Office of the Historian

279. Electronic Message From Robert Linhard of the National Security Council Staff to the President’s Assistant for National Security Affairs (Powell) and the President’s Deputy Assistant for National Security Affairs (Negroponte)1

Washington, September 8, 1988, 3:02 p.m.
General,

SUBJECT

  • SDI and Abrahamson Interview

There was an article in today’s Post2 about SDI saying Abe had given an interview in which he said he could cut program costs. Thought you might like an update on facts.

The cost for Phase-I that had made Frank choke was $120B. Of that, about $60–65B was for 300 garages carrying 10 Space-based Interceptors (SBI) each. The rest of cost was for sensors (BSTS, SSTS & LWIR ground-launched probes) an additional 100 ERIS ground based interceptors. Based upon the JCS requirements, set at the 1st DAB, this mix was designed to kill 50% of SS–18 force and 30% of remainder of attacking ballistic force.

After “Brilliant Pebbles” gave USAF Space Division a scare, the cost of the SDI has dropped from $60–65B to $15B. This is due to the following:

a.
the number of garages and interceptors (total) dropped from 300/3000 to 147/1470 while the number of ERIS is going up to about 1700;
b.
the sensor capability of each garage was also reduced to some extent basically cutting out redundancy with SSTS satellites, but making the value of each SSTS even greater and,
c.
some cost savings.

As the cost of SBI dropped, the cost of the ERIS went up a bit and the costs of the sensors was also adjusted. Some cost increases in the SSTS satellites were avoided by dropping the requirement that SSTS be able to do the mid-course discrimination necessary to target ERIS against late mid-course targets. To do this targeting, additional requirements were levied on the ground-launched LWIR probes.

The overall cost of this package (147 SBI garages, SSTS, BSTS, ground-launch probes, and 1700 ERIS) should come out slightly under $60B down from $120B.

Brilliant Pebbles still claims to be able to do the same mission for about $10B. Abe intends to present brilliant pebbles as a lower cost potential solution to the DAB in early October (12th). The baseline case he will present is the $60B program—but he will also offer a lower cost/high risk “brilliant pebbles” program option, and a lower cost all ground-based option.

Please protect the summary provided above. Abe has not shared this detail as yet with many in DOD.

  1. Source: National Archives, PROFS system, Reagan Administration, ID 82191. Top Secret. Copies were sent to Steiner, Tobey, Brooks, Mandel, Heiser, and Mahley. Sent through Stevens and Perito.↩
  2. For the original interview, see John H. Cushman, Jr., “Pentagon Official Proposes Cost Cut For Space Weapon,” New York Times, September 8, 1988, p. A1.↩