U.S. SAYS SOVIET COPIES SOME ARMS

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000403310006-8
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: February 9, 2012
• Sequence Number: 6
• Publication Date: September 19, 1985
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
3 Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/02/09: CIA-RDP90-00965R000403310006-8
AOT;r1E A?PEARED
ON PAGE-1
NEW YORK TIMES
19 September 1985
1U.S. Says Soviet Copies Somme
By ART It 91ELLER
9PftW a no Nw Ym* 7bou
WASHINGTON, Sept. 19 - A report
made public ment today says that the Soviet Udssi,
working from a chc list of Western
technology, has been systsomaticaul y
stealing or obtaining the owni d?
to buildup its and components each year
own itaryintlustries.
The report is based in largo part on
internal Soviet documents amusing
the success of a program for obtaining
Western reeearcb and mamahcarrlog
secrets from contractors, universities
and Government agencies. '
It includes lists of top priority targets !
and examples of technology already
used to advance the quality a[ Soviet
weaponry.
Made Pub1IC by Weinberger
Defense Secretary Caspar W. Wein-
berger, in making public the 3A-pap
report at a news conference, said:
"It is really, I think it is fair to say, a
far more serious problem than we have
reviously realized. By their own esti-
mate, more than 5,000 Soviet military
research projects each year are bens-
filing significantly from Western-se-
quired technology It
An Assistant Secretary of Defecae,
Richard N. Perle, who answered ques-
tions about the study, denied that its re-
lease was timed to influence the cli-
mate surrounding the arms talks
resuming Thursday in Geneva or the
,?eeting oetween President Reagan
and Mikhail S. Gorbachev, scheduled
for Nov. 19 mnd 20.
He said the possible effect on the
summit talks was discussed before the
White House approved release of the
Pentagon m report.
like this ought to be
based on reality, not on illusion," Mr.
Perle said. "This is part of the reality."
Some Items Stolen or Pon
The report says that the stood wore
,.tolen by spies, purchased by dumoty
grading companies, or in many cases
obtained legally from Government
agencies.
Mr. Perle said he believed the repot
was a strong argument for the Western
countries to reduce the number of Rus-
sians they allow to visit. He said many
of them were collecting military tscb-
nology in the guise of trade representa-
tives, scientists or journalists.
The documents included annual re-
ports of a secret Soviet body known as
the Military-Industrial Commission.
made up of the beads of military indus-
tries.
According to the United States Gov-
ernment report, this commission,
which does not figure in published
Soviet tables of orsudzation, prepares
lists of requests equipment and
documentation and spends an esti-
mated $1.4 billion a year to obtain them
through intelligence agenda of the
.Warsaw PacLcountdoa.
Stephen Meyer, bead of the So-Aet
Strategic Studies program at the Mas-
sachusetts Institute of Technology,
said today that the document obtained
by France were believed by experts to
be authentic internal accounts of the
commission's activities.
"If anything, you would think their
bias would be to understate how much
they got from the United States," he
'said. "These are the beads of the Soviet
defense industry, and these reports
amount to admitting they could not do
their job without the Americans."
A Fourth of Targets Secret
The report says that the Soviet Union
obtains 6,000 to 10,000 pieces of equip-
ment and 10p,000 documents every
year, about afls fourth of them either
secret or restricted by export controls.
Among previously undisclosed ex-
amples are than: '
!Soviet officials said the aviation
and radar. industries saved five years
of development time and $55 million by.
cancer'ning
using pilfered documents
the McDannsil Douglas F-18 fighter.
In the late 1970's, 'the K.G:B., the
Soviet intelligence agency, was asked,'
as a "most critical" priority, to obtain
'electronic components and program-
ming devices for the computer memo-
ries used in cruise missiles. The report
does not indicate the outcome. A Penta-
gon official said the material was ob-
tained, but it is not known whether it
was adapted for Soviet use. .
gFrom the mid-1970's to the early
1980's, the main source of aerospace
material for the Soviet military pro-
gram was public documents issued by
the National Aeronautics and Space
Administration.
NASA Wing Design Copied
Mr. Paris said an unusual NASAI
cantilever wing deep was copied by
the Soviet Union on the An-72, a short-
takeoff-and landing transport per,
that first flew In?laW 1177.
Mr. Perle said that NASA, which was
established in I$5 in part to promote!
peacetigW cooperation ink
space, "has an ea tatme- liberal pubis-
cation policy, to the point where NASA
has published information that has led
directly to improvements in Soviet I
The erepottsayyss that the Soviet acqui-
sitions ranges lrom public documents
to virtua1ly entire manufacturing as-
sembly lines. Soviet technology-hunt-
ere place top priority m microelectron-
ics and computers, and anything re-j
lated to antisubmarine warfare and
space weapons, the report says.
Most of the integrated circuits used
in Soviet high-tech weapons are copied
from Western originals, the report
says.
the early 1980's, the report says,
the Soviet Union obtained a Fairchild
Instrument corporation semiconduc-
tor memory tester and copied it to
produce its own testing machine.
Stephen D. Bryon, a deputy to Mr.
Perle in charge of trade and security,
said the most vulnerable points in the
Western supply system were military
contractors who had arrangements
with foreign concerns to co-produce or
build weapons under license. Other
sources include Government technical
clearing houses, universities and scion-
tific conferences, the report says.
The report portrays a two-pronged
Soviet Government apparatus for gath-
ering western technology.
One arm, the military-Industrial
commission, pursues documents and
equipment that can be copied. Each
year during the 1970's and early 1990s,
the report says, the commission issued
about 3,500 requests, with "roughly
one-third satisfied each year.'.
The Ministry of Foreign Trade rums a
separate program that relies heavily
on international middlemen to obtain
equipment, the repot says.
Mr. Perle today said the United
States' effort to control sensitive tech-
nology had impeded Soviet efforts, de-
spite what be called "people whose pri-
mary interest is the promotion of
trade." The remark appeared directed
at the Commerce Department, which
has long battled the Pentagon over con-
trols.
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/02/09: CIA-RDP90-00965R000403310006-8