AQUATONE BRIEFING PAPER FOR THE JOINT CHIEFS OF STAFF RE GUIDED MISSILES, ATOMIC ENERGY, AND LONG RANGE BOMBERS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP61S00750A000200080007-3
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: T
• Document Page Count: 5
• Document Creation Date: November 17, 2016
• Document Release Date: April 13, 1999
• Sequence Number: 7
• Publication Date: August 28, 1957
• Content Type: PAPER

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pose to define for you the unique rot. Which AQUATONLtyp.
photos', y ploys in the production of National Intetllganc. estimate., which
provide the buil for important decisions affecting the National Security.
All of the principal objectives we will discuss fall into those strengths that
have been determined by the National Intelligence Community to be the most
significant in the Soviet ability to strike at the United States
These are: The Soviet guided missile system, the Soviet nuclear
weapons production program, and the Soviet long-range bomber force.
Our preeent intelligence on all of these critical Soviet capabilities
still contains major areas of uneertaintiee. A significant quantity of our
*misting information on these strengths is fragmentary, and, consequently,
our present estimates, in gems cases, admit to significant margins of
possible error.
US define* plans, budgets to support them, involve vast cams
y and allocation of effort, da admittedly, are at present based
Mien having these margins of possible error. Accordingly, such
obi can be materially effected by reducing these margins.
t in the AQIIATONX system we have an important tool in
g these possible errors.
In ths critical field of Soviet guided missile d.votopmant,we find
seme of our 2111140T intelligence gaps. Other el sources have
provided knowledge of at least 260 ballistic missile firings en the KAPIISTIN
TAR range since 1993, We hove never seen a Soviet ballistic missile.
We have had only limited information regarding launching pads, erection
and bundling equipment, guidance imaginations and equipment, test stands
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fuel storage, ether associated launching devices. Data on these items
are essential for *firm statement a* to the else, type, and pay load of
missiles, guidance systems, and types of engines used for propulsion.
Thie type of information is vital for the production of estimates of present
and potential Soviet missile capabilities.
During AQUATONIC operations in July of 1956 two small probable
missile facilities were photographed, but it was not until about two weeks
ago that we had actually seen a major physical facility supporting the USSR
ballistic missile test program.
Now, at TTUR.A. TAM, we have photographed and can study in detail
a relatively new rangehead still under construction. The overcast on the
far oblique in this display obscures our ability to identify what is probably
the actual launching area--with its associated equipment, and.b.conceiyabir.,
actual long..range missiles. There is, however, considerable information
on the rangeheed support elements, The TYURA. TAM photography is the
first visual evidence of a facility bearing on the Soviet ICBM test program
A complete, unobscured coverage could have given indications not only of
the status of the program but possibly the critical element in the
guided missile estimates, andw-at the moment--would be particularly useful
in an evaluation of current Soviet claims on ICBM progress. We intend to
go back as soon as operationally feasible to clarify the launching site at
TTUR.A TAM.
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Our principal estimative problems with regard to the Soviet long.
range bomber force relate to its capabilities for attack on the VS, in numbers
and types of delivery vehicles available to the ferce as well as the availability
of meteor weapons of various types, "Stille our exploitation of a wide variety
of intelligence data has permitted broad fasthuates of the strength and capa-
bilities of the longftrakAge bomber force, there are significant gaps which we
believe could be starrerAved by additional photographic coverage. Photography
of moscowirui. 'the only known protucer of ISON jet heavy bombers, has
enabled us to dote:ma-tine more precisely the production capacity of the plant.
Similar photography ? of the aircraft Victories at VORONEZH, KITTRYSHEV,
KAZAN, and MICUTS},:.-..,..identified fon ) other sources as producing or capable
of producing h?avy bombers-AL-?":5Uld enable us to measure their actual and
potential production capsbilities with a degree of precision not now possible.
Our knowledge of the true stature of the Sevist heavy bomber force
has been limited not only by lack of precise information on production
facilities but equally by the lack of first band observation of the home bases
of this force, 25X1D1 a
Ana its of varioue types of intelligence,
Photography confirming
this belief would provide bench marks enabling us to ascertain far more
accurately than is now possible the steel and deployment of Soviet heavy
bomber forces.
Valuable intelligence broproducts also can be anticipated as a
result of the coverage of the primary systems we have discussed. Route
photography can be expected to yield significant details of other Soviet air
installations, transportation systems, industrial facilities, and ether
economic and military targets which could be of a significance only slightly
less than th.e information we anticipate en primary objectives, One of the
outstanding bonus effects that we know will be derived by future exercise
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of ? AQUATONEcapability will be an inersu. in our knowl
air defense capabilities.
will result in a firmar basis for o
employment of our n strike force. And it also must
the .xercie of the AQ A.TONE capability over otherwise largely inaccessible
areas of the Soviet Union could reveal installations and activities of a Ceram
pletely unknown but highly significant nature. In the TASHKENT area of
the Soviet Union, close to the Afghan border where we had previously known
only of the deployment of Soviet tactical aircraft, photography has revealed
an airstrip of approximately 15,000 feet in length is under construction.
The establiehment of such a facility in an area not normally coneidered
to be the sits of longpirange air force operations opens up a new region of
research into possible Soviet plans for employment of its long.range air
craft, As a specific by.product, AQUATONE photography yield* terrain
information from which accurate radar navigation and bombing charts can
be construed.
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