LAST DECEMBER'S 'FLASH'

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000301900074-1
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: September 24, 2012
• Sequence Number: 74
• Publication Date: February 18, 1981
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
, Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/09/24: CIA-RDP90-00965R000301900074-1
itiCTICLE ArPi
ON PAW,: A
THE WASHINGTON POST
18 February 1981
Rinvland Evans and Robert Novak 1
Last December's 'HAI
A mysterious "flash" ' signifying a
likely nuclear explosion in the far
reaches of the South Atlantic, eerily
similar to the still-unexplained Septem-'
bet 1979 flash in the same general area,
was secretly recorded on Dec. 15 by
sensitive U.S. monitoring devices.
If the "flash" was indeed a very small
nuclear test blast, as is strongly sus-
pected by top intelligence officials who.
are - now certain that that is what oc-
curred in 1979, President Reagan is con-,
fronted with one of the gravest, most
perplexing mysteries of the nuclear age.
The mystery: is the "nuclear club" ex-,
pending another notch, or has a card-
carrying member taken advantage of the
remote waters where the South Atlantic
joins the Indian Ocean to test weapons _
,without risk that the world will ever dis- -
ewer who he is?
Whatever the answer, the December
"flash" monitored by a U.S.. reconnais-
sance satellite makes one fact clear with
deadly logic. With all its monitoring and
verification tools, the United States is
still unable to solve two enigmatic nu-
clear riddles, either one of which could
affect the course of world history. That
surely counsels caution in current com-
prehensive test ban treaty negotiations
with the Soviet Union.
Some Carter administration officials
were convinced that President Carter's
effort to explain away the 1979 explosion
as an event that never happened was a:f
direct result of inability to solve the rid-
dle. To acknowledge publicly that a nu-
clear...test could be conducted even in a t
remote area without the United States'
knowing which country- triggered, it.
..would undermine Carter's zealous pur-
suit of the comprehensive test ban
treaty. It would also mock his whole
non-proliferation program.
So the White House Office of Science
and Technology issued its shocking report
last July contending that the 1979 event
was not a nuclear teat at all but rather a
chance collision between the reconnais-
sance satellite and a very small meteor.
Specialists in the Carter administration
were aghast at this kiss-off of what in fact
has created an agonizing dilemma for the
United States and a dangerous game for
the world: anonymous weapons testing.
The contrary opinion written by the
Defense Intelligence Agency was put
under a tight "secret" seal after it was read
by Carter White House aides. Its still un-
disclosed findings: the probability is over-
whelming that the "event" in September
- .1979 was no space collision by a low-yield
weapons test. Since that DIA report, sent
to the White House last spring, new evi-
dence further bolsters that verdict. .
As for the second anonymous test Dec.
15, evidence is only slightly less compel-
ling and still being gathered. Indeed, few
if any high Reagan officials have yet
been informed that U.S. monitoring de-
vices picked up the telltale signals in the
same general area?a vast waterland
with a diameter of 3,000 miles?south-
west of the South African coast.
Questions' now being urgently ad-
dressed in the intelligence community
are not confined to the identity of the
fugitive state responsible for triggering
nuclear tests behind the world's back, al-
though that question is clearly an impor-
tant one. There is no consensus as to the
guilty party, with this exception: it prob-
ably is not the Soviet Union_ s
Intelligence specialists, however, are
not unanimous even on this point It is
possible, we were infornied, that the
Russians lofted the low-yield weapons
on balloons from a submarine or trawler
and fired them simply to test whether
American verification devices were
competent to pick up the small blasts.
Most analysts, however, lean to less
conspiratorial theories: that the two tests
signaled the entry of a new state into the
nuclear club, possibly Israel (known to
possess nuclear devices) or South Africa;
that they are a culminating testing point
for nuclear-club member France in de-
veloping its own neutron bomb; or that.'
they belonged to India or even Pakistan.
Whoever the villain is that chooses to
keep on testing nuclear devices in the at-
mosphere, the deeper significance to
Reagaz? and his men is this: technology
for discovering nuclear testing and veri-.1
fying performance of states pledged not
to engage in certain types of testing ,is.
dangerously lagging.
Surely that raises the question' of
whether the United States should forget -
about negOtiating the comprehensive',
test ban treaty and at once launch. a .
weapons tasting program to catch up to
unprecedented Soviet testing the past
few years. Although that program ap-
pears to be unconnected to the mysteri-
ous tests in the faraway South Atlantic,
what happened there is a warning signal
that the United States may know far less
about the difficulties of verification than
it has believed. If so, it could be suicidal
to rely on good will, good intentions
even signed treaties thaVcannot be toz
tally verified.
IS10111
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/09/24: CIA-RDP90-00965R000301900074-1