‘Paper Trail’ Confirms New York Times’ Agenda, Sloppy Reporting On Recent SDI ‘Conspiracy’ Allegations

On 18 August 1993, the New York Times gave front-page treatment to a slanderous and factually unfounded story about a Strategic Defense Initiative experiment. The paper charged that a test was deliberately "rigged" to assure its success, to deceive the Soviets and — intentionally or otherwise — to con the Congress. Within hours of the publication of this article by Tim Weiner, the falsehoods contained in the article were authoritatively elaborated by those involved in ordering and conducting this 1984 test.(1)

Then-Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger, then-Director of the Strategic Defense Initiative Organization Lieutenant General James Abrahamson and then-Commander of the Army Ballistic Missile Defense Systems Command Major General Eugene Fox all promptly disputed Mr. Weiner’s allegation that a radio beacon had been used to "fake" the fourth test of the Homing Overlay Experiment (HOE) after the first three had failed. In fact, the Times was simply wrong about the character of the fourth test, about the role of the radio beacon (actually these devices were used in all four tests) and about the allegation that the Pentagon had dissembled on the character and results of the last HOE event.

As usual, however, the facts never caught up with the original story. Every major national news organization trumpeted the Times’ charges as though they were true. Efforts to point out that the facts contradicted those charges were ignored — or subsumed in follow-up stories that interpreted the Defense Department’s overly cautious announcement that it would "investigate" the allegations as evidence that there was something to investigate. Far from retracting the story (as the Center for Security Policy had called upon it to do), the New York Times on 19 August behaved as though the story had been fully confirmed, lauding Mr. Weiner for his investigative skills and lacerating the Pentagon for its perfidy.

What Investigative Skills? What Perfidy?

In subsequent days, evidence has emerged of just how shabby Mr. Weiner’s journalistic research actually was. For example, as long ago as 31 March 1986, Gen. Abrahamson apparently satisfied congressional critics of the SDI program — like Sen. David Durenburger, then-chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence — that charges of an alleged SDIO "disinformation program" were unfounded. While Gen. Abrahamson’s full response to correspondence sent by Sen. Durenburger on behalf of the committee remains classified, the unclassified cover letter says in part:

"I would like to assure you…that I have never engaged in, nor has anyone in the Strategic Defense Organization engaged in, any purposeful attempt tomisinform the U.S. Congress, the American people or the news media.

 

"Two years ago when the [SDIO] was formed, we made an organizational commitment to present the nation with a forthright assessment of the present strategic situation and the ability of the SDI program to affect a positive return to stability. We have kept our program open to close public scrutiny at home and abroad for the simple reason that we believe that the facts will make the case for strategic defense. My enclosed statement should leave you with little doubt that I fully intend to continue to present the SDI program as candidly as is appropriate within the constraints of security consideration." (Emphasis added.)

 

What is more, proof positive that the actual character of the fourth HOE test was duly understood by the Congress can be found in a May 1988 publication by the Congressional Office of Technology Assessment entitled, SDI: Technology Survivability and Software.(2)John Gibbons, President Clinton’s Science Advisor; it was overseen by an Advisory Council that included President Clinton’s Deputy Secretary of Defense, William Perry; and it was prepared by an Advisory Panel which included Richard Garwin — one of SDI’s most tireless critics. Reflecting OTA’s institutional biases, this document takes a generally critical view of the SDI program and its technical prospects. Still, it was produced by an organization led by

Nonetheless, concerning the last Homing Overlay Experiment, the OTA study says:

"The HOE demonstrated on the fourth test…that an experimental IR homing vehicle can acquire and collide with a simulated reentry vehicle in flight. The RV was launched aboard a test ICBM from Vandenberg AFB in California. After detection by radars on Kwajelein, a rocket carrying the experimental ground-launched interceptor was fired from a nearby island toward the oncoming RV. The IR sensor on the interceptor then acquired the RV and guided the interceptor to a direct hit high above the Pacific.

 

"While this was an encouraging and successful experiment, it does not mean that the United States could deploy operational exoatmospheric interceptors tomorrow. The HOE experiment was cooled for many hours prior to the test; an operational system could not be maintained at such cold temperatures. The detectors were not hardened against nuclear radiation; new types of detectors would be required for the operational system. The simulated RV fired from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California radiated about 10 times more IR energy than that expected from today’s Soviet Rvs, and future Rvs could have even lower IR signatures with thermal shrouds. There was only one RV, and the experimenters knew when and where it would be fired…."

 

What is more, the OTA study notes that:

"These comments on the SDI validation experiments should not be construed as criticism of SDIO management. These are all sound experiments properly designed to collect bits of information necessary on the path to developing a working system. At this time we have no major element of a non-nuclear ballistic missile defense system which has been tested in a system mode with equipment suitable for actual operation." (Emphasis added.)

 

More Evidence of the Agenda Skewing Weiner’s Reporting

The OTA comments are particularly noteworthy in light of a letter Mr. Weiner sent to Secretary Weinberger on 24 August 1993. This letter gave Mr. Weinberger less than a day to respond to additional information the New York Times evidently believes supports the general thrust of its 18 August article — if not the specific, demonstrably erroneous charges contained therein. The reason for the deadline? Mr. Weiner planned to publish on 26 August a "follow-up story, incorporating and expanding upon [Mr. Weinberger’s] original responses" — responses made in a June interview which had been so seriously taken out of context as to prompt Mr. Weiner to apologize "for any misunderstanding" that resulted. (In the event, the story did not run today but may as early as tomorrow.)

In his letter to Secretary Weinberger, Mr. Weiner drops any reference to his mistaken "beacon" story, but grasps at another straw: "…The test’s target warhead was artificially heated, which made it more visible to the infra-red sensor on the test’s interceptor." He also quotes one William Inglis, the civilian test director, and unnamed others as stating that "the test warhead contained an (sic) package of explosives detonated in mid-flight."

Secretary Weinberger responded to this contortion of the original Weiner thesis in a letter dated 25 August. He said in part:

"My information is that all four of the [HOE] tests…used target warheads that were heated to 100 degrees Fahrenheit….This is not an ‘enhancement’ of the test. As to your quotation that ‘the test warhead contained a package of explosives detonated in mid-flight,’ I am advised by those who conducted the tests that this [is] simply wrong. The test warhead contained only a spotting charge so that if it had been hit (as indeed it was) the event would be visible to observers on the ground. None of this was to deceive the Congress, or anyone, but to ensure a valid test."

 

So outrageous was Mr. Weiner’s palpably desperate bid for vindication that Gen. Fox also felt compelled to write him. In a letter dated 26 August, the general observed:

"I just read a copy of a letter you sent to C[aspar] Weinberger with more allegations concerning the HOE IV test. In no case did you personally interview anyone. Instead, you took pieces of quotes from other magazines and/or newspapers.

 

"It should be clear to you by now that you need to talk to people who are familiar with organizing field tests for technology experiments. There are a world of requirements on ranges for safety purposes that must be satisfied prior to permission to execute the tests. There are an additional number of requirements that must be satisfied to insure that information-gathering devices are properly positioned and, if possible, sufficiently redundant to insure that the necessary information is acquired. This is sometimes complicated by the various devices that must be placed to prevent third parties from acquiring this information.

 

"Your various articles attacking the test conditions are being written without an entire understanding of the composite picture. Rational people can discuss the test arrangements and the implications….You have seized on small issues and said "I have got you!" — forinstance, the beacons are normal and usual in the tests I have described. Most important of all is the intent of those conducting the test. I have said to others and I say to you that I was straightforward in my reporting, I tried to limit any claim of oversell, I was not ordered to say (or not say) anything by my superiors and I believed then and believe now that the attesting of the technology in HOE was accurate."

 

The Bottom Line

Tim Weiner’s letter to Secretary Weinberger presented other, but no more convincing "evidence" about deception plans concerning the SDI program and SDIO’s willful misleading of the Congress and the public concerning its test results. Regrettably, in light of recent experience, it must be expected that the New York Times will give these new charges — to which Mr. Weinberger has properly responded dismissively — unwarranted publicity and credibility.

It can only be hoped that more conscientious and thorough journalists will hold Mr. Weiner and his newspaper to no less rigorous a standard of integrity and transparency than the latter insist upon for Defense Department officials. The same standard should apply, for that matter, to the Congress and the work performed to advance Members’ political agendas by such entities as the General Accounting Office.

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1. See the Center for Security Policy’s Decision Brief entitled, All the ‘News’ that Fits the Times’ Political Agenda: Latest Assault on SDI Unfounded, Indefensible, (No. 93-D 70, 18 August 1993).

2. Interestingly, this report was subsequently reprinted by the Princeton University Press with the express purpose of "mak[ing] it more readily available to students, scholars and the general public."