Verification Technologies: Managing

Research and Development for Cooperative

Arms Control Monitoring Measures

May 1991

OTA-ISC-488

NTIS order #PB91-197913
Recommended Citation:

U.S. Congress, Office of Technology Assessment, Verification Technologies: Managing

Research and Development for Cooperative Arms Control Monitoring Measures, OTA-EK488 (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, May 1991).

For sale by the Superintendent of Documents

U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, DC 20402-9325

(order form can be found in the back of this report)
Foreword

Cooperative monitoring measures, including on-site inspections, are now a regular

feature of international arms control agreements. The Intermediate Nuclear Forces (INF)

Treaty, the Threshold Test Ban Treaty, the Conventional Forces in Europe Treaty, the

prospective Strategic Arms Reduction Talks (START) Treaty, and the proposed Chemical

Weapons Convention all contain such measures. This new element of arms control verification

is likely to be a part of any future arms control arrangements in which the United States

becomes involved. How well prepared are we for this new era?

The Senate Foreign Relations and House Foreign Affairs Committees asked OTA to

undertake an assessment centering on the technologies and techniques of monitoring the

START Treaty. (The first report of this study, focusing on the START Treaty, was delivered

in the summer of 1990.) In its request, the Foreign Affairs Committee also called on OTA to

address the “. . . newer technologies that can be brought to bear on such cooperative

verification measures as manned on-site inspections, manned perimeter and portal monitoring,

and unmanned on-site monitoring. ” The committee added that “it would be useful to place

these technologies in the broader context of verification technologies and methods.’

This report is one of OTA’s responses to the latter request: it examines the management

of the research and development process from which the new technologies are emerging.

(Another response to the committee request, to be completed in May 1991, will take the form

of a report analyzing at length one potential cooperative monitoring measure, aerial

surveillance.) Partly as a result of the way in which the research and development process is

managed, the allocation of research resources appears to be geared to meeting short-term needs

and solving isolated problems, rather than to pursuing long-term goals and developing

integrated verification regimes for the future. Our report identifies a range of organizational

options that might help improve the balance of research emphasis.

In preparing this report, OTA sought the assistance of many individuals and

organizations (see ‘‘Acknowledgments”). We very much appreciate their contributions. As

with all OTA reports, the content remains the sole responsibility of OTA and does not

necessarily represent the views of our advisors or reviewers.

u JOHN H. GIBBONS

Director
Technologies for Verifying a Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty

Advisory Panel

Rodney Nichols, Chairman

Scholar-in-Residence, The Carnegie Corporation of New York

James R. Blackwell

Director, International Security

Meridian Corp.

Ashton Carter

Director

Center for Science and International Affairs

Harvard University

Sidney Drell

Stanford Linear Accelerator Center

Stanford University

Richard Garwin

IBM Fellow

Thomas J. Watson Research Center

James Goodby

Distinguished Service Professor

Carnegie-Mellon University

Lt. Gen. Andrew Goodpaster, USA (retired)

chairman

The Atlantic Council

Sidney Graybeal

Chief Scientist

SAIC

Roger Hagengruber

Vice President for Exploratory Systems

Sandia National Laboratories

William R. Harris

The Rand Corp.

Admiral Bobby Inman

SAIC

Michael Krepon

President

Henry L. Stimson Center

Stephen Lukasik

Vice President & Chief Scientist

TRW/Space Defense Sector

Raymond McCrory

former Chief, Arms Control Intelligence Staff

Consultant

Ernest Mettenet

former CEO Hercules Aerospace

Consultant

Stephen Meyer

Professor of Politcal Science

MIT

Lt. Gen. William E. Odom, USA (retired)

Director of National Security Studies

Hudson Institute

George Rueckert

Senior Analyst

Meridian Corp.

Albert D. Wheelon

former Chairman and CEO, Hughes Aircraft Co.

Consultant

Charles Zraket

Trustee

The MITRE Corp.

NOTE: OTA appreciates and is grateful for the valuable assistance and thoughtful critiques provided by the advisory panel members.

The panel does not, however, necessarily approve, disapprove, or endorse this report. OTA assumes full responsibility for the

report and the accuracy of its contents.
OTA Project Staff—START Verification

Lionel S. Johns, Assistant Director, OTA

Energy, Materials, and International Security Division

Alan Shaw, International Security and Commerce Program Manager

Thomas Karas, Project Director

Arthur chat-o

Brian McCue

Christopher Waychoff

Administrative Staff

Donna Reynolds

Jacqueline Robinson-Boykin

Louise Staley

Acknowledgments

OTA gratefully acknowledges the assistance of individuals in the following organizations for their help

in supplying information or in reviewing drafts of this report (the contents of the report, of course, remain the

responsibility of OTA):

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory Sandia National Laboratory

Los Alamos National Laboratory U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency

Office of the Secretary of Defense U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Arms Control
Contents

Page

summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. .................+-...”””””” ““” ””””””””””””””””””””””””””” 

1

The Current U.S. Research and Development Program for Cooperative Verification

Technology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .*...*.. .+...””” ““”. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. .. .. .. .” ”” ”” ”” ”. ”~. ””””.” ● “00 .” ”*soo Qoo”””o 2

The Current Program: Coordination v. Direction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ............””.””.””””0” 4

Current Research Emphasizes Individual Technologies Over Systems Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . 7

Current Research Emphasizes Near Term . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. .. .. ..- ”. ””””””.”” “O.””””””””” 10

Conclusion: organizational Options . . . . . . . . . . . . ...........”””””” ““. ”” DO””””””.”-””” “.””. 11

Option l: Status Quo .. .. .. .. .. OO. .. .. .. ... ... O

.. O.OO. .Q. .. .o. .. .. o. .oo. oo”ooo ”o”oo”o 12

Option 2: IncrementalChanges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. ...............”””””” 12

Option 3: Lead Agency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. +. .. .. .. ...o” o”” 13

Option 4: Funding Agency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ....+...00...00.0””””oo.”” 14

Option 5: Verification Research Czar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

Option 6: New Arms Control Agency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ........o.”””.”. 15

Appendix A: The Technology of Arms Control Verification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

Future Verification Regimes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . “Q””””””””””””””””” ““ 17

Monitoring Measures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ..”””””””ooo”o”ooo ● “”” ”””””.”” 17

Monitoring Systems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . 17

Technology Requirements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .*.”””..”””oo””ooo ““”””” 17

Appendix B: Systems Analysis and Verifcation Research . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Introduction: Judgments Under Uncertainty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ......”””.”””0 21

Network Analysis of Evasion Strategies and Verification Measures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Boxes

Box Page

A. U.S. Government Organizations With a Role in Verification Technology Development . . . 5

B. The Arms Control and Disarmament Agency Role . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

C. Planning Intelligence and OSI Should Mesh, But Integrated Congressional Oversight

Is Difficult . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

D. Verification Technology System Levels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

E. The Timing of Verification Research . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ...............~””. .“””” 10

Figures

Figure Page

l. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency External Research Funds, 1962-90 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

2. Schematic Diagram of a Proposed U.S. Data Fusion Center . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

3. Portable High-Resolution Mini Gas Chromatograph-Mass Spectrometer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19

4. Network Representation of Evasion Strategies and probabilities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Tables

Table Page

l. DNA and DOE Verification Technology Budgets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

2. Candidates for Role of bad Agency in Verification R&D . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
Summary

In 1986 and 1987, the Soviet Union for the first time signed arms control agreements instituting on-site inspections

as a means of monitoring treaty compliance. Previous decades of Soviet resistance had led to U.S. pessimism that

extensive on-site inspections would ever be feasible. Accordingly, as U. S. agencies entered the Intermediate Nuclear

Forces (INF) and Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) negotiations, they had sponsored relatively little

external research into on-site monitoring systems. Policymakers devised verification regimes for these treaties, then

turned to the technical research community for quick development of new monitoring devices and systems as needed.

OTA’s review of the INF and START cases suggests that:

● the policymakers’ work might have benefited from the results of earlier, external research if it had been done;

and

● the technical research community might have been better prepared to respond to policymakers’ and negotiators’

needs if its own research programs had been prioritized by the requirements of likely overall verification

regimes.

U.S. technical research for cooperative arms control verification regimes has been piecemeal rather than synoptic,

and oriented to the near term rather than the long term. When unilaterally gathered intelligence was almost the sole

means of arms control monitoring, this approach seemed to suffice. (Note: This report addresses only issues related

to research on cooperative monitoring techniques, not on National Technical Means (NTM); secrecy requirements

impose this major omission.)

Three conditions suggest a need for more systematic, long-term research on cooperative verification methods:

● the likelihood that additional arms control agreements with cooperative verification measures will be

negotiated;

● the likelihood that some of these agreements will involve numerous nations, some of which will not have access

to NTM but will still want assurances of mutual treaty compliance; and

● the possibility that, as in the recent past, the United States will find itself negotiating arms control provisions

that only shortly before seemed politically improbable.

A more systematic program of long-term analysis and research could improve support for future arms control

negotiations. It could develop priorities for continuing research on technologies for various monitoring measures.

It could help assess potential monitoring problems and identify promising technical solutions for further research.

It might also help identify additional arms control measures made feasible by new monitoring techniques.

The United States lacks a synoptic, long-term program of research on cooperative measures of arms control

verification in part because there is no one in charge-no one whose job is to make such a program happen. Two

agencies, the Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Arms Control and the Defense Nuclear Agency (DNA) manage

the bulk of research on technologies for cooperative verification measures. In 1990 DOE spent about $130 million,l

mainly at its national laboratories; DNA dispersed about $35 million, including $14.5 million from the U.S. Army,

to the DOE national laboratories, to private contractors, and to other government agencies, Today, numerous

Government agencies participate in interagency committees to coordinate arms control research, but none has overall

authority.

Options for alternative organizational arrangements include:

make some incremental changes for better research focus;

designate a lead agency for planning verification research;

channel all or most research funds through one of the currently participating agencies to the others;

create a new verification research ‘ ‘czar’ to direct the multi-agency research program;

create a new arms control agency with primary responsibility and authority for all types of arms control

research, planning, negotiation, and implementation.

Each of these options has advantages and disadvantages requiring careful consideration.

——. ..— -—----—.-— — .—. -. —. —.. . . . . —-—

IA~Ut $75 milllon of ~s was dcv~ted t[} tflc monitoring” of INK Iear tests, wh~ch left iik}ut $SS million for CLL1 ~fier c~rent ~d future bT~s of a~s

control monitoring.

–1 ---
2 ● verification Technologies

The Current U.S. Research and

Development Program for Cooperative

Verification Technology

Introduction

Late in August 1987, U.S. inspectors entered

Soviet territory to inspect a Soviet ground force

exercise involving 16,500 troops and 425 tanks. The

Soviets had agreed to such inspections by signing

the 1986 Document of the Stockholm Conference on

Confidence- and Security-Building Measures and

Disarmament in Europe. In December 1987, the

United States and the Soviet Union agreed to five

additional types of on-site inspection when they

signed the INF Treaty (eliminating intermediaterange nuclear missiles in Europe).

Until these breakthroughs, unilateral intelligence

gathering (with some negotiated agreements on

cooperative measures to facilitate the use of National Technical Means) was the United States’

virtually sole method of arms control compliance

monitoring. Decades of Soviet resistance led, understandably, to pessimism that extensive on-site inspections would ever be feasible. Accordingly, as

they entered the INF negotiations, U.S. agencies had

sponsored relatively little external research on

on-site monitoring systems.2

Instead, these systems were developed as the

negotiations proceeded. For example, INF negotiations began in 1980, broke off in 1983, and resumed

in 1985. At the request of the Office of the Secretary

of Defense (OSD), Sandia National Laboratories

started studying the concept of a perimeter-portal

monitoring system in late 1983, but did not focus on

a particular design concept until late 1986; at that

time, it was asked to build a full-scale demonstration

complex (the Technical On-Site Inspection project)

within a 3-month period. The United States and the

Soviet Union signed the INF Treaty in December,

1987. The United States created its On-Site Inspection Agency (OSIA) in January 1988. The two sides

did not sign the INF Memorandum of Agreement

(MOA), which formalized on-site inspection procePhoto credit: Los Alamos National Laboratory

The Los Alamos National Laboratory arms control

verification simulation facility provides a testbed for

monitoring instruments. Items shown include a mock-up

of a Soviet missile transporter-erector-launcher (TEL)

and a passive gamma ray imaging system. The TEL can

be loaded with simulated single or multiple warheads.

These warheads resemble real ones in shape, density, and

radiation, and thus can be used to test a wide variety of

proposed warhead monitoring instruments from various

Department of Energy laboratories.

dures, until December 1989. Only during the 2-year

period between the treaty signing and the MOA

signing did the United States finish developing a

radiation detection device called for in the treaty-a

neutron-detecting mapper to help distinguish between the banned, three-warhead SS-20 and the

permitted, single-warhead SS-25.3

Thanks to modest DOE investments in longer

term research and development (R&D) and to their

~ne exception was for nuclear explosion detection and yield estimations. Another was for International Atomic Energy Agency nuclear material

accounting safeguards.

3Sm&a Natioti Laboratories led a 12-month effort to the completion of this task. The device was to be used during on-site @XCtiOnS at former

SS-20 deployment sites. It should be noted that the device had to be approved by the Soviet Union and by U.S. export-control authorities; the

speciflcat.ions for such devices are often the subject of lengthy, detailed negotiations. Those negotiations for INF had not been completed by the time

the treaty was signed.
Verification Technologies ● 3

existing technology base, the U.S. laboratories

apparently responded well to the demands for

inspection technology created by the INF Treaty.

Nevertheless, by 1988 the Strategic Arms Reduction

negotiations were moving ahead rapidly and, once

again, verification technology research appeared to

be working to catch up.

Before entering into an arms control treaty

negotiation, U.S. planners decide in advance what

arms control limits would serve U.S. interests; they

then design a verification regime that would meet

U.S. requirements. (In some cases, they might judge

that compliance with a proposed arms control

provision could not be acceptably verified and

therefore that the measure itself would not serve U.S.

interests.) Diplomats base their negotiating goals on

these plans, adjusting goals and plans as negotiations unfold.

It is not always possible to precede arms control

negotiations with thorough research on potential

verification regimes.4 The United States has frequently been engaged in arms control negotiations

for which lengthy advance preparations had not been

made: to wait for the completion of long-term

planning would be to pass up the arms control

opportunities these negotiations offer. Second, the

U.S. Government is likely to remain one of distributed power centers, both within the vast bureaucracy

that manages national security affairs and between

the executive branch and Congress; therefore, a

highly unified national planning process for longterm purposes is difficult to achieve without strong,

high-level interest and leadership. Third, changes in

Administration can disrupt the continuity of the

process.

Nevertheless, the absence of long-term research

has led in some cases to mutual dissatisfaction

between the research and policy communities. The

policymakers, bringing their requirements for new

monitoring technology to the researchers, have

found the researchers to respond on occasion with

proposals that they deemed unusable or that were

unnecessarily complex and costly.5 Researchers, on

the other hand, found themselves responding to

short-notice demands to supply technical solutions

to imperfectly specified problems. The INF and

START cases suggest that:

. the policymakers’ work might have benefited

from the results of earlier, external research if

it had been done; and

. the technical research community might have

been better prepared to respond to policymakers’

and negotiators’ needs if its own research

programs had been prioritized by the requirements of likely overall verification regimes.

U.S. technical research for cooperative arms

control verification regimes has been piecemeal

rather than synoptic, and oriented to the near term

rather than the long term. When unilaterally gathered intelligence was almost the sole means of arms

control monitoring, this approach seemed to suffice.

Under today’s circumstances, the Nation might be

better served by a more comprehensive and farsighted approach. What are these new circumstances?

First, the United States is likely to continue

negotiating new arms control agreements (such as

the Chemical Weapons Convention) that include

on-site inspection (0SI) and other cooperative

monitoring measures. These measures need to be

carefully thought out if they are to be more than

window-dressing. They will also be increasingly

expensive (in dollars and in other ways) unless

applied efficiently. Efficiency may include the

application of some monitoring measures to more

than one treaty.

Second, new multilateral, not just bilateral, arms

control agreements will impose new requirements

on verification regimes. For the United States, the

major source of arms control compliance informa4For e~ple, an fiteragency co~olidated Verification Group conducted extensive studies on possible monitoring measures ~d Proposal tie

verification regimes which have, to a great extent, been incorporated in the INF and draft ST~T treaties. The studies were conducted and proposals

developed even as negotiations were under way (in the mid-1980s)

5A p~cipmt~ the policy prWess Iwding to the INF and START verification regimes argued the follotig to OTA:

Design of veritlcation regimes is a policy function which draws on technical monitoring capabilities and which deals with many factors

(intrusiveness, costs, benefits, etc.) beyond the scope of the R&D community. Some of the mtional labs’ analytical studies have been built in a

vacuum; many contain some useful ideas but often reinvent the wheel or propose things that are and have been non-starters for various reasons

well understood by the policy community.

On the other hand, the researchers’ studies might be more relevant if they could take into account in advance all the constraints under which monitoring

technologies would be expected to operate. In additioq policy planners usually address the design of verifkation regimes when negotiations are either

imminent or in progress; some prior research might produce an information base from which they could draw when the time came.
4. Verification Technologies

tion will continue to be National Technical Means.

But many future negotiated monitoring measures

will have to be applicable in, and acceptable to, a

variety of nations simultaneously. They will also

have to provide some confidence in mutual compliance to countries without the considerable NTM

resources of the United States and the Soviet Union.

It is even conceivable that some day there will be an

international verification agency, which would require multilaterally acceptable monitoring measures.

6

Third, the recent past has shown that arms control

measures thought to be beyond the horizon may

move into serious negotiations faster than the U.S.

Government anticipates. Unless long-term research

has prepared potential responses to such contingencies, U.S. negotiators may have to improvise and put

forward positions not as well considered as they

might have been. Moreover, the very availability of

new monitoring techniques may make it possible to

consider arms control measures that previously

would have been considered infeasible.

Under these new conditions,7 U.S. interests would

be served best by a research program that emphasized:

●

●

●

●

systematic identification and analysis of potential arms control verification regimes (including both NTM and cooperative monitoring

measures) and of how all their components can

work together most efficiently;

systematic analysis of how data from multiple

sources can be fused into a meaningful picture

(and of how data gathered for one treaty might

contribute to monitoring compliance with others);

design of multilateral monitoring systems that

would both serve U.S. interests and increase the

confidence of countries without U.S. NTM

resources that all parties to an agreement are in

compliance; and

examination, on a contingency basis, of verification regimes for arms control measures not

currently on the active agenda.

Such analysis could improve support for future

arms control negotiations. It could develop priorities

for continuing research on technologies for various

monitoring measures. It could help assess potential

monitoring problems and identify promising technical solutions for further research. It might also help

identify additional arms control measures that could

be made feasible by new monitoring techniques.

Given the lessons of recent experience, why does

the United States still lack a synoptic, long-term

program of research on cooperative measures of

arms control verification? The short answer to this

question is that there is no one in charge-no one

whose job is to make such a program happen. A 1990

Administration report to Congress reveals the weaknesses and strengths of current executive branch

arrangements for managing verification research.

The Current Program: Coordination v.

Direction

Senators Jeff Bingaman and Pete V. Domenici

attached to the FY 1989 defense authorization bill an

amendment (Section 910) mandating a report to

Congress that included a review of the relationship

of the arms control objectives of the United States to

the responsiveness of research and development of

monitoring systems for verification. The deadline

for that report was June 30, 1989; the executive

branch delivered to Congress the 24-page document,

informally known as the “Section 910 Report,” on

March 5, 1990.

During the period between the mandate for the

report and its delivery, the National Security Council

established a new working group to coordinate

research and development in this area (for a listing

of organizations to be coordinated, see box A). As

the report explained,

In general, with respect to coordinating development and utilization of technology for treaty verification, agencies successfully have worked together

informally or through interagency working groups

for INF and START and have accomplished coordinated technology development and utilization. This

coordination will be further strengthened and for6For emple, see A Walter ‘om~ “The Case for a United Nations Verification Agency, “ IEEE Technology and Society Magazine, December

1990/Janumy 1991, pp. 16-27; and “Study on the Role of the United Nations in the Field of Veriilcatioq” United Nations document A/45/372, Aug.

28, 1990, pp. 86-87.

TA5 of ~ly 1990, the &ends cited a~ve could & ca~~ into question in tie light of diffi~lties with the Soviets in implementing the cOJIVeLltiODd

Forces in Europe (CFE) agreements and in concluding the STMT Treaty. On the other hand, long-term planning and research are in preparation for

contingencies, and neither can nor should be instantly adapted to near-term events.
Verification Technologies ● 5

Box A—U.S. Government Organizations With

a Role in Verification Technology

Development

Perhaps contributing to the 9-month delay in

delivery of the Section 910 Report was the multiplicity of the government organizations which had

to be consulted. The report identified the following

as playing major roles in verification technology

development:

. Department of Defense

-Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for

Acquisition

-Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for

Policy

-Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense

for C

3

I

—Defense Technology Security Administration

—Joint Chiefs of Staff

—Defense Intelligence Agency

—Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency

—The Military Services (Army, Navy, and

Air Force)

. Department of Energy, Office of Arms Control

● Department of State

—Bureau of Politico-Military Affairs

—Bureau of Intelligence and Research

● Arms Control and Disarmament Agency

● Intelligence Community

In 1989, the National Security Council created a

Verification Technology Working Group as a

forum for coordination among these groups.

realized through the Verification Technology Working Group (VTWG) of the Subcommittee on Verification and Compliance (SCVC) of the Arms Control

Policy Coordinating Committee of the National

Security Council (NSC).8

The Section 910 Report pointed out that, besides the

coordinating groups established at the initiative of

the executive branch,

. . .Congress has mandated one formal mechanism to

coordinate research and development applicable to

arms control throughout the government. Under

Section 31 of the Arms Control and Disarmament

Act and Executive Order 11044 (Aug. 12, 1982), the

ACDA [Arms Control and Disarmament Agency]

Director is charged, with the advice and assistance of

affected agencies, with ensuring the conduct of

research, development, and other studies in the field

of arms control and disarmament (including verification) and coordinating research, development, and

other studies conducted in the field by or for other

government agencies. The Arms Control Research

Coordination Committee (ACRCC) was created in

1984 to coordinate research related to arms control.

Chaired by ACDA, its members are the Office of the

Secretary of Defense, Defense Nuclear Agency

(DNA), the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the Departments of

State and Energy, the Central Intelligence Agency

(CIA), and the National Aeronautics and Space

Administration (NASA).

Even by the report’s description, this committee

has done little to perform ACDA’s congressionally

mandated role, described as follows:

The committee:

—meets periodically to exchange information on

current research, to consider steps to facilitate

coordination of research, and to discuss future

research plans;

-encourages agencies to circulate final reports of

contracted research on arms control to other

agencies and to share briefings on such research;

and

-establishes and maintains a data base catalog

(dubbed ACORN) listing past and ongoing research projects.

In fact, the ACRCC appears to meet rarely, and OTA

found it to be unknown even to some of the principal

officials involved in verification policy. (For a

discussion of the ACDA verification research role,

see box B.)

Other, lower level interagency working groups

also play coordinating roles. For example, the

Department of Defense (DOD) has a Verification

Technology Research and Development Working

Group “. . . to provide a forum for discussion of

current and potential verification technology requirements. . . .“

The two principal agencies funding (non-NTM)

verification technology research are the DOE Office

of Arms Control and the Defense Nuclear Agency.9

The DOE national laboratories execute virtually all

s’ ‘*s Conhol policy and verifi~tion lkchnoIogy: Repofi to Congress Pursuant to Section 910, FY 1989 Department of Defense Autiotition

Act (Public Law 10W56), Mar. 5, 1990.” Transmitted by the White House to the President of the Semte and the Speaker of the House on that date.

The report as a whole is classified ‘‘secre~” but all passages quoted or cited here are marked as unclassii3edin the document.

gAc@ as executive agent for tie Under SecretW of Defense for Ac@sitio~ Directorate of Defense Resewch ~dEnf@eer@ DePu9 Directorate

for Strategic and Nuclear Forces.
6 ● Verification Technologies

Box B—The Arms Control and Disarmament Agency Role

In March 1989, the ACDA Inspector General issued a report declaring that

ACDA does not now play an active role in coordinating research conducted by these agencies. ACRCC

[Arms Control Research and Coordinating Committee] meets only one or two times a year. . .ACDA has

little, if any, influence over research priorities that maybe established by these other agencies.

ACDA’s own funds for external research had declined over the years to less than $0.5 million annually (see

figure 1). Even astute uses of these funds

. . .do not come anywhere near giving ACDA the

role in external research that the Congress may

have originally intended when it asked the

Director “to exercise his powers in such a

manner as to insure the acquisition of a fund of

theoretical and practical knowledge concerning

disarmament.”. . .To the extent that national

security and foreign affairs agencies can persuade

OMB [Office of Management and Budget] and

their congressional committees that they need

research money for arms control, ACDA’s ability

to coordinate arms control research will be

correspondingly diminished. Given ACDA’s small

size and research budget (a condition likely to be

continued unless the Administration and Congress shift research funds to ACDA from other

agencies), there is no way that ACDA can

influence to any significant degree the way other

government agencies spend Federal research

dollars.

It should also be noted that in the 1960s

ACDA external research funds also financed

academic and think-tank research on arms control. In later years, private foundations took up

some of that effort. More recently, their support

Figure l—Arms Control and Disarmament Agency

External Research Funds, 1962-90

Millions

35 I I

25

20

15

10

5

0

62 64 66 68 70 72 74 76 78 80 82 84 86 88 90

= Then-year dollars ~ 1990 dollars

ACDA external research funds have paid for research on all

aspects of arms control, not just verification. As this graph shows,

ACDA’s ability to support external research on verification

technology had become almost negligible by FY 1990. When

then-year dollars (lower line) are adjusted for inflation (upper line),

the real decline of ACDA external research becomes apparent.

SOURCE: U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency and OTA, 1990.

has declined as well. Thus universities find it increasingly difficult to find support for research in this area.

Soon after the transmittal of the Section 910 Report, ACDA announced the creation of a Chief Science

Advisor’s office. This office is to support arms control negotiations, oversee ACDA’s external and internal

research activities and operational analysis work, and carry out ACDA’s coordinating activities with other

research and development organizations in and out of government. According to ACDA’s description of

this office, it is to identify

. . .promising technologies for development of techniques and instruments for use in cooperative measures

to monitor arms control agreements, as well as innovative science and technology projects for possible

ACDA sponsorship or support.

The office is also to support ACDA’s Verification and Intelligence Bureau in the formulation of guidance

for development of new National Technical Means collection capabilities.

The creation of this office in May 1990 seems to have been a response to the recommendations of the

ACDA Inspector General. The office might strengthen ACDA’s role in the interagency process described

in the Section 910 Report. As of February 1991, however, ACDA had not yet appointed the Chief Science

Advisor or staffed the office. (ACDA advised OTA that the delays were due to jurisdictional and funding

questions within ACDA, but that these should be resolved soon.)
Verification Technologies . 7

the DOE research, with some subcontracting to

private fins. A handful of defense contractors, in

addition to the DOE national laboratories, have so

far carried out the DOD research. The two departments have agreed that DOE will sponsor basic

research and development, while DOD will sponsor

technologies at the test and evaluation stages.

Table 1 indicates the types of research and

amounts of funding for FY 1990. (More detailed

breakdowns of DOE projects are only available in

classified form.) Note that for FY 1991, the DNA

budget increased dramatically, from about $35

million (including $14.5 million from the Army) to

about $107 million-with a proposed decrease to

$83 million in FY 1992.

Current Research Emphasizes Individual

Technologies Over Systems Analysis

Establishing monitoring systems to verify compliance with agreements limiting arms is a complex

process. The fact that such systems must operate

within a negotiated international verification regime

adds complexity. One way of managing the process

would be to analyze individual monitoring methods

or devices in their larger context. From such a

systems-level point of view, the whole is not seen as

just a sum of parts, but as an integral system of

interacting smaller systems. For example, the monitoring regime for a particular arms control provision

may be seen as comprising a set of monitoring

measures employing a group of systems, each using

various devices or techniques, which in turn derive

from the application of scientific knowledge (i.e.,

basic technologies). See box C for a discussion of the

difficulties of implementing comprehensive congressional oversight of both intelligence and cooperative elements of arms control monitoring. See box

D for further description of monitoring regime

system levels.

Most of the research supervised by DOE and

DNA has centered on developing the technical

elements of monitoring systems; much less has been

devoted to overall system designs or “architectures, " either for comprehensive monitoring regimes or for the sets of monitoring measures that

make up such regimes. For example, the United

States proposed at START that mobile missiles be

tagged as a monitoring measure (see section on

‘‘Monitoring Systems‘‘ inbox D). Tags were to help

inspectors distinguish between legal and illegal

Table l—DNA and DOE Verification Technology Budgets

Thousands

of dollars

Defense Nuclear Agency, FY 1990:

START . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17,081

Including:

Borescopes, videoscopes (for containers)

Radiography

Reflective particle tags

Fiber optic tags (also DOE money)

Seals on rocket motor casting, curing pits

Ultrasonic tags

Rapidly deployable portal-perimeter monitoring

system (RDPPMS)

Portal-perimeter continuous monitoring (PPCM)

CONVENTIONAL FORCES EUROPE . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,035

Including:

Tags (field demos)

Treaty-limited equipment storage monitoring

Sensors/human facility monitoring

Inspection regime analysis

CHEMICAL WEAPONS CONVENTION . . . . . . . . . . . . 14,500

(Funded by the Army, but administered by DNA)

Including:

Evaluate sampling methodology

Trial inspections

Field demonstration of available technologies

Perimeter monitoring development

Tagging development

Chemical process database

Analysis of manufacturing sites and equipment

Evaluation of cheating scenarios

THRESHOLD TEST BAN TREATY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2,685

(Nuclear test yield measurement)

GRAND TOTAL (DNA) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35,301

Department of Energy, FY 1990:

NUCLEAR TESTING

Including:

Underground, on-site . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14,510

Underground, seismic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10,963

Nonseismic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2,667

Aboveground, satellite . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43,160

Sample/debris . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4,115

DIRECTED ENERGY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5,000

OTHER TECHNOLOGY

Tags, demos, chemical detection, etc. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21,367

Radiation detection . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12,915

ANALYTlCAL SUPPORT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13,000a

PROGRAM DIRECTION . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2,300a

GRAND TOTAL (DOE) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129,997

WTA has arbitrarily assigned 50 percent of the budget for these functions

to verification research.

SOURCES: Defense Nuclear Agency, 1991, and Department of Energy,

1990.

missiles. It was not until well into the negotiations

(December 1989) that the United States was prepared to propose and demonstrate to the Soviets the

specific tagging technology of its choice (reflective

particle, or “glitter paint” tags). Even by that time,
8 ● Verification Technologies

Box C—Planning Intelligence and OSI Should Mesh, But Integrated Congressional

Oversight Is Difficult

The U.S. intelligence community continues to gather and analyze the bulk of the information relevant to Soviet

and other arms control compliance. At the same time, on-site inspection has added a new dimension to arms control

monitoring. Ideally, these two ways of gathering information would operate in a perfectly complementary way, each

collecting data inaccessible to the other, each supporting the other. In fact, such close integration is difficult to

achieve. The problem is that, by necessity, the one way of getting information is highly secretive, the other relatively

open.

Much intelligence gathering succeeds because the target government does not know or understand the sources

and methods used: if it did, it could improve its ability to hide or falsify informational On-site inspection, on the

other hand, comes about as the result of mutual agreement about the kinds of information to be gathered, the

instruments to gather it, and the conditions of their use.2

The division between these two worlds of secrecy and openness creates problems for those outside the

intelligence community (and its overseeing congressional committees) who attempt to assess U.S. monitoring

programs. First, it is difficult to assess the verification value of additional increments of National Technical Means

of verification (NTM)-partly because of the extreme secrecy surrounding NTM and partly because NTM systems

will rarely serve verification purposes alone. Should any share of a system that would be acquired for intelligence

be counted as an arms control monitoring cost? How should that share be determined? Without such an accounting,

it is impossible to analyze the trade-off between the costs of various forms of on-site inspection and additional NTM

expenditures.

Second, it is difficult to get net assessments of the gains and losses of sensitive information that come with

on-site inspections. With an on-site inspection regime, the Soviet Union has the chance to gather more information

about the U.S. military than they would otherwise; the United States, in turn, can get more information about the

Soviet military than otherwise. Those negotiating inspection agreements with the Soviets count the potential losses

of information to Soviet collection as part of the cost of the inspection regime. To the people whose facilities might

have to undergo inspection, these potential losses pose both a risk to security and the concrete costs of trying to

protect the information.

It may be that some in the intelligence community assess the potential benefits of getting more information

about the Soviet military. Somewhere in the government, there maybe rigorous, all-source analysis comparing the

values of the potential gains and losses. OTA was not privy to such analyses, nor is most of the Congress (outside

the intelligence oversight committees) likely to be. Such analysis could support an evaluation of the ways that the

overall security of the United States would be better off or worse off if particular kinds of inspection systems were

employed. Because of the secrecy surrounding this issue, however, it is not likely to play a large role in arms control

treaty ratification debates.

lsomet~=the ~ge~ pm wmts to reve~ ac~te information, and may help the intelligence collectors of the other side get it. Thu.%

in past arms control agreements, the United States and the Soviet Union have agreed to forms of non-interference with ~ so that they may

assure one another that they are complying with certain treaty provisions. Such cooperative measures are likely to be part of START as well.

@n the other hand, a legitimate inspector might engage in espionage, using clandestine methods to try to gather information beyond the

types agreed on.

the focus of research had been on the tag and control monitoring regimes. Government working

tag-reading mechanisms, not on the systematic use

of the tags to assure that they would supply the

desired information.

There is a marked contrast between the many

millions of dollars spent each year on the analysis of

new weapons systems (for example, Peacekeeper

missile basing modes or Strategic Defense Initiative

system architectures) and the relative absence of

comparable contracted, or external, analysis of arms

groups have conducted analyses in preparation for

near-term negotiations, but this process has been

apart from the technical research and development

process, and has not addressed longer-term possibilities. Recently, a few million dollars per year of DOE

verification technology resources have gone to

analytic support to policymakers and negotiators.

Much of this effort has been in the form of

‘‘quick-response’ support for ongoing negotiations.
Verification Technologies ● 9

Box D—Verification Technology System Levels

Complete Regimes

For a given arms control provision in a particular arms control agreement, the verification regime may comprise

these elements:

. national technical means (NTM) and other intelligence methods capable of supplying information about

compliance;

. cooperative measures enhancing use of NTM for monitoring compliance;

● other cooperative measures, including data exchanges and various kinds of on-site inspection or monitoring;

● institutional arrangements for implementing cooperative measures; and

. institutional measures for raising and resolving questions about compliance.

Monitoring Measures

Monitoring measures are the methods of gathering information that are part of the verification regime. An

example of a monitoring measure would be continuous, on-site portal-perimeter observation (monitoring) of a

mutually agreed-upon facility. Another might be observation of the destruction of treaty-limited items. Another

would be the unilateral use of NTM. Monitoring measures must be implemented by means of specific monitoring

systems.

Monitoring Systems

By a system, we mean a group of devices, processes, procedures, and people applied to a task. The technical

elements of a verification regime will probably include various systems directed toward particular monitoring tasks

or sets of tasks. An arms control monitoring system might comprise a set of intelligence assets applied methodically

to, for example, watching for deployments of banned missiles. Another example would be the particular

portal-perimeter continuous monitoring arrangement established under the Intermediate Nuclear Forces Treaty and

operated by the United States at the Soviet missile plant at Votkinsk U.S.S.R. A third example would be the

U.S.-proposed system of tagging mobile missiles under the Strategic Arms Reduction Talks agreement—a system

whose elements would include not just the tags themselves and the methods of applying and reading them, but the

times and places at which tags would be read, the personnel reading them, the transmission of the information

gathered, the analysis of the information, and the process of drawing conclusions from it about Soviet treaty-related

activities.

This report focuses on those systems which apply to cooperative monitoring measures, as opposed to those

used in unilateral intelligence gathering. In a complete verification regime, the United States and the Soviet Union

each would be likely to coordinate these two kinds of monitoring system.

Any monitoring system must include means of accumulating, sorting out, and combining the data it collects.

The problem of how to make sense of and use monitored data is itself becoming an important topic of verification

technology research and analysis.

Devices

A monitoring system will apply various devices to gather information relevant to compliance with arms control

provisions. The most complex mechanism ever likely to be applied to arms control monitoring is the human being,

with his or her acute senses and intelligence. The human observer may extend his or her powers with simple devices,

like measuring tapes or binoculars. More complex devices, like cameras, computers, or remote sensors may not only

extend the powers of human senses, but complement them by increasing the consistency of observations, providing

continuous coverage, making an objective record of monitored information, and collecting data outside the range

of human senses (e.g., detection of chemical traces or infrared imaging).

Basic Technologies

Basic technologies for arms control monitoring are the means that might be employed by devices for sensing

or measuring phenomena. (They might also include methods of concealing phenomena from inspectors that the arms

control agreement does not entitle them to.) Some of these devices may be simple adaptations of very old

technologies (such as X-ray scanners). Others may be special applications of relatively new devices, such as

chemical sniffers. Still others may be specifically researched and developed for particular arms control monitoring

applications. Advanced scientific research may in some cases point the way to accomplishing monitoring tasks that

seemed otherwise impossible. Nevertheless, it would be a mistake to think of research and development of

verification technologies as a quest for ever more sophisticated, high-tech devices. Rather, the challenge is to find

the most appropriate ones. See appendixes A and B for more on verification techology.
10 ● Verification Technologies

Photo credit: Sandia National Laboratories

The reflective particle tag (RPT), top photo, comprises a

mixture of clear (acrylic) plastic material and reflective

crystalline (micaceous) particles. The tag would be painted

onto a treaty-limited item, such as a rocket motor, and

cured with ultraviolet light. Light reflected from the tag

forms a pattern that depends on the random locations and

angles of the particles. Using instruments such as those in

the bottom photo, arms control monitoring inspectors

would record the unique pattern when they applied the tag.

In subsequent inspections, they would again record the

pattern and compare it to the original readings to ascertain

that the tag is authentic. A treaty-limited item without an

authentic tag would be a treaty violation.

Two recent DOE-sponsored studies did take

synoptic approaches to a verification regime. One

was the “Conventional Forces in Europe (CFE)

Verification Framework Study.” This study developed an overall monitoring system, including data

collection, data management and integration, and

analysis, for the CFE Treaty. A study group representing four DOE national laboratories (with assistance from three others) began the project late in

1989. With an overall budget of about $1 million, the

classified study was not yet delivered some months

after the treaty was signed. The study may still prove

useful for CFE follow-on negotiations. It may also

establish a model for future contracted studies,

perhaps undertaken earlier in the negotiating process.

Another DOE, multi-laboratory study in 1990

designed a possible verification regime for the

Chemical Weapons Convention. That study should

be delivered early in 1991. Negotiations on a

Chemical Weapons Convention started in the U.N.

Committee on Disarmament in 1969. In 1984, then

Vice President Bush submitted a draft treaty which

went onto become the basis for a‘ ‘rolling text’ that

continues under negotiation today. The 1990 DOE

study took this rolling text as the basis for the

verification measures it analyzed. Although coming

considerably after the submission of a U.S. draft

treaty, this study could supplement executive branch

studies and may still affect the current negotiations.

It may also influence further development work in

chemical weapons verification technologies now

being conducted by the Army for the Defense

Nuclear Agency and by others.

Current Research Emphasizes Near Term

Funding Constraints

In its discussion of the DOD’s Verification

Technologies R&D Working Group, the Section 910

Report said:

the VTRDWG coordinates the efforts of the

independent DOD agencies, DARPA, and DNA, and

Military Service organizations tasked to develop

technology and hardware to support INF implementation and the U.S. verification requirements for

START, CFE, and CW. While ideally the VTRDWG

would not only address near-term but also longerterm technology initiatives, the reality is that funding

is inadequate to look beyond near- and mid-term

verification requirements.

DOE, on the other hand, has sponsored some

long-term research, though its verification technology research budget requests have been shrinking,

and the budget has been maintained only with

congressional intervention. (See box Eon the timing

of verification research.) In addition, DOE-sponsored research is constrained by bureaucratic jurisdictional boundaries: DOE often attempts to refrain

from appearing to develop its own ‘policy’ on arms

control matters outside its jurisdiction.

Policy Constraints

The Section 910 Report pointed out that:

. . .the relationship between verification policy and

the technology development process varies in each

of the time-frames. For quick-reaction needs, R&D
Verification Technologies ● 11

Box E—The Timing of Verification Research

An executive branch report to Congress pointed

out that the technology development process has to

respond in three timeframes:

Quick-Reaction Response (Need exists within 12

months.) This category entails applications engineering (i.e., detailed design of systems, acquisition

of components, and demonstration projects) of

actual systems to meet a known immediate or

imminent treaty-implementation requirement (e.g.,

fielding of the portal-perimeter monitoring system).

Responses rely on existing technology developed as

apart of a strong and broad R&D base).

Near-Term Response (approximately 12 to 36

months). In this category, technology R&D responds to possible but not yet agreed verification

requirements of negotiations in progress. This

requires capitalizing on existing technology R&D

with some modifications from research near completion (e.g., tagging technology). Technology has

to focus on requirements based on plausible treaty

outcomes as well as on current U.S. positions; as

with the quick-reaction response, the emphasis is on

providing specific responses to specific tasking.

Long-Term Research (approximately 3 to 10

years). Long term (sic) research is designed to

develop a broad base of verification technology

across the spectrum of arms control-not necessarily tied to any specific present or future treaty

requirement but rather to more general verification

policy requirements. R&D undertaken in this area

entails investigating, developing, and testing promising concepts, technologies, and models. Such

research may be generic, with applicability in more

than one area of arms control (although it may be

oriented toward a specific problem, for example,

inspection of sensitive locations without revelation

of highly classified or sensitive information not

related to treaty compliance). It provides the basis

for future quick-reaction and near-term responses.

SOURCE: Section 910 report, op. cit., footnote 8.

has to be directly responsive to policy concerns and

more narrowly focused on specific solutions to

known problems. For near-term response, R&D

should be fully consistent with and directed toward

current policy and negotiations, but within this

framework, there often is more room for experimentation and initiative in the development of solutions

to known problems. There is even greater room for

initiative with long-term R&D, but again, U.S. arms

control and national security policy goals define the

direction of this R&D.

Note that even for the long term, the Administration

stresses consistency of research with existing U.S.

arms control and national security policy goals. This

policy is understandable, in that policymakers do not

want to appear to undercut their positions that

certain arms control measures would not be in U.S.

interests. Nevertheless, recent history shows that

sometimes government positions change.l0 And

when they do, the availability of contingency plans

can give the policymakers a more informed set of

choices.

Today, though, the vast majority of (nonintelligence) verification technology research funds are

dedicated to the areas of arms control currently being

pursued by the Administration: START, Conventional Forces in Europe, nuclear test detection and

yield estimation (for Nuclear Non-Proliferation

Treaty and Threshold Test Ban Treaty), and the

Chemical Weapons Convention. Some of the technologies under development with these arms control

agreements in mind someday may also be applicable

to other arms control measures. Examples of generic

monitoring systems now under research include:

tags and seals, portal-perimeter continuous monitoring systems (permanent or ‘‘rapid-deployment’ ‘),

and nuclear warhead detection or counting systems.

In the absence of policy guidance, however, researchers will be unlikely to develop these systems

into specific verification regimes for arms control

measures currently not on the Administration’s

agenda.11

Conclusion: Organizational Options

Today, immediate policy needs (such as fleshing

out details of verification measures already under

negotiation), taken with available technologies,

dictate the shape of quick-reaction and near-term

research and development. How might the government set long-term research priorities? One can

imagine at least six options:

1. status quo: continue current arrangements;

2. incremental changes: add some focusing

procedures to current arrangements;

loFor exmple, until IW, the U.S. offIcial position at ST~T was that mobile intercontinental ballistic missiles should be breed mdrely.

llE~~pleS of such me=wes me the cessation of production of nuclear weapons fissile materials and the dismdment of nucle~ w~heads. rn the

1991 Defense Authorization Act, Congress directed the President to establish a technical committee to report on verifkationrnethods for those measures.

It also authorized the Secretary of Energy to use DOE national security program funds “. . .to carry out a program to develop and demonstrate a means

for verifiable dismantlement of nuclear warheads.” U.S. Congress, Congressiona/Record, Oct. 23, 1990, p. H 12041.
12 ● Verification Technologies

3.

4.

5.

6.

lead agency: designate a lead agency from

among those now involved in this research;

funding agency: give one of the agencies now

involved not only a designated leadership role,

but authority over most relevant research

funding;

czar: create a new managing agency for all

cooperative verification technology research;

and

new arms control agency: revitalize or replace ACDA, creating an agency with increased arms control responsibilities, authority, and finding across the board, including

research.

Each of these options has advantages

backs.

Option 1: Status Quo

and drawIn recent years, the approach appears to have been

one of ad hoc adjudication of competing research

proposals, with allocation of resources guided by the

following general principles:

●

●

●

expect most research to address technical

monitoring requirements defined in ways consistent with current policy expectations;

support some research on generic techniques

that may be applicable both to the current

policy needs and to a range of future possible

arms control monitoring tasks; and

for the purpose of enriching the “technology

base’ from which solutions to future problems

might emerge, permit a few researcher-initiated

projects on technology issues of less apparent

relevance to current policy.

Given the variety of bureaucratic interests with a

stake in arms control verification, much of the

necessary coordination will continue to be a matter

of lateral negotiation among various agencies. With

some stimulus from Congress, in the past couple of

years the executive branch has taken steps to

improve this coordination, for example by creating

the National Security Council Verification Technology Working Group.

As shown above, this arrangement seems to be

meeting short-term needs for cooperative verification technology development. On the other hand, it

seems to be slighting needs for long-term research

on comprehensive verification regimes and the

technologies that might fit into them.

Even without strong Administration initiative,

some options are open to Congress for encouraging

a more coherent, longer-range research and development program in verification technology:

●

●

●

●

direct and fund one or more agencies (e.g.,

ACDA, DOE Office of Arms Control) to

sponsor additional long-term research on verification concepts and technologies for arms

control measures not currently under active

negotiation;

in legislative oversight of verification technology research, require executive branch reports

and testimony on the basis for proposed allocations of research resources;

strengthen coordination among oversight committees dealing with various aspects of verification: House Armed Services, Foreign Affairs

and Intelligence; Senate Armed Services, Foreign Relations, and Intelligence;

during the ratification process for arms control

treaties, require that the executive branch

supply descriptions and results of systematic

analyses of proposed verification regimes; and

encourage ACDA to staff and support its Office

of the Chief Science Advisor to more

actively assert its legislatively chartered role in

arms control research coordination.

Option 2: Incremental Changes

The executive branch could take steps to improve

the coordinating process established during the

preparation of the Section 910 Report.

A modest, but potentially useful first step would

be to refine budgetary reporting on arms control

verification. The Office of Management and Budget

has now begun to require that agency budget

submissions identify expenditures related to verification. A further set of subcategories could resemble

those in DOD budgets: research, advanced development, procurement, and operations and maintenance. Breaking down budgets into such categories

would make it much easier for both executive branch

managers and congressional overseers to evaluate

the content and direction of verification-related

research and development. This kind of budget

reporting would also ease evaluation of current arms

control monitoring activities. Finally, it would

permit better estimates of the potential costs of

proposed verification regimes.
Verification Technologies ● 13

A second incremental step would be to further

formalize the interagency coordinating process. The

interagency committee (currently the NSC Verification and Compliance Subcommittee’s Verification

Technology Working Group) could be assigned to

produce decision papers for the NSC.12 These papers

might propose verification regimes for particular

potential treaties and then propose research programs to support the regimes. The Arms Control and

Disarmament Agency might chair such studies. The

studies themselves might be initiated by requests

from the NSC or any of the agencies in the group.

Because the studies would result in proposals for

action to be authorized by the NSC, the affected

agencies would have a strong incentive to play an

active role. This decision-paper process might be

most applicable to near- and mid-term needs for

coordinating verification technology development

with negotiating plans.

A third step would be to delegate the preparation

of long-term research and development plans to a

single agency, perhaps ACDA. The plan would not

prescribe U.S. policy, but would look to preserving

and creating future options. It could identify weaker

areas of current research and point out areas where

successful technology development might open up

new arms control opportunities. Individual agencies

would still be left to carry out (or ignore) their

elements of the plan. But the availability of an

annually updated plan would assist higher-level

executive and congressional overseers in making

their decisions.

Option 3: Lead Agency

A modest centralization of the current arrangement would be to designate one of the current

research-sponsoring agencies as lead coordinating

agency. This step would have to go beyond simply

having the lead agency chair coordinating committee meetings. It might include directing the agency

to conduct planning research and propose the

primary, government-wide research agenda in this

area. Table 2 lists some candidates for lead agency,

along with pros and cons for each.

A significant drawback of this option is that

without the authority to determine how money is

actually spent, such a lead agency could not enforce

a coherent R&D program. Rather, it is likely that the

actual program would remain the product of a

combination of bureaucratic competition and cooperation. There already appears to be some competition, for example, between DOE and DOD agencies

for verification technology roles and missions.

A second problem facing any potential lead

agency is that since current research, focusing

largely on immediate and near-term needs, is already

stretching budgets, a more robust long-term program

will require more money. In the executive branch,

this is likely to mean asking agencies to reallocate

resources away from other, perhaps in their view,

preferable missions. For example, for each of the

past several years, DOE has declined to request real

growth in its Verification and Control Technology

budget line, while Congress has chosen to authorize

more than DOE requested. In Congress, reallocations of appropriations can also be difficult. The

amounts for plausible expansion of existing activities, however, would run to tens of millions, rather

than billions, of dollars per year.

Moreover, there appears to be congressional

interest in additional verification technology research. In its report on the FY 1991 defense

authorization bill, the Senate Armed Services Committee said:

The committee is disappointed that the Department of Energy has once again failed to adequately

support the arms control verification research efforts

of its laboratories in its fiscal year 1991 requests. The

committee received testimony from both the Under

Secretary of Energy and the directors of the Department of Energy laboratories that the requested

funding is inadequate to support ongoing arms

control negotiations and the requirements of recently

concluded agreements. The Senate Select Committee on Intelligence has also recommended additional

funding for this very productive research effort with

a long track record of successes.

The committee then added $43.2 million to the

DOE request for detection technology and directed

lz~e Prwess mi@t be analogous the joint DOD-DOE process for dete rmining nuclear weapon acquisitions. The relevant agencies of the two

departments participate in a liaison committee, the NUCIW Weapons COunCil standing committee, chaired by the Assistant Secretary of Defense for

Atomic Energy. This committee issues requests for studies based on proposals by the member agencies. These studies produce decision papers for the

departmental policymakers. One type of study (“Phase One’ examin es how perceived military requirements might be met by a range of technology

options. The resulting decision papers then identify and propose the most promising choices for further research and development. A second type of study

(’‘Phase Two’ evaluates the choices avtilable for developing a specific weapon.
14 ● Verification Technologies

Table 2-Candidates for Role of Lead Agency in Verification R&D

Agency Pro Con

Arms Control and —Is the congressionally designated agency for this

Disarmament Agency role

—Plays important role in arms control negotiations

—Is specialized for arms control tasks

Office of Arms Control —Many years of experience managing DOE labora-

(DOE) tory research on verification

-Largest current budget for cooperative monitoring

measures

—Provides technical advisers to arms control negotiating delegations

Defense NuclearAgency —Experienced as OASD Acquisition Under Secretary’s

(DOD) manager of DOD verification research

On-Site inspection —As designated executor of U.S. on-site inspection

Agency (DOD) activities, is the “customer” for products of cooperative verification research

—At present budget and manpower levels, lacks the

personnel, expertise, funds, and authority to manage such a program

—Is widely perceived to be incapable of assuming this

role

—As a small, independent agency, lacks intragovernmental clout of DOD, DOE

—Lacks operational role in implementation of most

arms control agreements

-Other Departmental interests (e.g. in warhead

testing and production) may appear to conflict with

some arms control objectives

—its Verification Technology Research Center has

focused on near-term test and evacuation, not

long-term research;

-Other DOD interests (e.g., development and acquisition of new weapon systems) may appear to

conflict with some arms control objectives

—is removed from arms control policymaking arena

—Too far removed from arms control policymaking

arena

—Too busy with current inspection tasks and planning to direct long-term research

the Secretary to submit a report within 45 days of

passage of the bill describing each project to be

funded. In the final authorization bill approved by

Congress, however, the total DOE verification and

control technology budget (of which detection

technology is an element) exceeded the DOE request

by only $30 million. This represented an 18-percent

increase over the previous year’s overall verification

and control technology budget, as opposed to the

5-percent decrease requested by DOE. However, the

$30 million was earmarked for the technology

development portion of that budget, there representing a 29-percent increase as opposed to a requested

decrease of 10 percent.

Option 4: Funding Agency

A more coherent, long-range program will likely

require that the President not merely designate a lead

agency, but that he assign it the authority and

resources to do the job. Congress, in turn, would be

called on to authorize and appropriate the resources.

Under this option, the same agencies now overseeing research would continue to do so, but their

verification budgets allocations would be funneled

through the lead agency. Since money now under the

control of one department would effectively pass to

that of another department, such a plan would no

doubt lead to resistance. In addition, the same

problems of identifying the appropriate lead agency

as exist under Option 2 would also burden this

option.

Option 5: Verification Research Czar

One way of sidestepping problems of bureaucratic

resistance and inertia is to create a new organization,

a ‘‘czar’ with the authority to focus government

efforts toward a particular task. For example, President Reagan created the Strategic Defense Initiative

Organization (SDIO) to centralize U.S. research and

development of ballistic missile defense technology.

Besides starting new research projects, the SDIO

took over direct management of existing projects

and supervised the continuation of others under the

management of existing organizations. One could

imagine a similar agency for verification research—

though funded in the low hundreds of millions,

rather than in billions of dollars.

Such a new agency can concentrate government

attention on a problem, at least in the short run. In the

long run, it has disadvantages:
Verification Technologies ● 15

●

●

●

it adds a new layer of bureaucracy, but one

without a solid base of experience and influence in the operations of the bureaucratic

system;

unless permitted to grow so large as to duplicate

the staff resources of existing agencies, it may

lack an adequate supply of in-house expertise;

and

the influence of the “czar” may last only as

long as the President takes a direct and continuing interest in the mission.

Option 6: New Arms Control Agency

A more dramatic option would be to create a new

agency-or to revitalize ACDA—with the bureaucratic and financial resources to execute a coherent

arms control research program. Such an agency

might also have substantial arms control action

responsibilities (policy, negotiation and implementation13) that make it a key player. The rationale for

creating this agency would be that arms control

planning, negotiation, and implementation has become a larger element of U.S. national security

policy than ever before, thus outgrowing previous

organizational arrangements. Pulling most arms

control activities together into one agency might

lead to more coherent, comprehensive planning and

execution of arms control policy. With respect to

cooperative verification technology research, such a

new organization would become the chief customer

for the research product. It would have a direct

interest in seeing that research met both near-term

policy and long-term planning needs.

The ACDA charter licenses that agency as the

focal point for U.S. arms control activities.14 Moreover, the law lays special emphasis on the research

function:

. . the Director is authorized and directed, under the

direction of the President, (1) to insure the conduct

of research, development, and other studies in the

field of arms control and disarmament; (2) to make

arrangements (including contracts, agreements, and

grants) for the conduct of research, development, and

other studies in the field. . .by private or public

institutions or persons; and (3) to coordinate the

research, development, and other studies conducted

in the field. . .by or for other Government agencies.15

With respect to verification,

. . .the Director is authorized (1) to formulate plans

and make preparations for the establishment, operation, and funding of inspection and control systems

which may become a part of the United States arms

control and disarmament activities, and (2) as

authorized by law, to put into effect, direct, or

otherwise assume United States responsibility for

such systems.l6

For many reasons, though, ACDA has not exuberantly carried out all the missions formally assigned

to it. While it does continue to play a major (but not

dominant) role in arms control negotiations, its roles

in research and in implementation are minimal.

Whether ACDA could be revitalized and expanded

to take on a larger role, or whether it would have to

be abolished and its successor created anew is an

open question.

This option, the most drastic in the list, would be

the most difficult to carry out. The Departments of

Energy and Defense would lose money and personIssomehave suggested that it would be consistent with the arms control agency mission to place the On-Site ImpectionAgencyun der itsjtisdiction.

“If that were done [for ACDA],” wrote one reviewer of this report, ‘‘the funds that OSIA receives for reseaxch which are not inconsiderable, could

be part of ACDA’s budget and ACDA would have a better chance of managing the A&mm“ “stration’s long-term research on arms control. ” On the other

hand, the OSIA will necessarily make considerable use of DOD personnel and logistical support; its access to these resources maybe more immediate

if it remains a DOD agency.

lq~e comssion~ statement of purpose in the law establishing ACDA Ws:

The formulation and implementation of United States arms control and disarmament policy in a manner which will promote the national security

can best be insured by a central organization charged by statute with primary responsibility for this field. . .This organization must have the

capacity to provide the essential scientflc, economic, political, military, psychological and technological information upon which realistic arms

control and disarmament policy must be based. It shall have the authority, under the direction of the President and the Secretary of State, to caxry

out the following primary functions:

(a) The conduct, suppo~ and coordination of research for arms control and disarmament policy formulation;

(b) The preparation for and management of United States participation in international negotiations in the arms control and disarrnam ent field;

(c) The dissemina tion and coordination of public information concerning arms control andisarmament; and

(d) The preparation for, operation of, or as appropriate, direction of United States participation in such control systems as may become part

of United States arms control and disarmament activities.

(22 U. S.C.A. 2551)

1S22 u,S.C.A. 2751.

1622 U-S-CA. 2574.
16 ● Verification Technologies

nel traditionally assigned to them. Even if those control, to the neglect of other national security

agencies parted horn-their resources willingly, the considerations.

transitions could be awkward. From the standpoint

of conducting international negotiations, the rela- In sum, each option for reorganization has

tionship between the State Department and the new formidable drawbacks. Nevertheless, each seems

arms control agency would be difficult to work out.

In both the executive branch and Congress, there to offer some improvement over the previous,

may be concerns that the new organization would more or less improvisational approach to verifibecome a vested interest in favor of evermore arms cation research.
Verification Technologies ● 17

Appendix A: The Technology of

Arms Control Verification

This report has addressed the “who” and the

“how” of the management of U.S. verification

technology research. This appendix discusses the

“what’ the kinds of research to be managed.

The following sections identify some of the kinds of

topics that could be productively investigated in a

systematic, long-term research program. The ideas

are illustrative, not exhaustive.

In considering research options, it is important

to keep in mind that research and development of

verification technologies is not simply a quest for

ever more sophisticated, “high-tech” devices.

Rather, the challenge is to find the most appropriate ones. The bottom line is in how effectively,

and at what cost, technology is applied to do the job.

Future Verification Regimes

Long-term research on verification regimes would

identify potential arms control measures that should

be examined. For each of those, it might build a

possible list of treaty-limited items. It could then

explore features of the production, testing, deployment, maintenance, or destruction of those items that

might most easily be monitored. Examples of

potential arms control measures that are not now on

the executive branch’s active agenda, but might

conceivably become so someday include:

●

●

●

●

●

●

●

ban on multiple-warhead ICBMs,

nuclear warhead accounting and elimination,

control or ban on nuclear sea-launched cruise

missiles,

control or ban on other naval tactical nuclear

weapons,

other forms of naval arms limitations,

cutoff of nuclear weapons materials production

and controls on fissile materials, and

limits on space weapons.

Like the Conventional Forces in Europe agreement or the Chemical Weapons Convention, some

future arms control arrangements may be multilateral, rather than just U.S.-Soviet. Therefore, it may

be important to devise verification regimes suitable

for multilateral participation and less dependent on

NTM.

Monitoring Measures

Long-term research on monitoring measures would

specify the kinds of measures that might apply to the

potential arms control provisions under consideration. At this stage of research, some monitoring

measures ‘would have broad enough application for

more than one kind of arms control provision. Others

might be specific to the particular features of one

kind of Treaty-Limited Item (TLI) or another. Some

of the research might involve analyzing the extendability of measures for current arms control monitoring to future types of arms control.

Examples of monitoring measures that might be

improved with further research include:

aerial surveillance (beyond Conventional Forces

Europe agreement);

unattended observation of TLI destruction;

remote tag reading for later START I implementation, START II, and other arms control

applications;

portal-perimeter continuous monitoring17 (beyond INF and START treaties); and

design and operation of new weapons in ways

that make them easier to monitor.

Monitoring Systems

The above sorts of monitoring measures will

require detailed analysis of the specific ways they

can be put into effect. This analysis would involve

not only identifying the types of devices that might

be deployed, but the integration of those devices into

systems as well as strategies and tactics for operating

the systems to maximum effect.

Examples of monitoring systems that might have

future applications include:

●

●

●

aerial surveillance aircraft and sensor combinations and strategies for their use,

portal-perimeter continuous monitoring systems specific to arms control measures beyond

START, and

data fusion systems to help pull together and

interpret all the relevant information for arms

control compliance assessments.

Technology Requirements

Analysis of potential verification regimes will

take account of the existing base of ready devices

l%cluding study of possible penetration of perimeters, such as WeIs.
Input data

Figure 2-Schematic Diagram of a Proposed U.S. Data Fusion Center

U.S. Data Fusion Center

Preprocessing Fusion, analysis, outputs

and storage

I I

d

Map displays

I

- ATTU maps

>

>

>

Acquisition

subsystem

- Satellite

transmitted data *

Database subsystem

Requested analysis

- Scenario-specific analysis

Automated analysis

- Validation

- Consistency checks

- Ceiling comparisons

- Internal thresholds

- Trend checks I-DText and

graphics displays

- Summaries

- Graphs

- Charts

- Etc.

I

H

Electronic document

archiving subsystem

- OSI and GBM data sheets

- Al and GBM photographs

- Data exchange documents

- Other papers, photos, etc.

L~l

I (

I I I

1 Tag/seal Off-line storage

subsystem - File cabinets

- Tag processing - Magnetic media containers

- Seal processing - Etc.

I 1

d

Document

displays

- Documents

- Photographs

Data and information management for arms control monitoring

Researchers at Sandia National Laboratories have proposed a verification data fusion center. The system would assemble information from disparate sources, including news

agencies, treat y declarations, on-site inspections, aerial inspections, or open literature sources. The system would store this data both in on-line computers for immediate

access and in archives for cumulative interpretation and analysis. The goal would be to provide decisionmakers with concise, comprehensible, and timely reports on the

information available about foreign compliance with arms control agreements.

SOURCE: Sandia National Laboratories.
Figure 3--Portable High-Resolution Mini Gas Chromatograph-Mass Spectrometer

‘canning FzE7 Spectra obtained by

ion acceleratirm voltage

mass analysis

‘m

————-

Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory is developing a portable, high-resolution gas

chromatograph-mass spectrometer that may be used by inspectors monitoring compliance

with the proposed international Chemical Weapons Convention. At a site suspected of

manufacturing chemical weapons, this instrument might detect even minute traces of

“precursor” chemicals that are combined to produce the prohibited poisons. First the gas

chromatograph (the coiled tube leading into the device pictured at left) would separate a

sample of air or water into different chemical components. These chemicals would be ionized

and introduced into the mass spectrometer (device pictured at left, with schematic diagram

below), which separates the ions according to differences in their mass. A resulting graph,

shown below for a water sample containing a precursor chemical, would indicate the presence

of ions of the compound of interest.

SOURCE: Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.

CW schedule 2 precursor analysis

Vacuum housing

325.0

287.0

fragment ions

by magnetic field

Gas chromatographic

- 1’b::

Ion detection

inlet and ion source electronics

Continuous

dynode

I

114.0

TI

+ Methylphosphonic acid

+ Ethylphosphonic acid

1

+ Internal

4 -A

standard

tBis– (diisopropylamino-

~ Isopropylaminoethanol ethanthiol) disoelide

10 15 20 25 30
20 ● Verification Technologies

and technologies available for development into the analytic work would serve two purposes at once:

ready devices. But the analysis will also suggest first, serve as a planning base for future arms control

potential monitoring shortfalls and promising tech- negotiators; second, guide investments in technolnologies that might help close the gaps. In this way, ogy research for future monitoring systems.
Verification Technologies ● 21

Appendix B: Systems Analysis and

Verification Research

In its review of verification technology research, OTA found little large-scale systems

analysis in comparison with that usually applied

to weapons technology research (as in the case,

for example, of SDI). This appendix illustrates

one such kind of analysis, “network analysis”

that could be applied to verification technology

problems.

Introducfion: Judgments Under Uncertainty

Assessing the value of arms control provisions,

regimes for verifying compliance, and specific

monitoring systems for those regimes involves

many complex judgments that must be made under

conditions of uncertainty. Nevertheless, the Senate

must implicitly or explicitly make such judgments

(or accept the judgments of others) when it chooses

or declines to ratify an arms control treaty. Both

Houses of Congress acceptor reject such judgments

when they choose to support or modify Administraion proposals for arms control verification technology research.

There is no way to eliminate all the uncertainties

surrounding these judgments. No technical calculations can dispel uncertainties about future events or

settle disagreements about the values to place on

policy outcomes; therefore, calculations will not

produce objectively “right” answers. Nevertheless,

it is possible to apply analytic methods that clarify

where the uncertainties lie and make more explicit

the assumptions of those proposing different courses

of action. Such methods may at least produce better

answers than the unstructured playing of hunches.

They may also lead to identification of areas of

research that could reduce some uncertainties.

NetworkAnalysis of Evasion Strategies and

Verification Measures

Analysts at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory have suggested a method to “. . identify

potential weaknesses in [an] overall treaty verification system, to highlight the evasion and breakout

strategies least likely to be detected or deterred, and

to determine the individual verification measures

that offer the greatest benefit.”18 They propose a

five-phase process of analysis, outlined below.

1. Identify Soviet Evasion Objectives

Determine how particular evasive actions might

lead to a militarily significant advantage. If different

objectives are possible, assign relative weights to

them.

2. Develop Network Model of Evasion

Strategies

A simpli.tied example of such a model is given in

figure 4. Developing the model involves identifying

steps that the Soviets would have to perform to

achieve their objectives. Evasion strategies consist

of sequences of steps that would lead to deployed

weapons (or other treaty violations). The example

the Liver-more analysts use is a network for the

manufacture of small, single-stage ballistic missiles.

3. Estimate Evasion Probabilities

Estimate the probability that treaty evasions

associated with each step in the network would be

undetected by verification measures in force at that

step. These estimates are by nature subjective

judgments. Analysis of this kind forces the experts

to make their judgments explicit. Agreement among

experts would be desirable, but where disagreements

exist, analysts can perform separate evaluations to

show what differences those disagreements make.

Moreover, additional technical research on specific

verification measures may narrow the range of

disagreements and increase confidence in judgments.

4. Determine Evasion Strategies Least Likely

To Be Detected

For each evasion strategy, multiply the probabilities of successful evasion of the individual steps.

5. Analyze Results and Perform Sensitivity

Analysis

The advantage of a systematic analysis like this is

that it clarifies the effects of varying assumptions,

estimates, and strategies. For example, the analysis

might show that a monitoring regime that had a

relatively small chance of catching violations at each

of several manufacturing steps would have a fairly

high overall probability of detecting significant

ISTIICMIMM A. muds ad R. SCOtt Strait, A Network Methodology for Evaluation of Treaty V2@cation Opfi”ons (LiVermore, CA: center for

‘IkcImical Studies on Security, Energy, and Arms Control, Lawrence Livermore National Laborato~, September 1989), p. 1.
22 ● Verification Technologies

Figure 4--Network Representation of Evasion Strategies and Probabilities

/

START

\

Fabricate

components

using method A

u3 0.9

Fabricate

components

using method B

T2 0.7

Assemble

components

using method C

,U4 0.6

I

Assemble

components

using method D

p

5 0 . 9

I

Deployed

weapon

system

Bold arrows show path

of highest probability

of undetected evasion:

L 1 I I

0.9 X 0.7 X 0.9 ■ 0.567

Path Undetected evasion probability

o + 1 + 2+5 0.504

0 + 1 +4+5 0.432

0 +3+ 2+5 0.567 Highest probability of undetected evasion

o +3+4+ 5 0.486

In this schematic diagram of possible paths to the deployment of a weapon system, each step has an

estimated probability that it will go undetected. The likeliest evasion path is the one in which the multiplied

probabilities of the steps come out the highest, in this case the path through steps 0,3,2, and 5. Note that

efforts to reduce the probability of successful evasion at Step 3 to below O.8 could just induce the violator

to use Step 1 instead, and therefore such efforts would not be worthwhile.

SOURCE: Adapted from Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, 1990.

numbers of deployed weapons. Or, it might show would simply cause the evader to choose an alternate

that even greatly improving the chance of detection step. Figure 4 illustrates this point.

at one step might not be worthwhile, because it