SOVIET'S DEFENSES CALLED INFLEXIBLE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP90-00965R000402700020-0
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 22, 2016
• Document Release Date: January 26, 2012
• Sequence Number: 20
• Publication Date: September 18, 1983
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/26: CIA-RDP90-00965R000402700020-0
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ARTICLE APFMED NEW YORK TIMES
ON PAGE_2q-
17 18 September 1983
SOVIET'S DEFENSES 11
CALLED INFLEXIBLE
U.S. General Says Plane Affair
Is Evidence They Might Be
Penetrated if Needed
Soviet Issued Denial on Radio
Soviet a ltborities have insisted that
the interceptor that shot down the
airliner was equipped with a radio and
an international emergency channel
with which it tried, but failed, to con-
tact the airliner.
The general said one pilot had fired
his guns well behind the airliner and
t ~ more firing the missiles
He also said, "I don't think he bad
tracers." Soviet spokesman have said
the fighter pilot fired tracers from a
cannon to warn the South Korean pilot
he was off course.
Border Regulations Tightened
Under a recent law on Soviet national
frontiers, the Air Defense Forces are
understood to have received new regu-
lations on guarding the boundaries.
Specialists said the tightened controls
undoubtedly governed Soviet actions
against the South Korean plane.
The specialists said radar was criti-
cal to Soviet air defense since all opera-
tions were controlled from the ground.
"A Soviet pilot," said one specialist,
"is little more than a guided missile."
An Air Force officer said Soviet
radar equipment, whether on the
ground or in planes, lagged behind.that
of the United States and was not able to
distinguish between the United States
Air Force's RC-135 reconnaissance
plane and the Korean Air Lines 747 in
the same'-area, despite their differ-
ences in size and shape. .
Most Soviet radar operators are offi-
cers who have been given four years of
training and hold the
equivalent of en-
ginesering degrees. Even so, an inex.
perienced operator could well have
been confused by the appearance of,
two blips on his scope.
Intelligence operations in the Soviet
Union are highly compartmentalized,
so that information from one unit is
~
handed to another ists speculated that slowly Specialon air
control radio transmissions from the
South Korean plane, monitored by
Soviet intelligence, was not made
available to air def",radar opera-
tors.
By RICHARD HALLORAN Earlier In the day, General Gabriel
s Wwna+.,,YWkTnm. said in a speech before the Air Force
WASHINGTON, Sept. 17 - The Air Association, "This barbarism and the
Force's Chief of Staff says that evi-, Soviet lies to cover up their crime have
deuce gathered from the Soviet down clearly proven to the world what the
ing of a South Korean passenger plane
on Sept.. 1 shows that Soviet air de-
fenses are inflexible. .
"In my mind," the officer, Gen.
Charles -A. Gabriel, said in an inter-
view on Wednesday, "it confirms what
we thought"
The general, who said he had been
given "a pretty good rundown" of what
happened in.the two'and a half hours
the airliner was tracked over Kam-
chatka, the Sea of Okhotsk and Sakha-
lin, also questioned the competence of
the Soviet pilots.
Moreover, a senior official of the
Reagan Administration, who asked not
to be identified, said today that it was
"quite possible" that the Soviet pilot
did not know he was shooting at a civil-
ian passenger plane. This, the official
said, made the Russians guilty of
.criminal negligence."
speattog at the same forum, Presi-
dent Reagan's national security advis-
er, William P. Clark, scoffed at the
paranoia :often attributed to the Rus-
sians. Mr. Clark, a former judge, said,
"We should not let the insanity plea oneratethem.11
Lass Formidable Than Believed of Soviet -air do.
fames, the question analysts inside and
outside the Government, having sifted
through the evidence, said it revealed
the air defenses to be less formidable
previously believed. They sug-
ted Soviet actions had been a conse-
quence of military confusion and ri-
gidity
In the Soviet Union, the Air Defense
Forces are & 'service arm separate
from the Air Force, Army, Navy and
Strategic Missile Forces. With 600,000 j
In the view of some specialists, sleep- Sneed for the regional command in Far
ticism over the effectiveness of Soviet Eastern Siberia to communicate with
air defenses and tactical airpower may Moscow accounted for the two and a
affect Congressional consideration of half hours that the airliner was tracked
President Reagan's military budget. before being shot down. Soviet spokes-
Mr. Reagan said the airliner episode , men have said the decision to shoot,
showed the United States needed more down the plane was made by local cAm-
militarypower? >re? : ..
But critics in Congress have begun to
put a different interpretation-an the in-
cident and to question the need for in-
creased military budgets and espe-
cially the need for building both the B-1
bomber and the Stealth bomber, a jet
that designed to evade radar detection.
General Gabriel said Soviet pilots
were held an "a short leash," with
not
have
radio frequencies with wthem hich they
could have contacted the airliner.
little more confidence" in the ability of
the United States Air Force to over-
come the defenses if necessary.
General Gabriel said the perform- electtnoic .adetecxian, with 9,000
ance of Soviet air defenses "gives us a !radars; aviation, with 3,000 intene?
Americans More Confident troops, it is divided into three branches
According to some specialists, the
Declassified in Part - Sanitized Copy Approved for Release 2012/01/26: CIA-RDP90-00965R000402700020-0