DCI BRIEFING OF THE SUBCOMMITTEE ON HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT, AND INDEPENDENT AGENCIES OF SENATE APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE ON THE SOYUZ/APOLLO FLIGHT

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP77M00144R000500100127-9
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 7
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: October 18, 2004
• Sequence Number: 127
• Publication Date: May 4, 1975
• Content Type: MFR

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OLC 75-1352
4 June 1975
SUBJECT: DCI Briefing of the Subcommittee on Housing and Urban
Development, and Independent Agencies of Senate
Appropriations Committee on the Soyuz/Apollo Flight.
1. On 4 June 1975, Carl Duckett, DDS&T, briefed the Subcommittee
on Housing and Urban Development, and Independent Agencies of the Senate
Appropriations Committee on the Soyuz/Apollo flight. The meeting lasted
from. 0930 hours until 1100 hours. A technical sweep of the room, 1223
Dirksen Office Building, was conducted and the room was kept under
technical monitoring throughout. The briefing included Top Secret/Sensitive
material. A transcript was taken.
William Proxmire (D., Wis.), Chairman
Birch Bayh (D., Ind.)
Lawton Chiles (D. , Fla.)
J. Bennett Johnston (D. , La.)
Walter D. Huddleston (D. , Ky. )
Milton R. Young (R., N. Dak.)
Ron Tammen
Robert B. Clark
Gilford Keyes
4. Accompanying the Director were:
Carl Duckett, DDS&T
George L. Cary, Legislative Counsel
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5. In his opening statement, Senator Proxmire expressed his
concern about the safety of the American astronauts in the upcoming
Apollo/Soyuz project. He said he had expressed this concern prior to
today's briefing and it was a matter of great interest to him. Mr. Proxmire
also raised a question of our reviewing the transcript of Mr. Duckett's
testimony with a view to sanitizing it for publication. Mr. Duckett indicated
that the bulk of the material on which this briefing was based was from
extremely sensitive sources, and
that to eliminate that information from the transcript would give a distorted
impression of the facts. Mr. Duckett suggested that perhaps we could
work with the Subcommittee staff in preparing an unclassified statement
which could be used in a Committee report on this subject,
6. The Chairman also asked Mr. Duckett to alert: the Subcommittee
and brief them on any additional information that might come to our attention
that has a bearing on the safety of the upcoming mission. Mr. Duckett
agreed to do this. Lastly, the Chairman asked Mr. Duckett if the
unclassified charts used in his presentation could be reduced to page form
and included in the published material. Mr. Duckett said they could.
7. Mr. Duckett read a prepared statement and then responded to
questions from the members. Chairman Proxmire was interested not. only
in the safety of the mission as far as U. S. astronauts were concerned but
also asked a number of questions as to what benefits would derive to the
U. S. from this program. Mr. Duckett said he felt there were very few
technical benefits that would be derived from this'misssion from the U.S.
.
standpoint the benefit would have to be assessed in terms of the political
aspects of it. He also pointed out that the Apollo program is way ahead of
the Soviets but even so, the advantages to the Soviets were fairly minimal
since much of the information on the Apollo program is in the public domain.
The principle advantage to the Soviets would be in their exposure to the more
efficient U. S. training procedures.
8. Senator Young asked the interesting question of, whether, in
case of an emergency, who makes the decision as to the action to be taken.
Mr. Duckett said that throughout the flight each crew will be responding to
directions from his own country. The only time that this becomes at all
confusing is during the docking situation where the two spacecraft are mated
together. It has been agreed, however, that in the event of an emergency,
the two spacecraft will undock and each spacecraft handle its own situation.
In response to a question from Senator Young about the language barrier, Mr.
Duckett said each of the crews has been trained in the other's language and
while they are not proficient, it is believed that they have had sufficient
language training to satisfy their purposes. Mr. Duckett was asked how far
out in space the docking will occur. He responded he thought about 150 miles
but he would double check on this.
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9. Senator Chiles asked how long the two spacecraft would be
mated together, Mr. Duckett replied approximately 4?, hours. Senator
Chiles also asked how many men can return in each of the spacecraft.
Mr. Duckett said that he thought: only the two Soviets could return in their
spacecraft, although they might possibly squeeze in a third person.
Certainly, they could not get all four in the Soviet craft. On the other
hand, the Apollo spacecraft could, if necessary, accomodate all four
spacemen.
10. Senator Huddleston raised the interesting question of whether
we would be losing any of our classified technology in the course of this
project. Mr. Duckett said that all necessary precautions are being taken
by NASA officials to avoid this possibility. The Chairman askedw.hatwe
thought would be the next big space activity on the part of the Soviets. Mr.
Duckett responded that he expected it would be a Venus probe.
11. Follow up Actions _, At the conclusion of the briefing, Senator
Proxmire raised a number of questions and asked that they be answered
for the record. Those questions and the others are as follows:
a. Provide the committee with page-sized versions of the
unclassified charts and the diagram of the Soviet and U. S.
spacecraft.
b. Check on the actual point in space at which docking
will occur.
c. How much have the Soviets spent for their space
program, especially in the past ten years.
d. What is our assessment of the cost of the Soyuz/Apollo
program to the Soviets.
e. Provide figures on the number of military and civilian
personnel in the Soviet space program.
f. To what extent are the Soyuz flights being used for
intelligence and military purposes.
g. Is Soviet work on an anti-satellite satellite, a violation
of the outer space treaty (Mr. Duckett indicated that this wasn't
really our responsibility. However, we might check with the
State Department to see if they have any position on this).
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h. Review the question of the relative advantages of
the joint space program to both the U. S. and the USSR for
publication.
8. At the conclusion of the briefing, Senator Proxmire complimented
Mr. Duckett on his presentation and also referred to the excellent intelligence
briefing he had received from the Director and our economists on the state of
the Soviet and Chinese economies. He characterized these briefings as
invaluable. Senator Bayh seconded this statement and said that during these
times of criticism of CIA he thought it was important to give us credit where
credit was due. Senator Proxmire indicated that the briefing had not changed
his basic position with respect to the joint program he is still opposed to
it on the basic grounds that it exposes U. S. astronauts to an undue safety risk
and there is little if anything for the United States to gain from this exercise
and more to be gained by the Soviets.
9. At the expiration of the briefing I talked privately with Senator
Bayh and said I had noticed his remarks in the Congressional Record the
other day with respect to legislation to bar the use of the polygraph in
Government, except for possible use for intelligence purposes. I told him
that as he probably knew, we made extensive use of the polygraph as an
investigative aid in our employment procedures and found it to be most
useful. I told him that we would be happy to meet with him and discuss this
in detail at his convenience. He said he would want to do this before hearings
are held on the legislation and commented that he might come down on the
other side of our position, but he was certainly willing to hear our case.
Geo ge L. Cary
Legislative Counsel
Distribution:
Original - Sui ject file
1 - DDS&T, Mr. Duckett
0"- OLC Chrono
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 Approved For Release 20C`41"/;-74: IA_ 1Gf00114R000500100127-9
JOURNAL
OFFICE OF LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL
Wednesday ?- 4 June 1975
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25X1A Senate Aeronautical and Space Sciences Committee, and, per arrangements
made by I left a memorandum relating to the-S- pint mann 1
space effort with him. I advised him that the Agency courier would pick
up the document later this afternoon. Allnut said. these arrangements were
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document.
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Met with Robert Allnut, staff director,
alerted the OCI couriers to pick up t12 X1
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Journal - Office of Legislative Counsel
Wednesday - 4 June 1975
CI INTERNAL USE ONLY'
Page ?.
6. Received a call from Louise Greenfield
on the star of the Join 7,conomrc Committee requesting a copy of a recent
CIA publication, ;mot?-W. , : 1974 Results and 1975 Prospects.
I told-her there would be no problem getting a copy to the Committee and
that I would deliver it within. the next week.
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Journal. -- Office of Legislative Counsel
Wednesday - 4 June 1975
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13.1 Accompanied Carl Duckett, DDS&T, to a
briefing of the Subcommittee on HUD, Space, Science, Veterans of Senate
Appropriations Committee on the subject of the Sovti-A.nr,11^ ri^ission. See
Memo for the Record.
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