17 January 1999. Thanks to Anonymous.

http://search.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/WPlate/1999-01/17/211l-011799-idx.html


The Washington Post, 17 January 1999, Page A02 

U.S. Labs at Odds on Whether Pakistani Blast Used Plutonium

By Dana Priest
Washington Post Staff Writer

The CIA told President Clinton in a highly classified report last month that
material released into the atmosphere during an underground nuclear test by
Pakistan the previous May contained low levels of weapons-grade plutonium,
according to U.S. national security officials.

The implications of the preliminary analysis, conducted at Los Alamos
National Laboratory, were that Pakistan was either importing or producing
plutonium without U.S. knowledge and, with it, could build smaller,
easy-to-conceal, longer-range nuclear weapons that would be more threatening
to neighboring India, which recently acknowledged its nuclear capability.

But scientists at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and other
government experts are contesting the accuracy of the initial analysis,
alleging that Los Alamos contaminated and then lost the air sample from the
Pakistan blast.

The CIA declined to comment last week and has not changed its initial
assessment. The agency has at times been slow to accept changes that might
reflect poorly on its initial judgment. In this case, said one U.S.
intelligence official, "there is some disagreement here, and experts at the
labs need to sort it out."

Brooke Anderson, a spokeswoman for the Department of Energy, which
administers the laboratories, said Friday night that Energy Secretary Bill
Richardson "has asked the lab directors for a full report on the procedures
used."

As the flap over the sample analysis demonstrates, U.S. intelligence experts
and scientists are having trouble keeping up with the demands to monitor and
detect the secret development of nuclear, biological and chemical weapons
around the world.

That questions surrounding the test results should remain unanswered eight
months after Pakistan conducted its first nuclear test "is a terrible
miscarriage of how the system is supposed to work," said Christopher Paine,
a senior researcher at the Natural Resources Defense Council, an
environmental advocacy group.

Said one official working to resolve the matter: "You can imagine how
scientists want to protect their work. I am thoroughly convinced that the
original test was wrongly interpreted."

On May 11 and May 13, to the surprise of U.S. intelligence agencies, India
conducted its first underground nuclear tests since 1974. Pakistan followed
suit 15 days later with the first of six tests that ended with the May 30
explosion that is the subject of the present dispute.

Secret, high-flying U.S. aircraft collected air samples in May and brought
them back to Los Alamos and at least one other classified laboratory for
examination. But it was one of the air samples collected from the May 30
test that set off alarms because smaller and more powerful plutonium-based
weapons could fit more easily onto ballistic missiles than those fueled by
the highly enriched uranium that Pakistan has produced for years.

The CIA assessment was eventually included in the highly classified briefing
book Clinton reviewed before he met with Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz
Sharif at the White House on Dec. 2.

Sources declined to say whether Clinton raised the plutonium issue with
Sharif at the meeting.

At the same time, however, U.S. experts on Pakistan's weapons program were
expressing serious doubts about the Los Alamos analysis and requested a
retest.

But the original sample was lost, so scientists are unable to reevaluate it.
A government official said an identical air sample is available at a second
laboratory, but several people with knowledge of the events say that sample
is not identical to the lost one. Nevertheless, scientists believe it will
be possible to positively determine whether the initial analysis was faulty.

The issue is being taken up by the Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board and
the Joint Atomic Energy Intelligence Committee, an interagency group that
monitors foreign nuclear proliferation, said two government officials.

The dispute comes at a time of growing concern over nuclear proliferation by
Pakistan and India.

"It's part of a trend we've been seeing," said a senior national security
official. "The more they move towards these weapons, the more they create a
destabilizing situation."

In fact, recent intelligence reports carry indications that both countries
are continuing to develop their nuclear capability and missiles that could
one day carry the weapons across borders.

The reports indicate that Pakistan's nuclear reactor at Khushab, which has
been under construction for years in the Punjab province, is fully
operational and will soon be capable of producing 5 to 10 kilograms of
weapons-grade plutonium annually, enough for one bomb. But the only plant
capable of processing the plutonium, located at the Pakistan Institute of
Nuclear Science and Technology (Pinstech), is small and would not be able to
handle the quantities of plutonium produced at the Khushab reactor unless it
is modified.

"We believe the Pakistanis are taking steps to upgrade the facility," said
the senior national security official. Much of what the plant needs, such as
stainless steel piping, is also the type of equipment commonly used in
commercial laboratories. The equipment's dual-use nature makes it
particularly difficult to monitor and intercept, said the senior official.
U.S. officials have told European allies to be on the lookout for suspicious
shipments to Pakistan.

"It's very difficult to head off this kind of procurement activity," the
official said.

"You've got political leaders in both countries who say they want to avoid
an arms race, yet they are completely unable or unwilling to control their
research establishments," said George Perkovich, director of the Secure
World Program and an expert on proliferation in South Asia. "There is a
momentum driven by charismatic scientists who have been unable, by
themselves, to draw a line and say: No, we're not going to do that."

There are also indications that India and Pakistan continue to develop
ballistic missiles.

On Wheeler Islands, near Bangladesh, India is preparing the first test
launch of the Agni-plus, an intermediate-range ballistic missile. A test of
the Dhanush, a naval version of the Prithvi short-range ballistic missile,
is expected in early 1999 at a test range near Balasore. The missile has the
potential to strike Karachi, Pakistan, according to U.S. intelligence
reports.

Weapons experts say Pakistan has been waiting for a new missile test by
India to provide it with the political cover to test its Shaheen II missile,
which has an expected range of 2,000 kilometers (1,240 miles).

State Department spokesman James P. Rubin said Friday that the United States
last week "urged both sides to exercise restraint and to avoid inflammatory
actions that would heighten tensions and fuel a missile arms race."
Impending missile tests, he said, "would not be helpful to efforts to reduce
tensions and build confidence through dialogue in South Asia."

Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott will travel to India and Pakistan
at the end of the month to discuss ways to reduce tension between the two
countries. 


Copyright 1999 The Washington Post Company