0279 Report on Activities and Programs for Countering Proliferation.
Counterproliferation Program Review Committee, Washington, D.C. May 1996. 134pp.
Congress directed, in the 1995 National Defense Authorization Act, that the CPRC be established to review activities and programs related to countering proliferation within the DoD, DOE, U.S. intelligence, and the Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS). This high-level national commitment to counter proliferation threats is reflected in the CPRC’s membership. It is chaired by the secretary of defense and composed of the secretary of energy (as vice chairman), the director of central intelligence (DCI), and the chairman of the JCS. The CPRC is chartered to make recommendations relative to modifications in programs required to address shortfalls in existing and programmed capabilities to counter the proliferation of WMD. The CPRC is also tasked to assess progress toward implementing its previous recommendations and the recommendations of its predecessor, the Nonproliferation Program Review Committee. This report presents the findings and recommendations of the CPRC’s annual review for 1996.
0413 Improving Theater Ballistic Missile Defense.
Naval War College, Newport, Rhode Island. Steven C. Schlientz. May 20, 1996. 28pp.
The proliferation of theater ballistic missiles (TBM) and WMD throughout developing nations is so widespread that over twenty states may have an operational capability to deliver WMD using TBM by the turn of the century. As was amply demonstrated during the Gulf War, even cheap, unsophisticated, and militarily insignificant TBM such as the Al Hussein (Modified Scud-B) can pose a psychological impact so severe that a strategic center of gravity such as the cohesion of alliances and coalitions may be threatened. The enormity of this threat will rapidly exacerbate with improvements in the accuracy, range, and lethality of TBMS. In recognition of this emerging threat, Congress has drastically increased funding for the development of various robust systems for joint theater missile defense. The first active defense systems and supporting space-based sensors that will provide a true area protection will be fielded no earlier than the middle of the next decade, however. Joint force commanders cannot rely solely on Patriot.
0441 Weapons Proliferation and Organized Crime: The Russian Military.
USAF Institute for National Security Studies, U.S. Air Force Academy, Colorado Springs, Colorado. Graham H. Turbiville Jr. June 1996. 30pp.
In the changed international security environment of the post–cold war era, concerns related to weapons proliferation—especially WMD—have taken center stage. One dimension of this problem that has received relatively less attention is how organized crime facilitates weapons proliferation worldwide. In this context, the FSU has emerged as the world’s greatest counterproliferation challenge. This region contains the best developed links among organized crime, military and security organizations, and weapons proliferation. The dissolution of the Soviet Union provided a fertile seedbed for the development of serious and pernicious criminal activity of all types. Crime in the FSU has increased by orders of magnitude. More ominously, organized crime has emerged as one of the strongest actors in the FSU. According to some official Russian estimates, organized crime may now control some forty thousand state and private organizations and over half of all economic entities within the FSU. The flourishing illegal trade in weapons, both within and outside of the FSU, is one of the most serious reflections of this overall criminal environment. Most importantly, analysts soon reach one inescapable conclusion concerning this trade in weapons: Russian military and security forces are the principal source of arms becoming available to organized crime groups, participants in regional conflict, and corrupt state officials engaged in the black, gray, and legal arms markets in their various dimensions.
0471 Weapons Acquisition. Warranty Law Should Be Repealed.
U.S. General Accounting Office, National Security and International Affairs Division,Washington, D.C. June 1996. 45pp.
Requiring the use of warranties in weapon system acquisitions is impractical and provides the government with few benefits. GAO estimates that the military spend sabout $271 million each year on weapon system warranties, which return only about five cents for every dollar spent. Congress expected warranties to improve weapon system reliability by providing a mechanism to hold contractors liable for poor performance. In practice, however, warranties have proved an expensive way for DoD to resolve product failures with contractors. The government has traditionally self-insured because its large resources make protection against catastrophic loss unnecessary. Further, it is often the sole buyer for a product and cannot share the insurance costs with other buyers. Because a contractor cannot allocate the cost of insuring against the risk of failure among multiple buyers, DoD ends up bearing the entire estimated cost. Moreover, DoD program officials said that warranties do not motivate contractors to improve the quality of their products. GAO believes that the warranty law should be repealed and the decision to obtain a warranty should be left to the program manager.
0516 U.S. Initiative for Chemical Weapons Arms Control.
U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. Reginald D. Scott. July 16, 1996. 107pp.
This research investigates the U.S. policy initiative renouncing the employment of chemical weapons (CW). The focus of the research is to determine if such an initiative will achieve the national objective for implementation of the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC). In 1993, the U.S. government established a policy banning the use of chemical weapons worldwide. This act may have won the moral high ground, but it will not deter nor eliminate the use of chemical weapons worldwide. The relative ease with which a nation can take various combinations of chemical compounds and produce a lethal chemical agent makes deterrence and/or complete elimination virtually impossible. This paper contends that the United States should continue to employ the elements of diplomatic, informational, military, and economic policy regarding nonproliferation inclusive of a deterrent-CW. It further notes that no use of CW or any WMD is best, but until the CWC is ratified, the United States should maintain a deterrent.
0623 Chemical Weapons Stockpile. Emergency Preparedness in Alabama Is Hampered by Management Weaknesses.
U.S. General Accounting Office, National Security and International Affairs Division, Washington, D.C. July 23, 1996. 82pp.
Eight years after the inception of the army’s Chemical Stockpile Emergency Preparedness Program, communities near the Anniston Army Depot in Alabama, as of1996, were not prepared to respond to a chemical stockpile emergency because they lacked critical items, including communication warning systems and protective equipment for emergency workers. Alabama and six counties, as of 1996, had not spent$30.5 million—about two-thirds of the $46 million earmarked for improvements in emergency preparedness. This lack of progress is the result of management weaknesses at the federal level and inadequate action by state and local agencies. The situation in Alabama may not be unique, however. GAO found that local communities near the eight chemical weapons storage sites in the United States were not fully prepared to respond to a chemical emergency, financial management was weak, and costs were mounting.
0705 Nuclear Weapons. Improvements Needed to DOE’s Nuclear Weapons Stockpile Surveillance Program.
U.S. General Accounting Office, Resources, Community, and Economic Development Division, Washington, D.C. July 31, 1996. 15pp.
DOE is falling years behind schedule in testing the nation’s nuclear stockpile for reliability and safety problems, and the agency, as of 1996, had yet to develop written plans detailing how it will get the testing program back on track. DOE was lagging behind schedule in conducting many stockpile surveillance tests, including flight tests, nonnuclear systems laboratory tests, and laboratory tests of key components. The delay was caused by several factors. At one facility, testing was suspended because the facility lacked an approved safety study required to disassemble and inspect one type of weapon. Testing was suspended at another facility because of concerns about safety procedures. Testing delays also arose during the transfer of testing functions to new facilities.
0720 Foreign Missile Threats. Analytic Soundness of Certain National Intelligence Estimates.
U.S. General Accounting Office, National Security and International Affairs Division, Washington, D.C. August 30, 1996. 17pp.
This report evaluates National Intelligence Estimates (NIEs) prepared by the U.S. intelligence community on the threat to the United States posed by foreign missile systems. The main judgment of NIE 95-19 (Emerging Missile Threats to North America During the Next 15 Years)—“No country, other than the major declared nuclear powers, will develop or otherwise acquire a ballistic missile in the next 15 years that could threaten the contiguous 48 states or Canada”—was worded with clear certainty. GAO believes that this level of certainty is overstated. The estimate also had other shortcomings. It did not (1) quantify the certainty level of nearly all of its key judgments, (2) identify explicitly its critical assumptions, or (3) develop alternative futures. The estimate did, however, acknowledge dissenting views from several agencies and also noted what information the U.S. intelligence community does not know that bears upon the foreign missile threat. The 1993 NIEs met more of the standards than 95-19 did. NIE 95-19 worded its judgments on foreign missile threats very differently than did the 1993 NIEs, even though the judgments in all three NIEs were not inconsistent with each other. That is, although the judgments were not synonymous, upon careful reading, they did not contradict each other.
0737 Russian-American Cooperation in WMD Counterproliferation.
Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, California. Richard S. Dabrowski. September 1996. 90pp.
This thesis examines the opportunities and risks associated with a new form of military cooperation between the United States and Russia: joint strategic special operations for counterproliferation contingencies—to seize and secure or to disable or otherwise neutralize WMD facilities or WMD–armed terrorists. This thesis compares Russian and U.S. views of the future secure environment, looking for areas of overlap that could serve as the basis for mutually acceptable cooperative approaches to military options— especially in areas in or around the FSU—to deal with new WMD threats. The most effective military options might require the creation of a Russian-American response force similar to the DOE Nu