The Twilight of the Bombs

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The Twilight of the Bombs Page 41

by Richard Rhodes


  44 eighteen nuclear-production sites: Yengst et al. (1996), p. 333.

  45 “This was indeed a new era …”: Arkin and Fieldhouse (n.d.), Week Twenty-five.

  46 “During the second week …”: David Kay interview, 2007.

  47 at least 50 wells: This and other details of the Kuwaiti oil-well fires from Hirschmann (2005).

  48 “use oil for self-defense”: Quoted in ibid., p. 13.

  49 “The Gulf War was …”: Quoted in Chollet and Goldgeier (2008), p. 12.

  50 “Yes, and do what?”: Quoted in Alfonsi (2006), p. 257.

  51 “I think that the proposition …”: Richard Cheney, “The Gulf War: A First Assessment,” Soref Symposium, 29 Apr. 1991 (online).

  52 “used to generate data …”: Perry (1991), p. 69.

  53 “Operating together …”: Ibid., p. 77.

  54 “tanks destroyed …”: Ibid., p. 67.

  55 “While it is certainly not …”: Ibid., p. 66.

  56 “Our wisest defense experts …”: Bundy (1991), pp. 86–87.

  57 “no feeling of euphoria …”: Bush and Scowcroft (1998), pp. 486–7.

  58 “when the [Iraqi] troops straggle home …”: Ibid., p. 487.

  THREE TRUE COURAGE

  1 “had forfeited any capacity …”: Quoted in Krasno and Sutterlin (2003), p. 4.

  2 “There were those who …”: Gallucci (2001), p. 2.

  3 “For the international community …”: Perricos (2001), p. 1.

  4 “that the [IAEA] …”: Gallucci (2001), p. 2.

  5 “the responsibility to designate …”: Ibid.

  6 “nuclear weapons or nuclear-weapons-useable material …”: United Nations S/RES/687 (1991) (online), C-12.

  7 “twisting middle-aged minds …”: Gallucci (2001), p. 2.

  8 “sort of first …”: Robert Gallucci interview (2002), “Conversations with History,” UC Berkeley (online), p. 2.

  9 “the magnitude of the destruction …”: Ibid.

  10 “but I was told …”: Gallucci (2001), p. 3.

  11 “there are lots of commissions …”: Ibid.

  12 “I had never met David …”: Ibid.

  13 “the U.S. military was anxious …”: David Kay interview, 2007.

  14 “Many of the IAEA staff …”: “Iraq’s Nuclear Weapons Capability and Inspections in Iraq,” Joint Hearing before the Subcommittees on Europe and the Middle East, and International Security, International Organization and Human Rights of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, House of Representatives, 103rd Congress, First Session, 29 June 1993, Jay Davis testimony, p. 63.

  15 “We had a different view …”: Gallucci Interview “Conversations with History,” p. 4.

  16 “The first thing we needed …”: Gallucci (2001), p. 3.

  17 “Not only did they not show up …”: Ibid.

  18 “We had no secure telephones …”: David Kay interview, 2007.

  19 “no frictions with the U.S.…”: Hans Blix interview, 2004.

  20 “We were all scared …”: Nichols (2001), p. 4.

  21 “I had to go out and lease …”: David Kay interview, 2004.

  22 “The first few trips required true courage …”: Gallucci (2001), pp. 7–8.

  23 “the city was still struggling …”: “David A. Kay” (interview), Chemical & Engineering News, Vol. 82, No. 31 (2 Aug. 2004), pp. 28–33 (online).

  24 “The inspectors came from all over …”: Gallucci (2001), p. 8.

  25 “as a dog on a leash”: Blix (2004), p. 22.

  26 “An even more serious …”: Ibid., p. 23.

  27 In secret high-level meetings in Iraq: See Iraq Survey Group Final Report at www.globalsecurity.org.

  28 Aziz, among others, speculated: Ibid.

  29 “This first declaration …”: Perricos (2001), p. 2.

  30 “had a little bit more content …”: Ibid.

  31 “The first inspection …”: Ibid.

  32 “To our surprise, Tuwaitha was …” Ibid., p. 3

  33 “Inspectors had to walk …”: Ibid.

  34 “they would be difficult …”: “Consolidated Report on the First Two IAEA Inspections Under Security Council Resolution 687 (1991) of Iraqi Nuclear Capabilities.” International Atomic Energy Agency, 11 July 1991.

  35 “The surprise that we had …”: Perricos (2001), p. 4.

  36 “We had not only to measure …”: Ibid.

  37 A later report: IAEA (1991).

  38 “but in some significant cases …”: Ibid., p. 5.

  39 “The overall impression …”: Ibid.

  40 “Dimitri talked to …”: David Kay interview, 2007.

  41 “a photo analyst …”: Ibid.

  42 “At that point he called …”: Ibid.

  43 “The team found that …”: Perricos (2001), p. 2.

  44 “didn’t find what …”: Nichols (2001), p. 2.

  45 “unusual … with unusually large …”: IAEA (1991), p. 1.

  46 “took hundreds of pictures …”: Perricos (2001), p. 9.

  47 “John’s first assignment …”: “John M. Googin,” Memorial Tributes, National Academy of Engineering 8 (1996), 120–24.

  48 “I can still see him …”: Perricos (2001), p. 9.

  49 “may have had a dim …”: David Kay interview, 2007.

  50 “We analyzed all the available …”: Nichols (2001), p. 2.

  51 “One of the intelligence …”: Ibid.

  FOUR FOLLOWING THE CALUTRON TRAIL

  1 “We got on our bus …”: Nichols (2001), p. 2.

  2 photographing boxed material through a fence: Davis and Kay (1992), p. 24.

  3 “running around Tuwaitha ….”: Gallucci (2001) (online).

  4 “that it might be a good idea …”: Ibid.

  5 “I had brought …”: Nichols (2001), p. 3.

  6 “just a dusty area …”: Ibid.

  7 “We quite literally wrote the script …”: U.S. Committee on Foreign Affairs (1993), p. 31.

  8 “took a walk beforehand …”: David Kay interview, 2007. Unless otherwise specified, all David Kay statements in this chapter come from this source.

  9 “The David Kay cowboys …”: Gallucci (2001), pp. 9–10.

  10 “Rolf Ekéus felt that …”: Trevan (1999), p. 98.

  11 Central Command details: Ibid., p. 76.

  12 “all concealment task forces …”: Quoted in Ritter (1999), p. 109.

  13 “The inspectors arrived …”: Perricos (2001), p. 10.

  14 “At one time or another …”: “Report on the Third IAEA On-Site Inspection in Iraq Under Security Council Resolution 687” (1991), p. 6.

  15 “where the inspectors asked …”: Perricos (2001), p. 10.

  16 one of his colleagues: Khidhir Hamza.

  17 the entire CERN library, standard magnet design programs: Albright and O’Neill (1999).

  18 an alternative design with a solid iron core: “In fact, Jafar ultimately settled on another design … which in one respect has some similarity with the original [CERN] proposal, i.e., the use of magnetized cylinders of steel,” Gsponer and Hurni (1995), p. 24.

  19 “If that was the model …”: Sidney Drell, personal communication, 2 Feb. 2009.

  20 “it was quite possible …”: Gsponer and Hurni (1995), p. 20.

  21 “There was no sense …”: BBC News interview with Gordon Corera, 12 August 2004 (online).

  22 The strategic aim of these programs: See Barzam (2001).

  23 “Jaffar tried to explain …”: Perricos (2001), p. 10.

  24 “Near the end of our stay …”: Nichols (2001), p. 3.

  25 “When Blix suddenly realized …”: Reported by Paul White, Los Alamos group interview, 2007.

  26 “The revelation that Iraq …”: Blix (2004), p. 24.

  27 “the Soviet ambassador …”: Ibid., p. 23.

  28 “We traveled all around Iraq …”: Frank Pabian, Los Alamos group interview, 2007.

  29 “a sand-covered Los Alamos report …”: Los Alamos NewsBul
letin, Summer 1991.

  30 “most of the material …” Davis and Kay (1992), p. 24.

  31 enough HEU for one or two bombs: Phillips, in the Los Alamos NewsBulletin, Summer 1991, says 12 kilograms, but Davis and Kay (1992), p. 25, write that “At design levels, Tarmiya could have produced 15–30 kg per year of highly enriched uranium … enough to make one or two bombs per year.”

  32 “The facility at Tarmiya …”: Statement of IAEA Director General to IAEA Board of Governors, Vienna, Austria, 17 July 1991 (online).

  33 “It is now being asked …”: Ibid.

  34 “What we didn’t have …”: Gallucci (2001).

  35 “Sometime during that August …”: Ibid. All Gallucci quotations in this section come from this source unless otherwise specified.

  36 “It just went against his Swedish …”: David Kay interview, 2007. All Kay quotations in this section come from this source unless otherwise specified.

  37 Inspection time schedule: “First Report on the Sixth IAEA On-Site Inspection in Iraq Under Security Council Resolution 687” (1991), 22–30 September 1991, Appendix, Chronology of Team Activities, p. 5ff.

  38 “Al-Atheer Plant Progress Report”: Included as an appendix to the IAEA report on its sixth Iraq inspection, translated at http://www.iraqwatch.org/un/IAEA/s-23122.htm.

  39 “within time variations …”: Al-Atheer progress report, Appendix, p. 18.

  40 “20 detonation tests”: Ibid., p. 16.

  41 “our scientists requested to refer …”: Imad Khadduri, “Iraq’s Nuclear Non-Capability,” www.dissidentvoice.org, 21 Nov. 2002 (online).

  42 6:20 a.m. on 24 September: “First Report Sixth IAEA Inspection,” Appendix, Chronology of Team Activities, p. 6.

  43 “We are currently in nighttime …”: “U.N. Inspector’s Words: ‘We’re Prepared to Stay,’” New York Times, 25 Sept. 1991

  44 a football game using a water bottle: Kay actually said a roll of toilet paper, but several of his fellow parking-lot attendees corrected him.

  45 Gallucci would hint: Gallucci (2001). See especially this talk’s Q. & A.

  46 “There was always the plausible …”: Ibid., p. 14.

  47 “did a lot to energize …”: Ibid., p. 12.

  48 “Project 6000, also known as Al Atheer …”: CIA 65819 6581901, online at www.globalsecurity.org.

  49 “The proud calutrons …”: Perricos (2001), p. 12.

  50 “Finding this smoking gun …”: Ibid., p. 11.

  51 “Saddam had witnessed firsthand …”: Alfonsi (2006), p. 343.

  FIVE THE LITTLE SUITCASE

  1 “I’m tired as hell …”: Quoted in Chernyaev (2000), p. 369.

  2 Eduard Shevardnadze … presaged: “The reformers have gone into hiding. A dictatorship is approaching. No one knows what this dictatorship will be like …” Quoted in Pryce-Jones (1995), p. 375.

  3 “For those in the know …”: Remnick (1994), p. 447.

  4 Vladimir Kryuchkov … learned of their discussions: Andrew and Mitrokhin (1999), p. 513; Albats (1994), pp. 282–83.

  5 Cheget: My primary source of information on the Cheget system is Tsypkin (2004). 84 “responsible for directing the activities …”: United States (1992a), pp. 71–72.

  6 a lavish presidential dacha: For a satellite view, see Google Earth N 44° 23′ 30.84″, E 33° 45′ 27″.

  7 Thirty-two-man KGB personal bodyguard: Gorbachev (1991), p. 23.

  8 “Let him … a ‘state of emergency’”: Gorbachev (1996), p. 600.

  9 “a quiet old man …”: Yeltsin (1994), p. 72.

  10 “The situation is catastrophic …”: Quoted in Remnick (1994), p. 450. 86 “the state would fall apart”: Quoted in ibid., p. 452.

  11 Pugo … had sneaked off: Gorbachev (1996), p. 634.

  12 Lukyanov … a friend of Gorbachev: Pryce-Jones (1995), p. 419, believes historians have confused Anatoly with another Lukyanov, Andrei, who was close to Gorbachev as an undergraduate at Moscow State University; but see Gorbachev (1991), p. 45: “For forty years, from our student days, we [i.e., Anatoly] had enjoyed comradely relations.”

  13 “Yanayev was already … drunk”: Quoted in Remnick (1994), p. 452.

  14 Cheget terminal … disconnected: 4:32 p.m. Tsypkin (2004), p. 2. Gorbachev gives the time he learned of the arrival as 4:50 p.m. Bonnell et al. (1994), p. 161.

  15 “[He] asked me about the condition …”: Tsypkin (2004), p. 2.

  16 “Many cars were piling up …”: Chernyaev (2000), p. 405.

  17 “Evidently they are going to try …”: Bonnell et al. (1994), p. 162.

  18 “a conversation with deaf-mutes”: Ibid., p. 164.

  19 “I was told that the cause …”: Tsypkin (2004), p. 3.

  20 The general staff … could launch: Ibid., p. 5.

  21 Gorbachev was “no longer capable …”: Quoted in Bonnell et al. (1994), p. 339.

  22 “the race to Foros”: Remnick (1994), p. 486.

  23 The Cheget team had been removed: As recorded in Raisa’s diary: “At five p.m. the senior security guard reported that the signaling unit had been withdrawn.” Gorbachev (1996), p. 635. This action is confirmed in the testimony of the Cheget team leader quoted in Tsypkin (2004), p. 4.

  24 “left for Moscow …”: Ibid.

  25 “We consider this a sign …”: Gorbachev (1996), p. 639.

  26 “I talked on the telephone …”: Ibid., p. 641. N.B. “I said to them … ‘garrison’” interpolated from MG’s original statement at Bonnell et al. (1994), p. 166.

  27 “judging by their reaction …”: Chernyaev (2000), p. 421.

  28 “It was then …”: Gorbachev (1996), p. 641.

  29 “she threw herself on the seat …”: Chernyaev (2000), p. 423.

  30 “We lived through …”: Gorbachev (1996), p. 640.

  31 “I have come back from Foros …”: Ibid., p. 642.

  32 “The conference was probably …”: Sam Nunn interview, July 2008. All Nunn quotations in this chapter not otherwise attributed come from this source.

  33 “You have to assume …”: “Coup Chiefs Likely Controlled Nuclear Bombs,” Toronto Star, 24 Aug. 1991, p. A11.

  34 “are more stringent …”: United States (1992c), p. 7.

  35 “We do not invest …”: Ibid., p. 4.

  36 “Under the conditions present …”: Ibid., p. 7.

  37 “Indeed, once Gorbachev’s Cheget was deactivated”: Tsypkin (2004), p. 5.

  38 “that the situation that occurred …”: United States (1992c), p. 6.

  39 “was a significant source …”: Barton Gellman, Washington Post, 28 Aug. 1991, p. A18.

  40 “in virtually real time …”: Bruce Blair, personal communications, 1 Sept. 2008.

  41 “Let me describe …”: United States (1992c), p. 5.

  42 “special processing …”: Ibid.

  43 “actually devised … to streamline …”: Ibid., p. 17.

  44 “There is an important lesson …”: Ibid., p. 9.

  45 “sufficient to eradicate Europe …”: Stanislav Shushkevich interview, Apr. 2003.

  46 In Kazakhstan 104 … work to do: Podvig (2001), p. 24.

  SIX MANY LITTLE MONSTERS

  1 Sam Nunn’s family background: Sam Nunn interview, Washington, 9 July 2008. All Nunn quotations in this chapter not otherwise attributed come from this source.

  2 “I remember very well …”: Shields and Potter (1997), p. xiii.

  3 “He and three or four …”: Ibid.

  4 Nunn, NATO, and forward basing: Nunn (2008), p. 1.

  5 “withdrawal of significant numbers …”: Goodby (2006), p. 107.

  6 “we had a major problem …”: Shields and Potter (1997), p. xiii.

  7 “In particular, I believed …”: Ibid., p. xvi.

  8 “Civil war in a country …”: United States (1992a), p. 2.

  9 “another form of defense …”: Ibid.

  10 “foolish”: Quoted in John Lancaster et al., “Citing Soviet Strife, Cheney Resists Cuts; Possi
ble Civil War, Famine Noted by Pentagon Chief,” Washington Post, 30 Aug. 1991, p. A1.

  11 “premature”: Quoted in Ann Devroy, Washington Post, 30 Aug. 1991, p. A1.

  12 “cut into the muscle of defense …”: “The President’s news conference in Kennebunkport, Maine,” 2 Sept. 1991, George H. W. Bush Public Papers.

  13 “to assist the Soviet Union …”: Sam Nunn, “A Helping Hand, Not a Blank Check,” Washington Post, 15 Sept. 1991, reproduced in United States (1992a), p. 82.

  14 the earliest statement … belived to be: “The Cold War has ended and we are entering a new era, one in which many of the old prescriptions lack curative powers. We face a new kind of nuclear threat and we need a new strategy to meet it. Deterrence is a necessary but no longer sufficient element of that strategy. We should begin now to work through together how to deal with nuclear dangers that cannot be reached by the threat of retaliation.

  “The threat of accidental or unauthorized nuclear attack is of this character. The chance of such an attack may be small, but the consequences would be incalculable. Unless we are willing to conclude that the recently failed coup is the last serious crisis for the Soviet Union, and unless we disregard the growing Third World threat, we must deal with this possibility,” United States (1992a), p. 76.

  15 “both the House and the Senate …”: Shields and Potter (1997), p. xvi.

  16 “the broadest and most …”: Bush and Scowcroft (1998), p. 546.

  17 “Cheney’s distaste for …”: Ibid., p. 545.

  18 “concerned that the North …”: Bush and Scowcroft (1998), p. 545.

  19 “largely a gesture …”: Quoted in Cumings (2004), p. 55.

  20 “directing that the United States …”: Bush’s speech is reproduced in full in United States (1992a), pp. 83–87, with a Fact Sheet following.

  21 “There were some differences …”: Bush and Scowcroft (1998), p. 547.

  22 “Prior to shipment to Russia …”: Blair (1993), pp. 102–3.

  23 “involved removing tritium …”: Blair (1993), p. 313, n. 134.

  24 “We ran into a buzz saw”: United States (1992a), p. 256.

  25 “The results of that election …”: Ibid.

  26 Senator Richard Lugar had arranged: According to Richard Combs in Shields and Potter (1997), p. 43.

 

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