SOVIETS PUSH TELEMETRY BYPASS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88-01315R000400390084-7
• Release Decision: RIFPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 3
• Document Creation Date: December 16, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 3, 2004
• Sequence Number: 84
• Publication Date: April 16, 1979
• Content Type: NSPR

Approved
Article appeared
on page 14 - 16
By Clarence A. Robinson, Jr.
2 with Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei
Gromyko.
The U. S. position ever since the earliest
Washington--Capability to tape record telemetry data onboard ballistic missiles and
parachute the tapes to earth is being developed by the Soviet Union. It may already have
been tested on an intercontinental missile. Such a system could make verification of a
Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty impossible.
The new wrinkle in Soviet efforts to avoid U. S. interception of telemetry data during
ICBM tests comes at a time when the U. S. already has agreed to permit Soviet
encryption of some telemetry data. It also comes as a national debate is heating up over
the second strategic arms agreement now in the negotiating home stretch, according to
Administration officials.
The officials explained that the USSR
has developed a system they describe as "a
tape bucket." After staging during the test
of an ICBM, a capsule is jettisoned with
the telemetry data for that portion of the
flight. A parachute deploys on the capsule,
and. it homes on a beacon. Reentry vehi-
cles carry telemetry information on the
final phase of the. test and are recovered
after parachute landing in the target
area.
Soviet ICBMs are launched from Tyu-
ratam and guided to the target area on the
Kamchatka Peninsula.
Verification of the SALT 2 agreement
is a major issue surfacing among Senate
members, and assurance of U. S. ability to
monitor Soviet compliance with the treaty
is central to achieving ratification in the
Senate.
"The USSR has been working on the
tape bucket recovery system ever since it
discovered how dependent the U. S. is on
interception of telemetry data," a U. S.
strategic weapons expert said. "This adds
vista Push Teiemetryll;
insult to injury, because the U. S. SALT 2.
negotiations have already agreed to permit
the Soviet Union to transmit telemetry
data encrypted on channels not specifical-
ly related to the contents of the agree-
ment. As an example, accuracy of ICBMs
is not related to the verification issue and
the Russian negotiators have cited this as
data they should be permitted to encrypt
before transmission."
Both the first strategic arms agreement
and the second treaty as it has been nego-
tiated prohibit interference with either
side's means of verification. But serious
questions have been raised by the U. S. on
two occasions over transmission of ICBM
test data when it was determined the
information had been encrypted.
The most recent occurrence was during
a test with the heaviest Soviet ICBM -the
SS-18, the ballistic missile that poses the
most serious threat to the U. S. Boeing
Minuteman ICBM force. That test took
place in December, 1978, as Secretary of
State Cyrus Vance was meeting on SALT
lion of telemetry data could be permitted.
Encrypted transmission during tests under
SALT 1 by the USSR was an issue raised
within the Standing Consultative Commis-
sion (SCC) by the U. S. The commission
was established under the strategic arms
agreement to take up issues related to
agreement compliance.
After the encryption issue was raised by
the U. S. the USSR ceased encryption of
telemetry data until the most recent tests.
The U. S. position has been that neither
side is permitted to take more rigorous
action to conceal strategic arms develop-
ment and deployment activities than at the
time SALT 1 was signed.
"Because the Soviets have raised the
issue that they will be permitted to encrypt
all telemetry data not specifically related
to verification," an Administration official
said, "the U. S. position is to assume that
encrypted channels will not preclude the
U. S. from verifying compliance."
The real nub of the problem, an official
explained, is that there are approximately
50 channels of telemetry data transmitted
and recorded during an ICBM test. "The
Soviets have been using a one-time code
for telemetry encryption, which makes it
all but impossible.to decipher," he said.
"If we permit encrypted transmission on
some channels, how can we be certain that
some of that data are not related to verifi-
cation? Suppose, for example, that we lose
the fuel flow data because. of encryption.
Then range calculation, throw weight and.
launch weight of the missile will be hard
to determine."
The official added that the U. S. has a
secret method for determining the ballistic.
missile's accuracy without the telemetry
data, so that is not a major concern.
"The real question, however, is not
whether we can determine accuracy via
another method," he said, "but rather
(that) it raises serious questions over
Soviet motives when it comes to taking
advantage of every possible loophole in the
agreement. This tape recovery system
being perfected is a good example." It is
not specifically precluded as the agree-
ment is now structured.
In recent weeks, the Carter Administra-
tion has been banking on the use of the Air.
Force/Lockheed U-2 high-altitude recon-
naissance aircraft with new antenna
arrays to intercept telemetry data from
Soviet ICBM tests. The aircraft would be
used as an interim replacement for the
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The U. S. has planned to operate the
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U-2s from bases in Pakistan to fly along
the Soviet Union's southwestern border
with Turkey and Pakistan to record USSR
ICBM test data. The capability of the
;U-25 to gather electronic data "is minimal
has far as antenna decibel gains [sensitivi-
ty] as compared to ground-based monitor-
ing systems, and the U. S. would have to
know well in advance that a test is
planned," one U. S. official said.
However, the U. S. decision to cut off
economic and military aid to Pakistan
because of the Pakistani effort to obtain a
gas centrifuge plant for enriching uranium
for nuclear weapons application may dash
.plans to base U-2s there and to fly them
over the border area.
In the past two weeks the likelihood that
the U. S. and USSR would reach accord
on SALT 2 has increased as meetings
between Vance and Soviet Ambassador
Anatoliy F. Dobrynin have taken place
here. The Administration also has in-
creased its effort to sell the second strate-
gic arms treaty to the American public
with major public speeches by National
Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski and
Defense Secretary Harold Brown.
The U. S. International Communica-
tions Agency, an organ of the State Dept.,
has been passing out to North Atlantic
Treaty Organization countries a publica-
tion entitled "Documents on SALT." The
brochure contains articles favoring SALT
2 by Jan. M. Lodal, former National
Security Council analyst; Stanley R.
_ Resor, under secretary of Defense for poli-
cy, and Herbert Scoville, Jr., former depu-
ty CIA director, and former assistant
Arms Control and Disarmament Agency
director.
In a letter accompanying the brochure,
-the agency said: "The media of our two
countries have carried a great deal of
information in the course of these negotia-
tions. Recently we have come across three
items which provide useful insights and
background."
The Soviets remain adamant that Com-
munist Party Chief Leonid Brezhnev will
not journey to Washington for signing of
the SALT 2 treaty. The U. S. has
proposed that the site for the treaty sign-
ing be Vienna.
The Soviets rejected that location and
the U. S. then countered that it be in
Geneva, and that is now being considered
as the most likely mutually agreeable loca-
tion, according to Administration of ii-
cials.
In an effort to overcome sentiment in
Congress against the SALT 2 agreement
as now negotiated, the Administration has
accelerated its efforts to reach an under-
standing with the Soviet Union on a ban of
space testing of antisatellite devices. There
is even some Administration optimum
that such an agreement might be reached 1
in time to coincide with the SALT 2I
treaty. It would enhance the chances of
SALT treaty ratification in the Senate.
The Soviets have carried out 16 tests in
space with their killer satellite system, the
most recent in May, 1978 (Aw&sT Oct.
30, 1978, p. 17), which was considered a
success.
"The crux of the whole argument over
whether SALT 2 is a good agreement and
thus should be ratified," according to a
senator whose vote the Administration is
counting on, "is not only the assurance of
verifying compliance, but more important-
ly, whether it will guarantee parity and
preclude the Soviets from brandishing
nuclear weapons. In world politics, it
doesn't do any good to be capable of
verifying a treaty if it is an inadequate
agreement. The average American finds
SALT agreements too technical to render
a judgment. But one thing is clear to me:
That even with SALT 2, we will not be
able to stop the vulnerability of the land-
based ICBMs in the U. S., and we will not
halt the Soviet deployment of over 6,000
nuclear-armed reentry vehicles on their
ICBMs."
The President's position, according to a
Senate staff member, is that the agree-
ment is adequately verifiable as opposed to
totally verifiable, and that any major
violations that could place the U. S. in
jeopardy could be detected before fully
completed. Violations less than that in
scope would be insignificant, in this view.
Air Force Chief of Staff Gen. Lew
Allen, Jr., in a speech last month in Los
Angeles, said:
"It is clear, however, that even within
the prospective terms of SALT 2, the
Soviets would be able to continue the
majority of their diverse programs to
modernize their strategic forces. Continu-
ing large-scale deployments of the latest
generation Soviet ICBMs, SLBMs and
bombers, projected. improvements in their
strategic defense and the almost certain
addition of new generations of these
systems are placing increasingly serious
stresses on our deterrent capabilities.
"Consequently, with or without a SALT
2 treaty, we will be obliged to modernize
our strategic forces in order to preserve
deterrence and essential equivalence.
Should we fail to maintain strategic
nuclear parity, the Soviets would certainly
capitalize on what they see as an historic
situation, strategic superiority, and act
even more aggressively and coercively
around the world."
CONTINUED
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Administration's VerMtion Claims Hit
Washington-U. S. monitoring of Soviet strategic missile testing
has met recent setbacks so severe that Carter Administration
claims of Strategic Arms Limitation Talks 2 verification amount
to "fraud," a former Defense intelligence chief said last week.
"I predict that U. S. Intelligence officials will say SALT is
subject to adequate verification, but the definition of verification
has been changed in a way reminiscent of George Orwell's
'newspeak' in the book, '1984."' Lt. Gen. (ret.) Daniel Graham,
former director of the Defense Intelligence Agency, said.
Loss of intelligence-gathering apparatus also has jeopardized
the verification of SALT 1, he told a meeting of the Coalition for
Peace through Strength. The compromise last year of the KH-11
reconnaissance satellite (AwasT Nov. 27, 1978, p. 21) opened a
serious strategic Intelligence gap, he said.
"The Soviets never knew until they got the manual [on the
satellite] that the KH-11 took pictures," Gen. Graham said. "if
I'd still been in intelligence, the Soviet lack of knowledge about
the KH-11 would have led me to say 'yes' about the U. S. having
a good shot at verification."
More critical, he said, was the loss early this year of monitor-
ing stations in Iran, which provided a 24-hr. watch on Soviet
testing. of intercontinental ballistic missiles and antiballistic
missiles. "That's critical," Gen. Graham added, "because It
represents a tipoff capability to notify other satellites to keep
watch or get aircraft out of Alaska to watch the end of the test
trajectory."
He said basing monitoring stations in Turkey would be virtual-
ly useless because of topographical interference of the Cauca-
sus Mountains. "Sending airplanes [U-2s] would be a fraud
because they're not up for 24 hr. and they can't carry the tons of
equipment we had in Iran," he added.
Of a third verification vehicle to replace the capability in Iran,
Gen. Graham said, "Even if we knew precisely what we want the
engineers to do, there's no way satellites could provide the
evidence we need until the end of the treaty period."
Extending the Soviet Backfire bomber to unrefueled intercon-
tinental range was addressed by Thomas C. Reed, former
secretary of the Air Force.
"The Backfire can recover in Cuba after hitting any U. S.
target," he said. "At the rate of Backfire production, which is 30
per year, and the retirement rate of our [Boeing] B-52s, by 1982
the Soviets will have surpassed us in the last strategic measure-
ment-the number of manned bombers."
Gen. Lyman Lemnitzer, former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of
Staff, said our North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies fear that
SALT 2 will weaken the U. S. position as NATO's strategic
nuclear leader. "They are worried about weakened deterrence
and our weakened stance in the MBFR [mutual balance of forces
reduction] talks, which are stalled In Vienna," Gen. Lemnitzer
said.
"Part of their concern Is over the 300 SS-18 heavy ICBMs the
Soviets have, while the U. S. doesn't have any," he added. "They
are puzzled by the protocol provisions in which the U. S. agrees
not to provide its NATO allies with cruise missile Information for
three years, and not allowing ground-launched cruise missiles
with a range over 600 km."
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