Asymmetric Threat: Defector Confirms Moscow’s Lourdes Complex in Cuba Compromised Sensitive Gulf War Battle Plans: What Damage Will It Do in the Future?

(Washington, D.C.): In a recent interview with the
Miami Herald, a former senior Soviet/Russian
military intelligence officer revealed one of the ways in which Cuba remains a real —
albeit
“asymmetric” — threat to U.S. security interests: Former GRU Colonel
Stanislav Lunev
affirmed that, thanks largely to the vast signals intelligence (sigint) facilities operated by Moscow
and Havana near Lourdes, Cuba, the Soviet Union acquired Top Secret U.S. battle plans,
including General Norman Schwartzkopf’s famed “Hail Mary” flanking maneuver, prior to the
launch of the U.S. ground war in the Persian Gulf.

Such a penetration of closely-guarded American military planning may have jeopardized the
lives
of literally thousands of U.S. troops in the event the intelligence had been forwarded to Saddam
Hussein. An even more urgent question now, as Secretary of Defense William Cohen reviews a
Pentagon-drafted study that reportedly declares Cuba to pose no threat to U.S. security interests,
is: What damage might the Lourdes sigint complexes do in the future?

Col. Lunev’s Revelations About Lourdes and Desert Storm

The following are among the more noteworthy of Col. Lunev’s revelations
reported by the
Herald‘s Juan Tamayo:

• “Lunev said he learned that Moscow was aware of Pentagon war plans when his
  GRU
  bosses asked him to analyze possible U.S. strategies based on secret cables sent by
  Moscow to the Soviet Embassy in Washington in late 1990 and early 1991.“
• “‘I had the papers in my hands and we knew all . . . including the surprise attack’
  into
  southwestern Iraq that encircled the bulk of Hussein’s troops, Lunev told The Herald in
  a
  two-hour interview.”
• “Lunev said he knows the information in the cables came from Lourdes because of
  their
  coding, and because friends and officials at the GRU told him so.“
• “‘There’s no doubt . . . that Lourdes is the radio and radio-technical intelligence
  center [a
  Soviet term for electronic eavesdropping] that opened the envelope on these
  communications,’ he said.”

An Abiding Threat

Today, in light of Russian Foreign Minister Yevgeny Primakov’s evident determination to
resurrect the former Soviet Union’s most odious “client state” relationships, it seems unlikely that
similar information gleaned by Lourdes would be withheld from Saddam or other potential U.S.
adversaries. In Col. Lunev’s words: “[In 1990-91] it was unheard of that Soviet intelligence
agents would work for other countries. But now [according to press reports], it looks like they
have begun to look for information in the interest of Saddam Hussein.” Although such reports
require confirmation, the question arises: Could the Lourdes sigint operation be used to imperil
U.S. personnel or strategic interests in future conflicts?

The Miami Herald interview with Col. Lunev
sheds valuable light on a number of other reasons
why the continued operation of Moscow’s 28-acre signals intelligence complex at Lourdes is no
more in the interest of the United States today than it was in the past. These include the
following:

• At present, Lourdes is an even more important asset for the Kremlin in its efforts to
  spy
  on the United States than it was during the Cold War. This is due, in no small measure,
  to
  the substantial attrition that has occurred with respect to much of Moscow’s space-based
  intelligence collection capabilities. As Col. Lunev put it:

“Lourdes…receives and collects intercepts by spy satellites, ships and planes in
the
Atlantic region, making it a full-fledged regional command and control center with
[several
hundred] Russian staffers.” (Emphasis added.)

• The Kremlin’s use of intelligence garnered by its Lourdes listening post is not limited to
  penetrating secret U.S. military operations. Its targets also include the interception of
  sensitive diplomatic, commercial and economic traffic (e.g. Federal Reserve
  deliberations,
  planned U.S. mergers and acquisitions, competitive bidding processes, etc.) and even
  private
  U.S. telecommunications. Such data could be valuable to the Russians for a variety of
  reasons — including quite possibly helping bank-roll Primakov’s global operations to the
  detriment of American equities.
• Lourdes is also an important component of Havana’s annual hard currency income
  —
  and, therefore, continuing life-support for Castro’s odious regime. According to Col.
  Lunev:

“Moscow has been paying Cuba $200 million-a-year to rent the Lourdes site since 1992,
and
carried out a $90 million upgrade of the base over the past two years. Havana is reportedly
seeking to raise the annual charge to $1 billion, starting next year — payable in Russian oil,
weapons and military spare parts.”⁽¹⁾

Congress has an obligation to establish where a cash-strapped Russia is getting the
wherewithal for even its $200 million tithe — let alone the higher price Castro is trying
to extract from Moscow. One likely source is the U.S. taxpayer in the form of as
much as $950 million in total annual assistance flows to Moscow. In the course of
their consideration of the upcoming Foreign Operations appropriations process,
Members of Congress should ensure that insult is not being added to injury in this
fashion by establishing that there will be a dollar-for-dollar reduction in U.S.
assistance to Russia for funds provided by the Kremlin to Cuba to permit the
continued operation of the Lourdes facility.⁽²⁾

• The signals intelligence complexes operated by Russia and Cuba at Lourdes also
  offers
  both countries the means by which to engage in information warfare (IW) against the
  United States. Since there is a growing appreciation of the devastating effect IW
  attacks
  could have against the Nation’s infrastructure, economy and military capabilities, the
  offensive potential of these facilities cannot be ignored.
  

‘See No Evil’

Incredibly, the Clinton Administration has to date gone out of its way to downplay the threat
posed by Cuban-based facilities engaged in such portentous intelligence collection. In fact, the
party line seems to be that the United States actually welcomes such
activities on the grounds
that they enable Moscow to engage in monitoring American compliance with arms control
agreements.

Given the myriad mechanisms for assuring this country’s fulfillment of its arms control
obligations
— notably, an executive branch that bends over backwards to do so; oversight by the legislative
branch; and assiduous monitoring by a free press — this rationale is approximately as absurd as the
proposition that a burglar’s heists should be welcome because, in the process, he monitors his
victims’ valuables. Arms control is supposed to diminish the threat to the
United States, not
serve as a pretext for perpetuating it.

The Bottom Line

There is mounting evidence that the Clinton Administration is determined to normalize
relations
with Fidel Castro’s regime, without regard to the menace it continues to pose to its own people,
to American interests or even to the security of the United States, itself. This seems the
unmistakable import of the draft Defense Department study that tried to ignore the various
asymmetric threats still posed by Cuba. It also was the message conveyed by Secretary
of State
Madeline Albright’s announcement earlier this week that it was “up to” the Caribbean
Economic Community (CARICOM) to decide whether Cuba would be admitted into the
organization — a step toward political and economic rehabilitation that the U.S. has
heretofore
consistently opposed.

It is time for the Administration to come clean about its policy toward
Cuba. Rather than
engage in various subterfuges aimed at salami-slicing away the principled opposition to Castro’s
regime that has characterized successive U.S. presidencies of both parties, the
Administration
should make clear its desire to treat with Fidel on essentially his terms. That change of policy
could then be subjected to an informed and rigorous debate in Congress.

The alternative to dissembling about the abiding danger posed by a Cuba still governed by a
Communist totalitarian — and misleading the American people and their elected representatives
about the U.S. government’s willingness to deal with that regime, and as a practical matter to
contribute to its perpetuation — is as contrary to democratic principles as it is to the Nation’s
interests. The Casey Institute applauds the efforts of Representative Lincoln
Diaz-Balart (R-FL) who is currently seeking to establish a “Juragua Caucus” — to
address the irretrievably-flawed
Russian-sponsored nuclear reactor complex near Cienfuegos — and continues to advance
broad-based opposition to the Clinton Administration’s systematic inattention to these and other
asymmetric threats posed by Cuba.

– 30 –

1. In order to put these figures in perspective, Cuba’s yearly hard
currency revenues total only
about $1.7 billion.

2. A similar requirement is already on the books concerning Russian
involvement in the
completion of the fatally flawed Juragua nuclear complex — although there is reason to believe
that the Kremlin is trying to find ways to circumvent this statute by not identifying the precise
amount it is providing Castro for that purpose. See the Casey Institute’s
Perspective entitled
Castro’s Cuba: A Classic ‘Asymmetric’ Threat ( href=”index.jsp?section=papers&code=98-C_59″>No. 98-C 59, 3 April 1998).