research Council, Panel on Basic Research Requirements in Support of Comprehensive Test Ban Monitoring, Research Required to Support Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty Monitoring, (National Academy Press, 1997)
Prototype International Data Center, www.pidc.org/
accessed: April 2, 2001
Science Applications International Corp., Fifty Year Commemorative History of Long Range Detection: The Creation, Development, and Operation of the United States Atomic Energy Detection System, (Springfield, VA: NTIS, 1997)
Gen. (USA, ret.) John Shalikashvili, Findings and Recommendations Concerning the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, (U.S State Dept., 2001)
Lynn Sykes, \"Small Earthquake Near Russian Test Site Leads to U.S. Charges of Cheating on Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty,\" Journal of the Federation of American Scientists, November/December 1997,
www.fas.org/faspir/pir1197.htm
Lynn Sykes and Paul Richards, interview:\"The Watchers: Seismic Monitoring and the CTBT\", www.omnimag.com/archives/live_science/lamont/ls2.html
accessed: April 1, 2001
US Dept. of Energy Nuclear Explosion Monitoring Research & Engineering Program, webpage: www.nemre.nn.doe.gov/nemre/
accessed: April 1, 2001
Gregory van der Vink, Jeffrey Park, Richard Allen, Terry Wallace, Christel Hennet, \"False Accusations, Undetected Test And Implications for the CTB Treaty,\" Arms Control Today, May 1998, www.geophysics.princeton.edu/~rallen/PUBLICATIONS/98.ACT/index.html
Charles A. Ziegler and David Jacobson, Spying Without Spies: Origins of America’s Secret Nuclear Surveillance System (Westport, CT: Praeger, 1995)
PHYS180 Research Paper ENDNOTES
1) Charles A. Zeigler and David Jacobson, Spying Without Spys, (Westport, CT, Praeger, 1995), 4-8.
2) Zeigler and Jacobson, 210-211
3) Zeigler and Jacobson, 145
4) Science Applications International Corp., 50 Year Commemorative History of LRD, (Satellite Beach, FL, 1997), 42
5) http://www.nemre.nn.doe.gov/nemre/
6) http://www.tt.aftac.gov/
7) SAIC, 59-69
8) SAIC, 83-86
9) SAIC, 71-80
10) SAIC, 97-100
11) SAIC, 113-116
12) SAIC, 123-129
13) The Center for Security Policy, http://www.security-policy.org/papers/2001/01-F26.html
14) Prototype International Data Center, http://www.pidc.org/
15) Lynn Sykes, \"Small Earthquake Near Russian Test Site Leads to U.S. Charges of Cheating on Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty,\" Journal of the Federation of American Scientists, Nov/Dec 1997
16) Richard Monastersky, \"Policing the Peace,\" Science News Online, May 11, 1996
http://www.sciencenews.org/sn_arch/5_11_96/bob1.htm
17) Gen. (USA, ret.) John Shalikashvili, Findings and Recommendations Concerning the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, (U.S State Dept., 2001), 5
18) Gregory van der Vink, Jeffrey Park, Richard Allen, Terry Wallace, Christel Hennet, \"False Accusations, Undetected Test And Implications for the CTB Treaty,\" Arms Control Today, May 1998
19) Shalikashvili, 4
20) van der Vink, et al
21) The Center for Security Policy, http://www.security-policy.org/papers/2001/01-F26.html
22) Shalikashvili, 4
23) Shalikashvili, 6
24) Zeigler & Jacobson, vii
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Comments
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Slightly Corrected Version: Bush Ignores H... |
by Mike Lehman, U-C IMC
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
08 Jul 2001
|
If you use this article as a reference, please use the version on the global IMC site at this URL. It has a couple of corrections.
Thanks,
Mike Lehman, U-C IMC |
See also:
http://www.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=51470&group=webcast
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Concerned? |
by Mike Lehman
(No verified email address) |
Current rating: 0
08 Jul 2001
|
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With the issues raised here? Other approaches are possible. Check out this report from the Union of Concerned Scientists: |
See also:
http://www.ucsusa.org/security/npr.html
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Re: Bush Ignores History Of Verification |
by Floyd E. Rasmussen
floyderasmussen (nospam) yah00.com (unverified) |
Current rating: 0
14 Dec 2005
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I served in AFTAC from 1962 to 1969 and am now just researching some of the on-line material concerning my unit's history, accomplishments during the Cold War,and present activities.
I was almost shocked to learn of the fact that AFTAC now has it's own web page! When I was in the mere mention of the acronym"AFTAC" was a criminal offense.
Since i served during the Vietnam era,I'm often asked if i was in Vietnam? I have to honestly say no. That immediately renders me to the position of "less than honorable", just regular, Air Force joe.
I wish there were a way whereby those of us who served this mission during the Vietnam years could receive due honor and recognition before our families, communities, and the Veteran's Administration .
We were involved in fighting a war that had perhaps more dire consequences than the,albeit, war in Vietnam.
After getting out in 1969, I suffered my own type of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder from years of living in secrecy, not being able to share much of anything about my 20's with loved ones.
I found that the Veteran's Administration doesn"t give much consideration to those of us veterans who cannot show that they were "involved in combat"!
Are you able to tell me about any programs established to support those of us veterans who were involved in this kind of work?
I've been minimally employed, or essentially unemployable, for many years now, but cannot receive much of any kind of help from the VA since i cannot provide details of my service.
Veterans' representatives don't seem to be able to help because they don't have a clue as to what i'm talking about when I try to explain the nature of my service!
I'm proud of my service years, and very proud of the work AFTAC is now doing. I wish I were still a part of it! |
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