PRIVILEGED

Meeting of the Delegations of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences
and the Academy of Sciences of the U.S.S.R.

on International Security and Arms Control

Washington, April 1-3, 1986

gavin or Bus.

SUMMARY

Delegations from the U.S. National Academy of Sciences (Committee on
International Security and Arms Control) and the Academy of Sciences of
the U.S.S.R. met on April 1-3, 1986, at the National Academy of Sciences
in Washington. Dr. Wolfgang K.H. Panofsky, Director Emeritus of the
Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, chaired the American delegation and
Academician R.Z. Sagdeev, Director of the Institute of Space Research,

chaired the Soviet delegation.

The agenda for the meeting was a synthesis of items suggested by botn

sides and contained the following items:

1. Possibilities of radical cuts of nuclear weapons in context of 50
percent cuts examples.

2. Biological Weapons.

3. Verification problems arising due to technological innovation of
nuclear weapons and their carriers.

4. Discussion of Strategic Defense. The boundaries between
permitted and unpermitted activities relating to strategic
missile defense and the uses of outer space.

5. Balance of Military Forces in Europe, NATO and Warsaw Pact, and
problems of security, disarmament and confidence-building

measures.

Sagdeev in his opening remarks expressed concern about the current

state of U.S.-Soviet relations and what he viewed as their deterioration
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said that the official position was to ban only nuclear -armed cruise
missiles. He said this raised the central problen, along with the
problem of radar detection and determining their trajectories from che
point of view of sufficient detection time, of their configuration and
characteristics. He said it was very difficult to distinguish a nuclear
one from a non-nuclear one and that this was an issue which he chought
should be resolved. Kokoshin said he could not give 4 reply at this
moment and that he dia not know how this problem was being considered in
Geneva, but that he really believed that we were facing a very
complicated problem not only because they were hard to count, but also
pecause they were destabilizing and it was difficult to distinguish
nuclear-armed from non-nuclear -armed cruise missiles, even with on-site
jinspection. Kokoshin said that so many people would be involved in this
kind of verification that the budget could not carry it.

Panofsky said he agreed that verification of cruise missiles would be
very difficult. He said there were two aifferent ways to do it: either
negotiate verification measures or ban all cruise missiles or GLC1s (he
said banning SLCMs would be more difficult). Panofsky asked whether the
Soviet position was to find a way to verify the difference between
nuclear and non-nuclear cruise missiles, OF simply to forego the nuclear
ones along with the non-nuclear ones and ban them all. Kokoshin
responded that he personally thought that this whole class of weapons
should be banned, so that once and for all this problem of verification
could be solved. He said we could spend years and years on this problem
and devote entire institutions to its resolution. Kokoshin said that
Gorbachev's January 15 proposal was to find a way to eliminate weapons
that would simplify verification. Kokoshin said that poth sides would
nave to sacrifice weapons that were promising as conventional weapons in
order to solve the verification problem.

Sagdeev said that was a very important point. He asked whether the
two sides had finished with the first agenda item. Panofsky said yes,
and suggested taking a break hefore coming back to discuss biological
weapons .-

After the break, Sagdeev said it was time to move to the second

agenda item - piological weapons ~ and to Dr. Lederberg's presentation.
21

Lederberg said he was glad to hear that the meeting of a special
subgroup on biological weapons was something he could expect to happen.
Lederberg said he would give a recapitulation of his remarks at last
year's meeting (see attachment #5). He said these remarks were not
particularly controversial, and that they were just his own background on
the problem.

Lederberg said the difficult problems of potential and rapid breakout
of the BW convention may persist regardless of both sides' current
{ntentions and activities. He said the potential was always there for
the use of biological agents in a military setting. Lederberg said that
there were steps that could be taken to attempt to protect responsible
governments from the BW threat from third parties. He said that grave
threats also came from nature, adding that today's example was the AIDs
virus but that every decade there had been a similar natural threat.
Lederberg said there was no doubt about the misery that could be caused
by germs.

Lederberg said there was no forum now available to discuss BW, share
information and define the problem. He said this group had done that for
conventional and nuclear weapons. Lederberg said there was a degradation
of confidence that spilled into other areas of arms control. He noted
that one reporter for the Wall Street Journal had launched an anti-Soviet
campaign based on uncertainties, but said that this was symptomatic of
anxieties in this country. He said that on the other side the political
left in this country was noisily concerned about what research the U.S.
was carrying out. Lederberg said all of this did not create a good
atmosphere for arms control.

Lederberg said that, on the positive side, he hoped this joint study
group could help restore confidence and work toward cooperation in
biomedical research. He concluded that he looked forward to the
opportunity to proceed.

Sagdeev said that Ustinov would make some remarks about what would be
happening on this issue on the political level.

Ustinov said that Lederberg's concerns were important and deserved
study. He said that there was to be a review conference for the BW
convention. He added that at the last five-year review conference, the

participants were satisfied with the Treaty and how it had been carried
out by all countries. He said that the vitality of this agreement Was
manifested by the fact that as of January l, 1986, it had 101
signatories. Ustinov said that later that month in Geneva there would Se
a preparatory meeting for the Review Conference. He said the British and
the Soviets had been discussing how this next conference would be
organized. He said there had been a proposal to guarantee the world
against the appearance of new weapons of mass destruction and the
proliferation of chemical weapons. He said we could think of similar
programs for BW. Ustinov said the Review conference would be provided
with working papers that showed the state of affairs in different fields
and how new technology was correlated with the treaty. He said this
conference would take place in the autumn and that Lederberg's paper
could be useful in the preparation of the working papers.

Sagdeev thanked Lederberg for his comments and said he remembered
when Ledertery raised this problem almost two years ago, particularly the
problem of terrorist or third party use of these agents.

Lederberg said that the military potential of these new technologies
were still ten or fifteen years away. He said the problem with the
military application of this technology was not one of lethality, but of
control. He said he'd like to keep in balance the capability of today
and that since WII. He said that much of the research that was
dedicated to the control and prevention of diseases could be used to make
variants of a disease too.

Sagdeev asked about the AIDs virus. Lederberg responded that it
could not be used effectively militarily because it was unique in its
method of transmittal. He said it would take ten to fifteen years to
kill the target. Sagdeev said he had read that recently there had been
major news in the field of AIDs and asked whether Lederberg could comment
on these new breakthroughs. Lederberg said it had to do with the
discovery of more variants of the AIDs virus. Lederberg said it appeared
that AIDs began in Africa as a virus epidemic in green monkeys. He said
that there appeared to be variants in Africa that were not so lethal.
Lederberg said the big problem was how to test vaccines.

Sagdeev commented that Lederberg had said that scientific exchanges
in biotechnology could help reverse the deterioration of confidence, and

asked if there had been any cooperation on AIDs research. Lederberg said
23

that in the West there was competition of research and publication and
also great sharing of information. He said the problem of AIDs would
become a problem for the Soviet Union too.

Doty said that it might be useful to say a word about chemical
warfare, noting that there was a growing interest in that subject. He
said one could applaud the expression of common Soviet-American interest
in attacking the problem of proliferation of chemical weapons. He said
this should not deflect us from the central question of whether it was
possible to control chemical weapons in the East and West. He said it
nad become a more elevated concern given the Irag/Iran war. Doty said
there would be a meeting on chemical warfare in Berlin in June to discuss
whether it was possible to control chemical weapons. Doty said there was
a large area of agreement but also a fundamental area of disagreement in
how to verify undisclosed stockpiles of chemical weapons. Doty said
there might be no solution given the difference in our two societies.
Doty said he had started to study the problem more, and that he saw no
solution. He said what was needed was a change in attitude toward
verification and that the Soviet pronouncements fell short of what was
necessary to be done. He said the present traditional methods of
verification placed limits on what could be done.

Ustinov said it seemed to him that it would be justified to regard
the situation with some optimism since there were multilateral
discussions underway at the Disarmament Conference in the Special
Committee on Chemical Warfare. Ustinov acknowledged that there was a
serious fear of cooperation among the forty participating states.

Ustinov said that on January 15, the Soviet government reiterated its
intention to devote itself toa solution to this problem. Ustinov said
that this was not just a declaratory statement. He said they were
working toward the conclusion of a document prohibiting the production of
chemical weapons. He said they were talking not just about stockpiles,
but about a prohibition of production bases. Ustinov said that the
Soviet position in the January 15 Gorbachev proposal was formulated
precisely and optimistically. Ustinov said the disarmament negotiations
might be speeded up. He said the U.S. and Soviet delegations ‘often met
bilaterally, and that last month in Bern, U.S. and Soviet officials

discussed the nonproliferation of chemical weapons. He said these
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developments were only part of a broader issue, and that it would be
useful if they led to a global prohibition on all weapons of mass
destruction.

Ustinov said the Soviet Union was prepared to develop procedures for
dismantling production facilities. He said he felt that the field of
disagreement had been reduced. He said it would be possible to state in
advance the location of facilities producing chemical weapons and to see
that they did not produce chemical weapons in the future. Ustinov said
that Gorbachev's proposal said that the Soviet Union was willing to go
along with such procedures. Ustinov said that the elimination of the
production bases should not enable them to produce chemical weapons under
the guise of commercial production. He said he understood that this
involved both commercial and government facilities, and said that these
measures should apply to transnational corporations too. He said that
on-site inspections could be used when necessary.

Ustinov said that chemical weapons was one of the promising areas of
arms control. He said it would be right to take this opportunity to
prohibit chemical weapons now to prevent their use in the future. He
said that both sides, in fact all sides, needed to adjust their positions
to resolve the remaining problems. Ustinov said we could look forward to
a resolution because this problem was ripe for resolution.

Panofsky asked whether Ustinov or Doty could talk about the points of
difference in these negotiations.

Ustinov responded that in Geneva they were discussing the technical
fine points of how to locate production facilities. He said the sides
were approaching this problem in a businesslike fashion, trying to do
away with the remaining small details. He said the fine points of
verification remained, and that some countries feared that verification
would touch on commercial activity. Ustinov said that the Federal
Republic of Germany, Japan and Holland expressed doubts about this, but
he thought that the problems could be resolved in the near future.

Doty said that Ustinov was closer to these matters than he was, and
that everyone could take heart from his optimism. However, Doty said he
thought it was like going across a stream from rock to rock, and we were
at the last step to shore. He said the Soviets saw it as a small step,

but the Americans saw it as a long step. Doty joked that Keeny said the
25

solution was to learn to walk on water. Doty asked how it would be
possible to verify undisclosed stocks or illegal production facilities
after a treaty was made. Doty suggested that the two delegations should
take five minutes in every future meeting to ask whether there were any
new developments in this area.

Ustinov said he agreed that they should keep an eye on it, but said
it should be a constructive eye. He said this issue was not 4 stumbling
block in the talks.

Lederberg said he was skeptical about the possibilities for progress
because there were risks concerning the completeness of verification. He
said there was a coupling petween the restoration of confidence and
exchange of information and the possibility of coming to an agreement
that could not be perfectly verified.

Sagdeev agreed that there was a need for increased confidence. He
asked what Keeny's view on this was, from the point of view of a former
negotiator.

Keeny responded that he was not current on the state of negotiations
now. He said he was encouraged by Ustinov's comments, but surprised
pecause he shared Doty's impression that the problems were far from
resolved. Keeny said that verifying residual stocks and small-scale
production was extremely difficult to accomplish. He said he would lixe
to ask a related question, which was: If there were an agreement on no
stocks, etc., what would you do about defensive measures? Keeny said
that both countries had a massive CW defensive capability, yet neither
side had thought that poth should get rid of their defensive measures as
a signal of seriousness of intent. Keeny asked for the Soviet reaction
to this proposal.

Sagdeev responded that, at first glance, it was a very interesting
idea for CW. But he added that for BW, it would not be possible.

Doty said that the difficulty with this proposal was with the nuclear
side of the game because the protection against fallout was similar to
the protection against chemical warfare agents. Garwin said that the
suits were really very different. He said the chemical suits used liquid
to wash the chemical weapons and neutralize them. ,

Lederberg said that one extreme of chemical weaponry could not be

controlled, namely the commercial chemicals of multiple use. He said
26

chere was the problem of legitimizing those that weren't limited by the
creaty. Lederberg said there was a certain security in that if one side
cheated, the other side was still not helpless. Lederberg said that an
agreement that allowed some possibility of violation would add
paradoxically to a sense of confidence.

Sagdeev joked that the deliberate toleration of clandestine use had
an analogy in the Soviet policy on alcohol.

Carwin said that less effective agents could be compensated for by
sophisticated means of delivery. He said that control of delivery means
of agents was important along with the control of sophisticated agents.

Sagdeev asked whether the day's session should be concluded.

Panofsky concurred and the first day's meeting adjourned at 5:30 p.m.

The second day's session convened at 9:00 a.m. on Wednesday, April 2.

Panofsky said they had a good discussion the previous day. He
reviewed that they had exchanged views on the effect of 50% cuts on
stability and discussed the definition of stability. Panofsky said there
had been agreement that high MIRVing was unstable. Panofsky said the two
sides overlapped in other areas, but with different emphases. Panofsky
said they had heard a good summary by Lederberg of the BW issue,
preparatory for the future meeting of specialists on that subject. He
said there had also been a good summary of the CW business by Ustinov and
comments by Doty.

Panofsky said that today the subject was the discussion of
verification issues raised by new technologies. Panofsky said that
Sagdeev yesterday talked about the pace of diplomacy being slower than
the pace of technology. Panofsky said the advent of cruise missiles and
mobile ICBMs raised new verification issues. He said the agenda item was
to discuss the verification issues which those new technologies
introduced. He said Flax would discuss verification of land-mobile

missiles.
Flax said he would give a free-form consideration of the problem,

 

ranging over many possibilities. He said some of those ideas might
appear impractical or unworkable, and that he would welcome comments.

Flax said that mobile missiles of any kind potentially posed new

 

verification problems. He said if their numbers were small relative to

the total aggregates cf gtrazegic missiles, then some degree of