SOVIET ABM BREAKOUT

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00806R000200980042-6
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: July 22, 2010
• Sequence Number: 42
• Publication Date: August 16, 1983
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/22 : CIA-RDP90-00806R000200980042-6
P ~~LE APPEARED 1
(
WALL STREET JOURNAL
16 August 1983
~yL
REVIEW & OUTLOOK
Soviet ABM Breakout
In developing and supplying "ye]-
low rain" for use against primitive
Hmong tribesmen and Afghan free-
dom fighters, the Soviet Union treated
chemical and biological weapons trea-
ties with brazen- contempt. Now evi-
dence is growing that it has taken the
same attitude toward the anti-ballistic
missile limitations in the first Strate-
gic Arms Limitation Treaty.
The ABM limitation in SALT-I is
the granddaddy of nuclear-arms con-
trol. Signed in 1972 by President-Rich-
ard Nixon and Leonid Brezhnev, It
has been cited as the-most successful
arms-control agreement and perhaps
the one most central to -strategic
weapons balance between the' U.S.
and U.S.S.R. It provides sharp limita-
tions on the deployment of anti-ballis-
tic missile systems to shoot down in-
coming missile warheads. Each side
is allowed only one ABM system with
not more than 100 launchers. Since
this means a system can always be
saturated with 101 warheads, the U.S.
has entirely forsaken its one system,
while the Soviets have built an ABM
around Moscow and have been ener-
getically upgrading it these last few
years.
Within the past few months, how-
ever. T.'.S. intelligence has detected a
I nevw AE'M: radar at Abalakovo, far
away from Moscow but near fields of
SS-19, SS-11 and SS-18 intercontinental
missiles. The installation, larger than
a football field, has apparently been
under construction for two years,
though detected only recently.
The Abalakovo radar is the most
clear-cut violation of the ABM treaty
to date. The treaty provides that large
phased-array radars of this type can
be deployed only along the national
periphery and "oriented outward," so
they can be used for early warning
systems but not ABM battle manage-
ment. The Abalakovo radar is located
in the central U.S.S.R. about 500 miles
nor`: of Mongolia and 3,000 miles
from the Pacific coast.
Even more significantly, the Aba-
lakovo radar is not the first but the
sixth large phased-array radar com-
pleted or under construction in the So-
viet Union. The others have been
known to the U.S. but were either ar-
guably on the periphery or otherwise
allowed under the treaty. Large
phased-array radars are already in
operation at Pechora near the Caspian
Sea, Lyaki in the northwest.-and Mi-
sheleka in the far east. In addition,
.ABM .radars,.... presumably _.peimitted
by the Ire*.-are. Saryshagan. at the
Soviet's-test Tange in central'. S S.R."
_andjhgbushkino system .,now being
constructed near Moscow. The Abala-
kovo radar, which cannot be rational-
ized under the treaty, is aimed over
the northeastern U.S.S.R. toward
Alaska, and would fill in the final gap
in an ABM radar network covering a]-_
most the entire Soviet Union.
All six radars are practically iden-
tical, housed in structures about 500
feet wide and more than 100 feet high
resembling decapitated pyramids.
They have tremendous range and can
provide .not only early warning of an
attack but also can help direct the fir-
ing of anti-ballistic missiles to bring
down the incoming missiles. Indeed,
the U.S. Joint Chiefs of Staff said in
January 1981 that the radars then un-
der construction may be designed to
improve impact predictions and tar-
get handling capabilities for ABM bat-
tle management." This warning came
even before discovery of the Abala-
kovo radar.
Besides the radars, the Soviets also
have tested a variety of surface-to-air
missiles in an ABM mode, in violation
of the treaty, including the SAM-10
and SAM-12. These missiles are mo-
bile, which is another treaty violation,
and are now in mass production.
Around Moscow, the Soviets are de-
ploying the ABM-3 system of SHO-4
and SHO-8 missiles along with mobile
radars; more than 100 silos have been
sighted, which may be another viola-
tion of the limits on the number of
silos allowed by the ABM treaty. The
Soviets have also tested rapidly re-
loading these silos in two hours, yet
another violation.
Last Friday Sen. Steve Symms
wrote to President Reagan that the
latest reports "suggest the existence
of a clear-cut, overt violation of the
ABM treaty entailing as many as five
key provisions." And the Abalakovo
violation addsiurgepcy to the warning
Sen. James McClure issued on the
Senate floor last. month that the- Sovi-
ets are In -:fact . already ,deploying a
nationwide ABM defense. '
Now, the ABM limits have never
been our favorite arms-control. idea.
But it certainly changes the strategic-
balance if the Soviets build an ABM
while we abide by a treaty outlawing
it. in light of a Soviet ABM, we need
to think about missile defense of our
own, and about how to secure our re- i
taliatory power-probably with'flocks
of small and highly. accurate cruise
missiles to By under -these defenses.
But, more broadly, we need to spend
less of our time and energy on negoti-
ating treaties with people who break
them, and more on securing our own
defense and retaliatory power.
STAT
Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2010/07/22 : CIA-RDP90-00806R000200980042-6