REVISED TALKING POINTS ON THE EXPULSION ROUND

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP88G01117R000200280002-7
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: S
• Document Page Count: 9
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: December 16, 2010
• Sequence Number: 2
• Publication Date: October 30, 1986
• Content Type: MEMO

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The Director of Central Intelligence
Washington, D.C. 20505
National Intelligence Council
NIC #05011-86
30 October 1986
MEMORANDUM FOR: Director of Central Intelligence
Deputy Director of Central Intelligence
FROM:
SUBJECT:
Fritz W. Ermarth
National Intelligence Officer for USSR
Revised Talking Points on the Expulsion Round
1. Attached is a revised set of points on this subject, modified slightly
in response to comment by
2. These points can be used when you meet with PFIAB next week. However,
you will probably wish to gloss over the more negative political judgments
toward the end of the paper, partly because they are pretty speculative. I
include them because they may be useful points to make in other settings, to
make sure we think through the likely Soviet political perceptions if we get
into something like this again.
3. I've deleted most specific numbers at Billisuggestion. They are not
needed to make the arguments. And accurate numbers are hard to nail down
4. Under the subhead "Image and Credibility" you will find a reference to
"unusual channels of communication." I assume you know what this refers to.
If not, I can tell you what I know orally.
Attachment:
As stated
cc: NIO/FDIA
DC/SE/DDO
C/Cl/DDO
SECRET
CL BY Signer
DECL OADR
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Office of Current Production and Analytic Support
CIA Operations Center
News Bulletin The Washington Post
A19
Rowland Evan s.and Robert Novak
'Blinded' Satellites
High-powered Soviet ground-to-space micro-
waves have disabled U.S. reconnaissance satel-
lites on more than one occasion in the past six
months, a space-war breakthrough causing con-
cern among intelligence officials because of the
present inability to launch new spies-in-the-sky.
At best, the Soviet capacity to "blind" a
satellite in synchronous (stationary) orbit
23,000 miles in space raises an elemental
question of sincerity about Mikhail Gorbachev's
claim that President Reagan's Strategic De-
fense Initiative is bellicose and provocative.
Frying to choke the U.S. program, the Soviets
are doing well maintaining their own.
At worst, this space-war success combined
with the US. space shuttle tragedy and the
failure of other attempts to launch satellites
endanger the United States at a time of maid-
mum Soviet pressure against SDI. The danger
was foreseen in a top-secret 1980 report to
Reagan warning that the United States could be
"completely blinded" by the mid-1980s.
The successful Soviet effort to disable American
satellites has been accomplished by "propagating"
high-powered microwaves fired from ground
station located near Dushanbe, close to the Afghan
border in the Soviet Socialist Republic of Tadzhild-
stan. When the beam of the short-wave electro-
magnetic pulse strikes, the satellite is unable
either to receive orders from the United States or
to transmit the all-important pictures that are the
heart of U.S. intelligence-gathering
In addition to this microwave bombardment,
the Soviets have also had some success attack-
ing American satellites with ground-based la-
sers. Intelligence specialists told us these laser
transmitters are located in Moscow, at the big
Soviet nuclear station in Saryshagan and at one
other unidentified place.
? The intelligence community believes laser
attack has damaged several satellites. If so,
that may Mean that as of today U.S. satellite
reconnaissance of the Soviet Union is limited to
little more than one or two undamaged "cam-
eraS-in-the-sky," with the future uncertain.
The importance of now-imperiled existing sat-
ellites to report on offensive and defensive Soviet
space and ground-based military operations is
paramount There is no apparent means available
for months to launch another spy satellite. The
old satellite-launching Titan missiles became ob-
solete with development of the shuttle Some
eliminate photoreconnaissance capability by mkt-
or late 1980s.
That is not far from what has now happened,
but not even the prophetic authors of the
transition report knew six years ago how rapid
would be Soviet antisatellite technology.
It is this pessimistic backdrop that has
caused some of the president's strongest ad-
mirers to question his willingness to make any
concessions at all to Gorbachev on developing
antimissile defenses or space-warfare technolo-
gy. They say privately that he is not informed
about Soviet advances and that he does not
understand the double-edged Gorbachev game:
stall U.S. technological progress and move full
speed on his own.
An incident just before Reagan went to
Reykjavik enforced this critical view. A report
from the CIA representing the entire intelli-
gence community was sent to the Oval Office
with this unequivocal warning: the sole reason
for Gorbachev's wanting the Iceland summit
was to offer unprecedented inducements for
Reagan to drop SDI. The warning was ignored.
There was no White House response at all.
01916. News America Synsicate
29 October 1986
Item No, 1
Titans kept in reserve have exploded this year on
their pads or in early flight.
The irony of the successful Soviet assaults on
American satellites is their convergence with
Gorbachev's unprecedented nuclear arms-reduc-
tion "offer" to induce the president to give up
SDI. Gorbachev's goal, in the view of administra-
tion strategic analysts, has now become clear. He
is pressing full speed ahead to develop the
Soviets' own war-in-space program and doing so
under cover of an attempted U.S. satellite black-
out. He also is building worldwide fear of "Star
Wars" to force the president to kill SDI.
The secret transition report to Reagan im-
mediately following the 1980 election warned
with gloomy precision about the dangers of the
space-warfare race?particularly the impor-
tance and vulnerability of satellites in keeping
tabs on Soviet gains.
"The failure of a single launch in the early to
mid-1980s could negate all our capabilities (for
satellite reconnaissance] for a protracted period
of time," the report warned. Such a failure, it
went on, "could be disastrous for the entire
technical collection effort" leading to the United
States' being "completely blinded." That could
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