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Egypt’s Missile Efforts Succeed with Help from North Korea

Washington does not like to talk about Egypt as a proliferation threat, but Cairo’s flourishing missile partnership with North Korea is beginning to worry U.S. officials. After years of help from Pyongyang, Cairo can now produce its own version of the Soviet Scud-B missile, which can deliver nuclear or chemical warheads up to 300 kilometers. It is also developing a more advanced Scud-C version that could threaten all of Israel and target Arab cities in Libya, Syria and Sudan.

“If we were to rank our concerns in Egypt,” a U.S. official tells the Risk Report, “it would be missiles first, then chemical weapons, then biological weapons, and last–a good ways down on the list–Egypt’s nuclear program.” Because Egypt, a U.S. ally, does not possess nuclear weapons and currently has a peace treaty with Israel, Washington has watched Cairo’s missile industry grow without saying much. But that may change.

“There is a 15-year old Scud relationship between North Korea and Egypt,” says a U.S. official who tracks missile proliferation, “and by now Egypt is relatively far along in its indigenous production effort–there are Scud-Bs coming out of the production line.”

Washington has expressed its concern about the missile trade to Pyongyang and Cairo, but the question is whether the Administration will impose sanctions. Under U.S. law, the Clinton administration can impose two-year trade sanctions on any foreign company or person that “conspires or attempts to engage in” the export of Scud-size missiles or the transfer of equipment or technology that “contributes to the design, development or production of missiles” in a country such as Egypt. If applied, the sanctions would penalize the buyers in Egypt as well as the sellers in North Korea.

The early years

Cairo began its quest for nuclear-capable missiles in the early 1960s. A group of German engineers and scientists were imported to help build a satellite launcher and a series of liquid fuel missiles known as the Zafir, the Kahir and the Ra’id, with projected ranges of 370km, 600km and 1,500 kilometers respectively. None of these missiles ever became operational, partly due to problems with the guidance technology and partly due to widespread mismanagement of the projects.

After Egypt’s defeat in the 1967 Arab-Israeli war, Egypt turned to the Soviet Union for help. In 1972, Moscow agreed to train Egyptian technicians in guidance technology and later shipped unguided FROG-7 missiles to Egypt that could fly up to 70 kilometers. By early 1973, the Soviet Union had also agreed to supply approximately 18 completed Scud-B missiles and nine transporter-erector launchers (TELs). During the 1973 Arab-Israeli war, Egypt was able to launch three Soviet-supplied Scuds at Israeli positions in the Sinai. After the war, Egypt began an effort to upgrade its Scuds, and to replace Soviet parts with Egyptian-made components.

Missile cooperation in the 1980s

It was in the 1980s that Egypt began its first successful drive for missile production capability. Argentina, Iraq and North Korea were all recruited as helpers. Egypt’s first step was to ship at least two of its Soviet-supplied Scuds to North Korea for reverse-engineering. In return for the missiles, Pyongyang agreed to help Cairo build Scuds on its own. North Korea provided technical documents, drawings and extensive access to North Korea’s own Scud production program.

At the same time it was working with North Korea, Egypt began a secret project with Argentina and Iraq to build a 1,000km-range missile known as the Condor-II in Argentina and the Badr-2000 in Egypt. “The goal was to develop a missile in Argentina and then pass the cookbook to Egypt and Iraq,” says a knowledgeable U.S. official. The project began in 1982, with Egypt promising to help Argentina with technology and with Iraq paying the bills. The Condor-II/Badr-2000 was a solid-fuel, two-stage missile designed to fly 800-1,200 kilometers with a 500-kilogram payload.

Work on the Condor-II began at a site near Falda del Carmen in Argentina’s Sierra Chica mountains. Similar sites were later built in Egypt and Iraq. The Egyptian site reportedly included a missile fuel and test area at Abu Zaabal and a missile production facility at Helwan. Argentina, Egypt and Iraq procured the necessary technologies from a number of Western armament and aerospace companies, primarily in Germany and Italy. The leading supplier was Germany’s Messerschmitt-Boelkow-Blohm (MBB), which had designed the missile’s Argentine predecessor, the Condor-I.

Due to the sensitivity of the project, its suppliers sought to conceal their participation after 1985. To accomplish this, work on the Condor-II was taken over by a consortium of companies known as “Consen,” including some of Europe’s defense industry giants. The whole operation was headquartered in Munich and used foreign subsidiaries. Press reports have linked several supplier firms to the project, including SNIA-BPD, a subsidiary of Italy’s Fiat; Transtechnica, a subsidiary of MBB; the French company Sagem; and the German firm MAN. Nearly 20 others were reported to have played a role in procuring technologies for the Condor, including companies named Delta Consult, Ifat, Desintec, Condor Projeckt and Aerotec.

In addition to procuring technology in Europe, Egypt went shopping for controlled goods in the United States. A California rocket scientist, Egyptian-born Abdelkader Helmy, was recruited by the Egyptian Defense Minister General Abdel Halim Abu Ghazala to obtain materials for the Badr-2000 missile program. Helmy arranged for the export of restricted U.S. rocket materials to Egypt. But the scheme was thwarted in June 1988, when an Egyptian military officer was arrested in Baltimore as he tried to illegally load “carbon-carbon” on a Cairo-bound military transport plane. One year later, Helmy pleaded guilty to one count of illegally exporting about 420 pounds of carbon-carbon. Carbon-carbon is used in the manufacture of rocket nose cones, nozzles, and heat shields on re-entry vehicles. It improves missile accuracy by protecting the nose cone from the tremendous frictional heat caused during re-entry of the atmosphere. The Egyptian government insisted on diplomatic immunity for the Egyptian officers who were implicated. But Helmy was sentenced in June 1989 to 46 months in prison and fined over $350,000. He was also ordered to forfeit most of what prosecutors said were $1 million in payments by Egyptian intelligence operatives via Swiss banks. James Huffman, an associate of Helmy’s who had helped arrange the export, was sentenced to 41 months in prison and fined $7,500. The U.S. district judge who tried the case in California reportedly described Helmy’s scheme to acquire sensitive U.S. missile materials as a “large, complex, intricate conspiracy” developed by Egypt with financial backing from Iraq. President Mubarak fired Abu Ghazala in April 1989, but official American and Egyptian reactions to this incident were muted. The incident did not affect Egypt’s $2 billion in military and economic aid each year from the United States.

At the same time Helmy was active in the United States, Egyptian missile experts were in Iraq working on the Condor-II. From 1987 until the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990, Egyptian experts were working alongside Iraqis at a missile complex about 40 kilometers south of Baghdad. In August 1989, an explosion at the site killed hundreds of workers, including Egyptian military engineers. Egyptian-Iraqi missile cooperation included work on extending the range of Scud missiles as well on the Condor-II. As part of the deal, Cairo had always planned to import the means to produce its own version, the Badr-2000. Egypt received some technology from Argentina and started to build its own production facilities, but critical technology was still missing in the late 1980s. Jane’s Defence Weekly reported that a 1988 “dummy test” in Argentina, which had included launch preparation and software trials, showed the Condor to have significant technical problems. Its development was not complete when, under pressure from the United States, Argentina decided to cancel its participation in the project in 1990.

“Fortunately, we engineered the demise of the Condor in Argentina before the cookbook or blueprints were ready,” says a U.S. official. Though Argentina is now out of the Condor business, U.S. officials tell the Risk Report that Iraq and Egypt may not be. “In Egypt, the Condor [Badr-2000] has never entirely died, but it is on life support–a nurse monitors the vital signs and some research is being conducted, but full resuscitation is unlikely,” says a State Department official. The full extent of Egypt’s secret missile cooperation with Iraq before and after the Gulf War is still not known. Cairo has refused requests for information about the Condor-II from the U.N. inspectors in Iraq charged with monitoring Saddam’s continuing missile efforts.

Egypt’s main missile priority has now shifted from the Condor/Badr-2000 to the simpler Scud technology, which Egypt is pushing ahead with full vigor. The Scud program is now getting steady infusions of equipment, technology and training. Earlier this year, U.S. intelligence detected several North Korean missile-related shipments to Egypt. According to a CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) report quoted in the Washington Times in June, Pyongyang has made at least seven shipments of materials for Scud-C missiles, including steel sheets and support equipment. The transfers took place in March and April and the CIA was quoted as saying that they “could allow Egypt to begin Scud-C series production.”

Egypt’s goal is to build its own version of North Korea’s Scud-C, which can fly up to 600 kilometers depending on the payload, and has better accuracy than the Scud-B. This would allow Egypt to hit targets throughout Israel as well as in Libya, Sudan and Syria. According to U.S. officials, Egypt is rapidly approaching success. “It’s safe to assume that Egypt has successfully enhanced the range of its Scud,” a U.S. official tells the Risk Report.

By the year 2,000, if Egyptian-North Korean cooperation continues at its present level, Egypt also could gain access to North Korea’s more advanced “Nodong” missile. Pyongyang is already sharing Nodong technology with Iran. The Nodong is a medium-range missile that was first tested in 1993 across the Sea of Japan. If Pyongyang does help Cairo build larger missiles such as the Nodong, the U.S. Administration may feel more pressure to intervene. But it is easier for Washington to penalize North Korea, as it did in 1992 for selling missiles to Iran, than to punish Egypt, an ally with close U.S. military ties. A U.S. official admits that “it is easier for us to focus on rogue states like Iran, Iraq and North Korea than to talk about our friends like Egypt or Israel.”

Israeli Nuclear Program Pioneered by Shimon Peres

In December 1995, former Israeli Prime Minister Shimon Peres drew world headlines for his casual remark to a group of Israeli journalists in Tel Aviv: “Give me peace and we will give up the nuclear program–this is the whole story.” Though the media heralded this announcement, it reflected nothing more than longstanding policy. For years, Israel has said that it would negotiate the establishment of a nuclear-weapon-free zone in the Middle East after the establishment of lasting peace. Shimon Peres has told Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak that Israel would be willing to negotiate the signing of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty within two years after the establishment of “regional peace.”

But Peres has never said what such a peace would include. He has preferred ambiguity in this and much else in Israel’s nuclear diplomacy. In fact, it was Peres who came up with Israel’s most often repeated nuclear declaration. At a April 1963 meeting in the White House, Peres responded to President John F. Kennedy’s questions about Israel’s nuclear program by saying: “Israel will not be the first to introduce nuclear weapons to the Middle East.” Two years later, Prime Minister Levi Eshkol elevated Peres’s words to Israel’s official nuclear line.

In 1953, at age 30, Shimon Peres was appointed by Israel’s first prime minister, David Ben Gurion, to become Director-General of the Ministry of Defense. Within three years, Peres had laid the foundation for Israel’s nuclear weapon program. He picked France as the major supplier, arranged the sale of a nuclear reactor, and spent the next decade overseeing the construction of the Dimona nuclear weapon production complex.

In his memoirs, “Battling for Peace,” Peres describes his nuclear accomplishments leading up to the 1967 Arab-Israeli war: “My contribution during that dramatic period was something that I still cannot write about openly for reasons of state security. After Dayan was appointed defense minister I submitted to him a certain proposal which … would have deterred the Arabs and prevented the war.” Peres now says that Israel has come a long way from a young country that needed Dimona to deter war to “a strong country on the brink of peace.” He credits Israel’s early investment in Dimona as responsible for the Arab world’s later steps toward peace, including Egyptian President Anwar Sadat’s decision to come to Jerusalem in 1977.

Israel’s Nuclear Shopping List

Despite Israel’s impressive achievements in nuclear weaponry, it still need imports to maintain and develop its existing arsenal. According to a 1992 Pentagon study, “The Militarily Critical Technologies List,” Israel’s strongest capabilities lie in processing nuclear materials and in developing high explosives for nuclear weapon detonation. Israel is less capable in enriching fissile material, building power reactors and mastering thermonuclear fusion.

One of Israel’s most important recent imports has been people. Following the breakup of the Soviet Union, Israel began recruiting Soviet nuclear scientists. In 1991 alone, nearly 20 top Soviet scientists reportedly emigrated to Israel, some of whom were involved in operating nuclear power plants and planning for the next generation of Russian reactors. In September 1992, German intelligence was quoted in the press as estimating that 40 Soviet nuclear scientists had emigrated to Israel since 1989.

The biggest challenge for Israel’s nuclear weapon program has been its inability to openly conduct explosive tests. To compensate for this limitation, Israel must rely on imported high-speed computers. Supercomputers can simulate what goes on inside both fission and fusion weapons. Israel will also have a continuing need for other diagnostic and development tools such as vibrational test equipment, flash X-ray machines and multistage light gas guns.

To continue enriching uranium with gas centrifuges, Israel will need to replace worn-out centrifuges and their parts. This, in turn, will require continued access to high-speed balancing equipment, high-strength rotor materials such as fibrous and filamentary materials, to filament winding machines, and to frequency changers and inverters. Israel also needs a steady supply of tritium to boost the yield of its existing nuclear bombs. Tritium decays at the rate of approximately 5 percent per year, so existing supplies must be constantly replenished. This means that Israel must continue to run the Dimona reactor to irradiate lithium, Israel’s only means of producing tritium. In addition, Israel will continue to need tritium storage containers, oil and rubber-free mechanical vacuum pumps, and palladium and palladium alloy diffusers for separating tritium from helium-3 and other gases. Cryogenic distillation equipment will also be needed to handle tritium.

Israel: A Green Light on Imports from Western Suppliers

Although Israel has the biggest nuclear weapon and ballistic program in the Middle East, and is included on virtually every export control warning list, it is now being allowed to import almost everything it needs to keep its weapon programs going.

The reason, Western officials tell the Risk Report, is that Israel’s close relation to the United States has created a virtual taboo against mentioning Israel at meetings of the international export control regimes (the Nuclear Suppliers Group-NSG, the Australia Group-AG-and the Missile Technology Control Regime-MTCR) in which countries have agreed to restrict their sales of nuclear, missile and chemical/biological weapon technology. The only obstacle Israel now faces in nuclear imports is obtaining large items such as a nuclear power reactor. The Nuclear Suppliers Group insists on full-scope safeguards as a condition of export, which Israel does not meet.

“When it comes to Israel, there is little information-sharing…in fact, there is absolute silence…no one talks about ‘sensitive’ Israeli buyers,” says an Austrian official. A German official agrees. After listing the countries he tracks for proliferation, which include Iran, Iraq, Pakistan, North Korea, India and Syria, he adds with a wink: “And of course, Israel, I almost forgot–we also track Israel.” The official could not think of a recent case, however, where an export license had been denied to Israel.

A Swiss official argues that the current system amounts to “paper export controls,” in which Israel is allowed to get what it needs in practice despite the official control system. When it comes to Israel, he says, the Swiss are actually tougher than the Americans. “We don’t just give things to Israel like the United States does; we ask for test protocols for machine tools and we deny things to Israel based on end-users that the United States does not.”

A U.S. official responsible for tracking countries of proliferation concern recently confirmed that United States is not especially worried about Israeli proliferation. He told the Risk Report: “I don’t know of anybody in the [U.S.] government who really tracks Israel’s program closely. Very few people look at the Israeli nuclear weapon program in detail. It’s a big fact, and it will be changed only in the context of political developments on the ground.”

In 1994, the recent history of American nuclear-related exports to Israel was reviewed in a report by the General Accounting Office (GAO). It found that the United States routinely approves controlled equipment to Israel. The report quoted a State Department official who said that “while the United States does not endorse the Israeli nuclear program,” it has approved high-powered computers for Israeli organizations linked to the unsafeguarded Israeli nuclear weapon effort “because of the overall U.S.-Israeli relationship and the U.S. policy of maintaining Israel’s qualitative military superiority over its neighbors.”

This taboo against asking questions is even stronger in Israel, where discussion of the nuclear program is strictly off limits. The resulting silence makes it difficult even for Israeli companies to know how their products will be used. An employee of Ortal, an Israeli firm specializing in the diecasting of zinc and magnesium, tells the Risk Report that Ortal makes small parts for use in missiles, but that he is not supposed to know which missiles are involved. Ortal simply fills the orders for Taas (Israel Military Industries), the aerospace giant that builds Israeli rockets. Taas does not divulge even to Ortal how the parts are used.

Abraham Alexandrovitz (A. Alexandrovitz Inc.), a company that buys and sells specialized materials, plastics and rubbers from Europe, distributes these materials to manufacturers and factories throughout Israel, including the Atomic Energy Commission. A company employee admits that Alexandrovitz sells materials to Dimona, but he adds, “I am not even allowed to ask what the application is. If I did, we wouldn’t be allowed to sell there.”

This policy of secrecy means that exporters to Israel will have a hard time verifying that their products are not misused. An experienced Israeli trade consultant, who insisted on anonymity, told the Risk Report that discovering which small companies contribute to Israel’s nuclear and missile programs is next to impossible. “There is a great fear of business espionage in Israel. Companies hold information very closely. It is not like in the United States. Especially if you are inquiring about security-related activities, you will meet silence. People feel they could get in trouble for talking and they are very protective of Israel’s reputation and security.”

Israel’s Nuclear Weapon Capability: An Overview

Today, Israel is the world’s sixth most powerful nuclear state, with a stockpile of more than 100 nuclear weapons and with the components and ability to build atomic, neutron and hydrogen bombs. Israel’s nuclear program began and still operates under tight secrecy, but in the 1980s a series of revelations showed the crucial role played by foreign suppliers.

France launched Israel on the nuclear path in the late 1950s by building the Dimona reactor, which is still the source of Israel’s plutonium–its main nuclear weapon fuel. The reactor’s heavy water, essential to achieve a chain reaction, was supplied by Norway in 1959. In 1963, when the reactor started operation, the United States supplied four more tons of heavy water.

Israel got other nuclear help from the United States, which also supplied a small 5-megawatt (thermal) research reactor at Nahal Soreq. The reactor started in 1960, but cannot produce significant quantities of plutonium. Instead, the reactor offered an early training ground for Israeli nuclear technicians. Later in the 1960s, Israel was widely thought to have smuggled more than 100 kilograms of highly enriched uranium out of a nuclear materials plant in Pennsylvania.

France’s contribution

Franco-Israeli nuclear cooperation is described in detail in the book “Les Deux Bombes” (1982) by French journalist Pierre Pean, who gained access to the official French files on Dimona. The book revealed that the Dimona’s cooling circuits were built two to three times larger than necessary for the 26-megawatt reactor Dimona was supposed to be–proof that it had always been intended to make bomb quantities of plutonium. The book also revealed that French technicians had built a plutonium extraction plant at the same site. According to Pean, French nuclear assistance enabled Israel to produce enough plutonium for one bomb even before the 1967 Six Day War. France also gave Israel nuclear weapon design information.

In 1986, Francis Perrin, high commissioner of the French atomic energy agency from 1951 to 1970, was quoted in the press as saying that France and Israel had worked closely together for two years in the late 1950s to design an atom bomb. Perrin said that the United States had agreed that the French scientists who worked on the Manhattan Project could apply their knowledge at home provided they kept it secret. But then, Perrin said, “We considered we could give the secrets to Israel provided they kept it a secret themselves.” He added: “We thought the Israeli bomb was aimed against the Americans, not to launch it against America but to say ‘if you don’t want to help us in a critical situation we will require you to help us, otherwise we will use our nuclear bombs.'”

U.S. intelligence reports

After the United States discovered the Dimona reactor in 1960, U.S. nuclear specialists inspected Dimona every year from 1965 through 1969, looking for signs of nuclear weapon production. It is not clear what they found, but in 1968 the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) reported to President Lyndon Johnson its conclusion that Israel had already made an atomic bomb. In 1969, Israel limited inspection visits by U.S. scientists to such an extent that the Americans complained in writing. Without explanation, the Nixon administration ended the visits the following year.

The CIA continued to report on Israel’s nuclear weapon progress during the 1970s. In a September 1974 memorandum, “Prospects for Further Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons,” the CIA cited “Israeli acquisition of large quantities of uranium, partly by clandestine means” as further evidence that “Israel already has produced nuclear weapons.” The CIA also cited Israeli missile development as evidence that Israel had made nuclear weapons–the CIA said the Jericho made little sense as a conventional missile and was “designed to accommodate nuclear warheads.” In a February 1976 report to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, CIA Deputy Director for Science and Technology Carl Duckett reported that Israel was already making bombs with plutonium produced in its Dimona reactor.

Israeli deployment and possible test

According to a detailed account contained in Time magazine, Israel assembled about a dozen bombs and readied them for use during the October 1973 Arab-Israeli war. The bombs could have been delivered by aircraft or missiles. In 1974, Israeli President Ephraim Katzir said that “it has always been our intention to develop a nuclear potential … We now have that potential.” This remark was followed five years later by a spectacular and still controversial event.

On September 22, 1979, an American “Vela” satellite detected a distinctive double flash off the southern coast of Africa. The satellite data, together with other information from U.S. intelligence sources, offered strong evidence that the flash had been caused by a low-yield nuclear explosion. Defense Department and State Department officials pointed out that this was only the 42nd time that a satellite of this type had registered such a signal; and in the first 41 cases, according to these officials, the Vela had correctly detected atmospheric nuclear tests. A State Department official later told the Washington Post: “Look, the Vela satellite picked up a signature like this 41 times before. In every one of those 41 instances, there was never any question about the fact that a nuclear test had taken place. Each of those 41 was undeniably a nuclear explosion. This was, too.”

A 1979 CIA memorandum stated that “of all the countries which might have been responsible for the 22 September event, Israel would probably have been the only one for which a clandestine approach would have been virtually its only option.” The CIA also observed that Israelis had participated in South African nuclear research during the preceding several years.

In June 1980, the CIA reported to the National Security Council that a 2-3 kiloton nuclear test had taken place at the time and place of the Vela reading, and that it had probably involved Israel and South Africa. However, a panel of scientific experts assembled by the Carter White House analyzed the technical data and concluded that the information was too ambiguous to prove that the event was a nuclear test.

In 1981, after Israeli planes destroyed Iraq’s Osirak reactor (also built by France), former Defense and Foreign Minister Moshe Dayan told the New York Times: “We do have the capacity to produce nuclear weapons, and if the Arabs are willing to introduce nuclear weapons into the Middle East, then Israel should not be too late in having nuclear weapons, too.”

Israel’s continuing need for imports was revealed in 1985, when Los Angeles businessman Richard Smyth was indicted for smuggling to Israel 810 krytrons, high-speed electronic switches used as nuclear weapon detonators. The krytrons were shipped between 1979 and 1983 to an Israeli firm under contract to the government for defense work. The Israeli Ministry of Defense returned only 469 of the krytrons, and Smyth vanished a week before he was to appear for trial. Records obtained by NBC News from Smyth’s firm, Milco International, also showed that two related firms, Heli Trading and Milchan Brothers, both owned by Hollywood producer Arnon Milchan, ordered large quantities of missile-related equipment and materials between 1977 and 1982. Among the nuclear items listed were the 810 krytrons, plus neutron generators, high-speed oscilloscopes and high-voltage condensers.

Vanunu’s disclosures

In September 1986, Mordecai Vanunu, an Israeli arms technician who had worked at the secret Dimona site for eight years, provided the world with the first detailed account of Israel’s nuclear weapon progress. He provided almost 60 color photographs to the London Sunday Times of what he said was Israel’s underground bomb factory. He also described Israel’s nuclear weapon production techniques in an account accepted by weapons experts on both sides of the Atlantic. According to Vanunu’s data, the solid plutonium spheres for Israel’s nuclear weapons weighed 4.4 kilograms. He also said that Israel had produced 100 to 200 advanced fission bombs by 1986, had mastered a thermonuclear design, and appeared to have a number of thermonuclear bombs ready for use.

Vanunu’s photographs also showed the processing of what appeared to be large hollow hemispheres of lithium deuteride–parts for a thermonuclear bomb with a destructive power of about 200 kilotons. According to Vanunu, other Dimona products included copper hemispheres, into which the plutonium was sealed, and beryllium neutron reflectors, which reduced the amount of plutonium required to achieve a nuclear explosion. Dimona was also making the thermonuclear bomb ingredients tritium and deuterium. Vanunu reported that the plutonium spheres and bomb components from Dimona were taken at regular intervals by convoy with armed escorts to an airfield near Haifa for assembly.

Experts’ conclusions

Theodore Taylor, a highly respected former U.S. weapon designer, reviewed Vanunu’s claims in detail. Taylor concluded that Israel’s thermonuclear weapon designs appeared to be “less complex than those of other nations,” and “not capable of producing yields in the megaton or higher range.” Nevertheless, “they may produce at least several times the yield of fission weapons with the same quantity of plutonium or highly enriched uranium.” In other words, Israel could “boost” the yield of its nuclear fission weapons. According to Taylor, the uncertainties involved in the process of boosting required more than theoretical analysis for full confidence in the weapons’ performance. Taylor therefore concluded that Israel had “unequivocally” tested a miniaturized nuclear device.

In 1987, the Institute for Defense Analyses (IDA), which does Pentagon-funded research, released a Pentagon-sponsored report confirming that Israel was still conducting extensive research in the technology required for the design and fabrication of nuclear weapons. According to the report, Israel’s facilities at Soreq and Dimona have the same mission as the Los Alamos, Lawrence Livermore and Oak Ridge National Laboratories in the United States. IDA reported that Israel was developing the computer “codes which will enable them to make hydrogen bombs…. However, it is doubtful they have the codes to completely design such devices.” The report concluded that as of 1987, “the Israelis are roughly where the U.S. was in the fission weapon field in about 1955 to 1960.”

Since 1988, Israel has been trying to buy supercomputers that would allow it to speed up its nuclear weapon calculations by a factor of one hundred. Supercomputers can simulate the implosive shock waves that detonate nuclear warheads, calculate the multiplication of neutrons in an explosive chain reaction, and solve the equations of state that describe the behavior of nuclear explosives (plutonium and high-enriched uranium) under high temperature and pressure–all essential problems for nuclear weapon design. Although it is possible to develop unsophisticated nuclear weapons with less powerful computers, supercomputers are particularly valuable to countries such as Israel that seek to avoid conducting nuclear tests. They also can be used for missile design by modeling the forces acting on a flying body, such as the heat and shock waves encountered by a long-range missile reentering the atmosphere.

In January 1992, Israel’s Technion University procured two “parallel” computers capable of reaching supercomputer speeds from the U.K. company Meiko Scientific Ltd.. The sale effectively circumvented U.S.- and Japanese-imposed restrictions for countries that had not signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT). But in November 1994, the United States approved the sale of nine supercomputers to Israel: two from Cray Research, five from IBM and two from Silicon Graphics. (The speeds of the nine computers ranged from 1,071 to 6,796 MTOPS.) The end-users–Technion University, Hebrew University and the Weizmann Institute–all have links to Israel’s nuclear and missile programs. U.S. officials opposed to the sales were concerned that Israel would get a boost in computing power to work on a major engineering problem: shrinking thermonuclear warheads to fit on long-range missiles.

Dubai is a Growing Diversion Risk, German Officials Say

German officials tell the Risk Report that Iran is increasingly using Dubai in the United Arab Emirates to obtain high technology, particularly electronic `equipment. They say that Iranians operating in Dubai have created a number of front companies, which exist only in the form of mailing addresses.

In a confidential letter to German industry, the Economics Ministry identifies the following Tehran-based organizations as active in Dubai:

  • STATE PURCHASING ORGANIZATION (SPO): SPO buys equipment and technology for the Iranian military.
  • BONYAD MOSTAZAFAN AND JANBAZAN FOUNDATION: This foundation makes purchases for several hundred companies in Iran and buys equipment for the Iranian nuclear weapon, chemical/biological weapon and missile programs.

The German letter says that front companies for SPO and the Bonyad Mostazafan and Janbazan Foundation act as “go-betweens.” They arrange and finance the technology transfers from Dubai, but the actual goods are not transported via Dubai. These Iranian business partners in Dubai are aware of the military potential of their purchases, German officials say.

The letter from the German Economics Ministry serves as a “warning” to German exporters to be careful. It says that the most important front companies in Dubai to watch out for are subsidiaries of BONYAD MOSTAZAFAN FOUNDATION, including the following:

  • MOSTAZAFAN AND JANBAZAN FOUNDATION EST.
  • AL YUSUF UNIVERSAL IMPORT-EXPORT EST.
  • AL YOUSUF UNIVERSAL IMPORT-EXPORT EST.
  • AUIE (AL YOUSUF UNIVERSAL IMPORT-EXPORT EST.)
  • COMMERCIAL COMPANY 209
  • COMPANY OF M&J.

Israel’s Plutonium Production

Israel makes plutonium for atomic bombs at Dimona, a secret nuclear complex in the Negev Desert. The French-supplied reactor there has produced plutonium free from international controls since 1963. The quality of the plutonium created by the Dimona reactor is ideal for making atomic bombs.

The size of the reactor at Dimona is listed by the International Atomic Energy Agency [IAEA] as 26 megawatts (thermal). However, experts believe it is much more powerful than that. Mordechai Vanunu, an Israeli technician who worked at Dimona for eight years, reported that the reactor had been scaled up twice before he arrived at the site in 1977. The first scale-up was from 26MWt to 70MWt; the second was to some higher level.

The first scale-up was planned when Dimona was built. Israel convinced France to make the reactor’s critical components–including its cooling circuit–three times larger than needed for a facility of its nominal size, and three times larger than originally agreed upon. This modification permitted a scale-up to 70MWt without the addition of extra cooling circuits, which would have attracted outside attention. Further evidence of a scale-up came in late 1968, when Israel diverted 200 metric tons of Belgian uranium on the high seas–a quantity considerably greater than a 26-megawatt reactor would have required. Israel probably needed the additional uranium for the first scale-up, which appears to have occurred in 1970.

Vanunu also said that Dimona had been producing 40 kilograms of plutonium per year for some time before he arrived in 1977. If the reactor at Dimona was unusually efficient (i.e., producing more than 1 gram of plutonium per megawatt day) and ran for as many as 300 days per year, the 40 kilograms could have been produced with a peak power of sightly more than 100MWt. If the reactor were less efficient, and operated for fewer days per year, the peak power would have to approach 150MWt.

Plutonium extraction

To be used in weapons, plutonium must be extracted chemically from irradiated nuclear reactor fuel. A French firm, St. Gobain Techniques, supplied Israel with a chemical extraction plant at Dimona. The plant’s first trial runs were in late 1965. By 1968, Israel had extracted enough plutonium for an atomic bomb.

The Dimona reactor, if operated continuously, could have created as much as 870 kilograms of plutonium through 1994. This figure assumes that the reactor started operating at 26MWt in 1963, was scaled up to 70MWt in 1970, and was scaled up again in 1977 to a level at which it could produce about 40kg of plutonium per year. Vanunu reported that the extraction plant where he worked produced 1.17 kilograms of plutonium per week for 34 weeks per year, a total of 40 kilograms annually. At this rate, 320 kilograms of plutonium would have been produced during the eight years Vanunu worked at Dimona. If the reactor experienced shutdowns, or was operated at a lower power, this figure could be significantly smaller.

Future plutonium production at Dimona is uncertain, primarily because of the reactor’s age. The United States has urged Israel to cap its nuclear program and cease plutonium production at Dimona, but Israel has not agreed to do so.

Size of Israel’s arsenal

The above figures for plutonium production indicate that Israel could have up to 175 bombs’ worth of plutonium in its nuclear arsenal today. This figure assumes roughly 5 kilograms of plutonium are needed per bomb, including processing losses. (Vanunu reported in 1986 that Israel was using about 4.4kg of plutonium per bomb, an amount slightly greater than the reflected fast critical mass of plutonium-239.)

It is impossible to estimate the exact size of Israel’s arsenal without knowing Dimona’s true operating history and the characteristics of Israeli nuclear weapon designs. For example, Israel has produced enriched uranium, which could be used to make additional weapons. Israel has also made a number of “boosted” weapons using tritium, also produced at Dimona. Tritium can be produced by irradiating lithium-6 targets in the Dimona reactor.

Dimona reactor:

Reactor: IRR-II
Type: Heavy water
Power: 26-megawatt (thermal) scaled up to 70MWt or more
Start-up: 1963
Safeguards: None
Plutonium created through 1994: Up to 870 kilograms

Israel’s Uranium Processing and Enrichment

Israel has relied on plutonium, rather than high-enriched uranium, as the primary fuel for its nuclear weapons. Nonetheless, Israel has developed the ability to process and enrich uranium at the Dimona nuclear complex. Israeli nuclear technician Mordechai Vanunu told the Sunday Times of London in 1986 that Israel had been operating a secret uranium enrichment facility “on a production scale” since 1979-80. Vanunu also told former U.S. nuclear weapon designer Theodore Taylor that uranium was enriched by gas centrifuges. Based on Vanunu’s information, Taylor concluded that Israel was enriching uranium to weapon grade. Vanunu also confirmed earlier reports that Israel was conducting research on laser enrichment at Dimona.

Israel has obtained natural uranium supplies on the world market from a number of sources. Starting in the mid-1970s, Israel clandestinely imported 600 metric tons of yellowcake from South Africa. Israel has also devised a method of extracting uranium from the phosphate deposits in the Negev desert, where there is an estimated thirty to sixty thousand tons of uranium contained in low-level phosphate ores. Active mining of phosphate deposits takes place in the Negev near Beersheba. The Nuclear Engineering International industry handbook lists the Negev Phosphates Chemicals Company, at Mishor Rotem, as Israel’s only fuel cycle facility.

The French companies that built the Dimona reactor also supplied a uranium fuel fabrication plant. At the plant, uranium metal is encased in aluminum cladding to make reactor fuel rods. The plant’s capacity is unknown but is apparently sufficient to fuel the Dimona reactor.

China National Nuclear Corporation (CNNC) to Work with Westinghouse on Advanced Reactor

The Clinton administration has approved six one-year visas that will allow nuclear engineers from the China National Nuclear Corporation to work on the development of Westinghouse’s most advanced nuclear reactor, the AP-600.

Because the AP-600 project is part of the Department of Energy’s “Advanced Light Water Reactor Program” the U.S. government reserved the right to prohibit certain countries from participating in the project. Only with the consent of the State, Commerce and Defense Departments, in addition to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and the Arms Control and Disarmament Agency (ACDA), could DOE grant permission to the Chinese. The National Security Council also gave its approval. Officials at DOE cited the action as a reward for China resuming nonproliferation talks, which China had suspended in protest of President Lee Teng-hui’s visit to the United States last year. Westinghouse reports that it has spent a total of about $400 million, of which $63.9 million are federal funds, on the AP-600 program since 1985.

The approval of the visas comes at a sensitive time in U.S.-China relations. China’s repeated exports of proliferation-sensitive technology, in addition to its missile tests around Taiwan, have put U.S. cooperation with China under the microscope. In May 1995, the Risk Report revealed that clandestine shipments of poison gas ingredients were going from China to Iran, and in February of this year major newspapers reported the transfer to Pakistan of Chinese ring magnets, equipment needed to enrich uranium for use in atomic bombs. The 1994 Nuclear Proliferation Prevention Act authorizes the President to halt Export-Import Bank financing if a country like China assists other countries in developing nuclear weapons. There are about $10 billion in loans for Chinese projects now in the Ex-Im Bank pipeline.

China acknowledged that it exported the magnets to Pakistan but maintained that it had done nothing that violated the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT). China also refused to rule out future sales of sensitive technology. If the Clinton administration were to impose sanctions against the China National Nuclear Corporation, the action could jeopardize contracts held by Westinghouse and Bechtel totaling about $800 million. As the Risk Report went to press, the administration had made no decision on sanctions but had persuaded the Ex-Im Bank to suspend action on loans concerning China pending negotiations.

Western business interests perceive China as one of the biggest emerging markets in the world. U.S. Energy Secretary Hazel O’Leary and late U.S. Commerce Secretary Ron Brown both traveled to China in 1995 with American business leaders to witness the signing of agreements worth billions of dollars.

Israel: U.S. Turns Down Shavit Rocket

In early May, the Clinton administration denied a request from Israel to sell its “Shavit” space launcher to the U.S. Air Force, which wanted to use the Shavit to launch small military satellites from U.S. soil. If the approval had been granted, it would have marked the first import into the United States of a foreign-made space rocket developed as a ballistic missile. The request went all the way up to President Bill Clinton because U.S. space policy requires a presidential waiver before a foreign rocket can launch U.S. government satellites.

The proposal sparked controversy among federal agencies, with the opponents of the deal arguing that it would undermine U.S. efforts to halt missile proliferation and subsidize Israel’s effort to build rocket motors capable of delivering nuclear warheads.

The Shavit, which is built by Israel’s leading aerospace company, Israel Aircraft Industries, launched Israel’s first spy satellite, the Ofek-3, in April of 1995. The Shavit’s two large rocket motors were developed in the 1980s to power Israel’s “Jericho-II” ballistic missile. “The Jericho-II is a Shavit minus the upper stage, which is replaced by a warhead,” a U.S. official told the Risk Report last year (Vol. 1, No. 5, June 1995). In 1987, the Jericho-II was tested over the Mediterranean to a range of more than 800 kilometers, and tested again in 1988 and in 1989, when it flew nearly 1,300 kilometers. The Jericho-II is mounted on a mobile launcher to enhance its military effectiveness; the Shavit launcher operates the same way.

A U.S. government analyst has estimated that as a missile, the Shavit could fly up to 4,500 kilometers carrying a nuclear-sized payload. In the 1970s, the CIA (Central Intelligence Agency) cited Israel’s Jericho missile program as evidence that Israel had made nuclear weapons. The CIA said the Jericho made little sense as a conventional missile and was “designed to accommodate nuclear warheads.”