In follow up to your direction that we give some thought to how we might
form a cooperative SDI
research/development program, my staff has been thinking and consulting
quietly with outside experts. They have come up with one rather novel
idea—a jointly manned spacelab from which experiments would be conducted
on applied technologies holding promise of intercepting ballistic
missiles in flight. We would also invite the other nuclear powers to
participate (Brits, French and Chinese).
Clearly there are some things we ought not share—supercomputers, for
example. But this concept is worth pursuing in my judgment. Is this the
sort of thing you had in mind?
Attachment
Paper Prepared by the National Security Council
Staff2
Points on Sharing SDI Technology with the
Soviets
1. Sharing our SDI technology with
the Soviet Union is one way to ease the transition from a world of
nuclear offenses to anti-nuclear defenses. But we must remember that
it is one thing for the U.S. and the Soviet Union to move
independently along parallel tracks towards a world in which they
have better defenses and less offenses. It is a very different
matter for the Soviet Union to be building its defenses and future offensive systems with full
knowledge of our defensive technology. For example, if we told the
Soviets how we searched for and tracked ballistic missiles, they
would have a much better idea of how to evade that search. While we
do not object to Soviet defenses, we should not teach them how to
beat our defenses, particularly at a time when their offensive force
is larger than ours.
2. Sharing SDI technology could
reduce our technological lead in non-nuclear military areas. SDI technology, in many cases, can be
used to strengthen other Soviet military capabilities. Super
computers will be at the heart of SDI. Sharing those with the Soviets would also help the
Soviets find our submarines, and design better fighter aircraft. We
must eliminate the threat of nuclear war. We must not do so at the price of increasing Soviet non-nuclear military capabilities.
3. We have gone to our European allies and asked them to help with
our SDI research. If we now give it
to the Soviets for free, they will be justly upset. They, and the
Chinese, will view U.S.-Soviet collaboration on SDI as a project that will neutralize
their small nuclear arsenals. How will China feel if its small
nuclear force is neutralized by Soviet defenses using American
technology, while the Soviets still have hundreds of missiles aimed
at China? We should think more
[Page 537]
about how to share our military technology in
sensitive areas with our allies before we begin to share it with the
Soviets.
4. The Soviets, however, have been attacking us for “militarizing
space.” This, of course, is incorrect; they militarized space long
ago. But if we proposed joint, multi-national research into the
feasibility of space-based anti-ballistic missile weapons, their
attacks on us might be answered. This research could take the form
of the Apollo-Soyuz space mission of the mid-1970s. We could talk to
the Soviets about creating an international space-lab to do research
into non-nuclear ways to destroy ballistic missiles in flight. As
with Apollo-Soyuz, we would be careful not to transfer technology
that would have undesirable military applications (other than ABM, of course). We should invite
Great Britain, France, and China to participate, since their nuclear
ballistic missile forces would be affected as well. The fruits of
that research would be unclassified, and would be made available to
all, as is done with other forms of scientific research.
5. The first step would be to propose to the Soviets a scientific
commission involving the five nuclear ballistic missile powers to
investigate the possibility of international manned experiments in
space on anti-ballistic missile weapons.
6. We would continue with our existing SDI research in the meantime, just as we would expect
the Soviets to continue their own independent work on anti-ballistic
missile defenses.
