Did the WashPost Miss Explosive Story?
Andrew Lichterman
The Washington Post ran a story Friday headlined Pentagon to Test a Huge Conventional Bomb.
According to the Post,
“A huge mushroom cloud of dust is expected to rise over Nevada’s desert in June when the Pentagon plans to detonate a gigantic 700-ton explosive — the biggest open-air chemical blast ever at the Nevada Test Site — as part of the research into developing weapons that can destroy deeply buried military targets, officials said yesterday.”
It appears possible, however, that the Post missed the real story. There is considerable evidence that one of the main purposes of the “Divine Strake” test, if not the only one, is to use a large conventional high explosive charge to simulate the effect of a low yield nuclear weapon, although the picture is blurred a bit by recently released budget documents. February 2005 Department of Defense budget documents reveal plans to conduct a “Full-Scale tunnel defeat demonstration using high explosives to simulate a low yield nuclear weapon ground shock environment at Department of Energy’s Nevada Test Site” in fiscal year (FY) 2006. The descriptions of the same program in February 2006 (FY 2007) documents continue to state that the program of which the test apparently is a part “will develop a planning tool that will improve the warfighter’s confidence in selecting the smallest proper nuclear yield necessary to destroy underground facilities while minimizing collateral damage.” But the descriptions of specific activities in the current budget document deletes references to nuclear weapons, substituting vague general language about weapons effects (details and document links below; click on “more” to continue).
According to the Washington Post, the objective is to study conventional weapons effects:
“The test is aimed at determining how well a massive conventional bomb would perform against fortified underground targets — such as military headquarters, biological or chemical weapons stockpiles, and long-range missiles — that the Pentagon says are proliferating among potential adversaries around the world.”
Further, the Post piece implies that this is its only purpose:
“Such a bomb would be a conventional alternative to a nuclear weapon proposed by the Bush administration, which has run into opposition on Capitol Hill. The Pentagon for several years has sought funding for research into the Robust Nuclear Earth Penetrator (RNEP) — also known as the “bunker buster” — after the administration’s 2001 Nuclear Posture Review stated that no weapon in the U.S. arsenal could threaten a growing number of buried targets. Congress, however, has repeatedly refused to grant funding for a study on a nuclear bunker buster, instead directing money toward conventional alternatives.”
So far as I know, however, that Congress has not prohibited the study of nuclear weapons effects on underground targets.
The “Divine Strake” test appears to be part of the Tunnel Target Defeat Advanced Concept and Technology Demonstration series, apparently the “full scale” event described in the budget document excerpts below:
…”The Tunnel Target Defeat Advanced Concept and Technology Demonstration(s) (ACTD) will develop a planning tool that will improve the warfighter’s confidence in selecting the smallest nuclear yield necessary to destroy underground facilities while minimizing collateral damage. The focus of the demonstration is to reduce the uncertainties in target characterization and weapon effect/target response. Target characterization uncertainties include those related to determining the target function, layout, operational status, and the geological and geotechnical features. Weapons effects/tunnel response uncertainties are associated with predicting ground shock and tunnel response in layered and jointed media.”
….FY 2005 plans …
“Complete Tunnel Target Defeat Advanced Concept and Technology Demonstration(s) (ACTD) high explosive, low yield, nuclear weapon simulation planning and design.”
….FY 2006 plans
….“Conduct the Tunnel Target Defeat Advanced Concept and Technology Demonstration(s) (ACTD) Full-Scale tunnel defeat demonstration using high explosives to simulate a low yield nuclear weapon ground shock environment at Department of Energy’s Nevada Test Site.
– Deliver validated analysis and planning tools to conduct the end-to-end use of nuclear planning tools to characterize and “weaponeer” the full-scale Tunnel Target Defeat Advanced Concept and Technology Demonstration(s) (ACTD) event.
– Provide Military Utility Assessment on the overall performance of the Advanced Concept and Technology Demonstration(s) (ACTD) and transition the updated planning capabilities to USSTRATCOM.
– Prepare final program documentation and reports for Tunnel Target Defeat Advanced Concept and Technology Demonstration(s) (ACTD) program
– Begin transition of improved tunnel ground shock defeat planning tools to USSTRATCOM”
The general program description language in the current (February 2006) version of the same program element descriptive summary is similar to the previous year, retaining the description of the Tunnel Target Defeat demonstration as developing a planning tool for the use of nuclear weapons:
“The Tunnel Target Defeat ACTD will develop a planning tool that will improve the warfighter’s confidence in selecting the smallest proper nuclear yield necessary to destroy underground facilities while minimizing collateral damage. The focus of the demonstration is to reduce the uncertainties in target characterization and weapon effect/target response….”
But the description of specific FY2006 plans activities in the current budget document has eliminated references to nuclear weapons effects or planning, using vague language instead, for example:
“Conduct the Tunnel Target Defeat ACTD large-scale tunnel defeat demonstration using high explosives to produce the desired ground shock environment at the Department of Energy’s Nevada Test Site. Deliver validated analysis and planning tools for use in characterizing and “weaponeering” the large-scale test event. Conduct a Military Utility Assessment. Prepare final program documentation and reports. Begin transition of improved tunnel ground shock defeat planning tools to USSTRATCOM.”
It appears as well that Divine Strake is the “full scale” demonstration described above. A January 21, 2004 announcement on the Los Alamos National Laboratory Earth and Environmental Sciences Division web site stated:
“Los Alamos Participates in Tunnel Target Defeat and Advanced Concept Technology Meeting
Members of the Earth and Environmental Sciences Division, Robert Swift, David Coblentz, and Gregory Cole, along with Earl Knight and Dave Steedman of Decision Analysis Division participated in the Tunnel Target Defeat/Advanced Concept Technology Demonstration meeting on January 21-22, 2004 at the United States Strategic Command in Omaha, NE.
The Test Working Group discussed updates on Discrete Gemini (Intermediate Scale Test) and Divine Strake (Full-scale Test). In the Site Characterization Working Group Session, Cole discussed relevant issues related to Los Alamos’ work on GAMUT (Geologic Assessment Methodology for Underground Targets) applications.”
The National Research Council, in its 2005 study Effects of Nuclear Earth Penetrator and Other Weapons, also suggests that the last experiment in the Target Tunnel Defeat technology demonstration series is intended to explore low yield nuclear weapons effects:
“As part of DTRA’s program for improving GVN methodology, the global damage mode has been recalibrated to virtually the entire underground nuclear test database (i,e., EM-1) in terms of peak free-field strain in the surrounding rock, rather than peak stress, as was done in the older GVN methodology. This more physically attractive approach is made possible by modern computational capabilities. An ongoing DTRA experimental program (the Target Tunnel Defeat Advanced Concept Technology Demonstration) is intended to verify the improved vulnerability assessment method, by means of a series of tunnel experiments at various scales in jointed limestone geology, the final test being of a prototype tunnel configuration loaded by a high-explosive simulation of a low-yield EPW. This test is scheduled for late 2005.” National Research Council Committee on the Effects of Nuclear Earth Penetrator and Other Weapons, Effects of Nuclear Earth Penetrator and Other Weapons, National Academy Press, 2005, p.35.
It appears likely that the test referred to is “Divine Strake,” but that its schedule slipped a few months. In context, it also appears that simulation of a “low yield EPW” refers to simulation of a low-yield nuclear earth penetrator weapon.
This kind of research began years ago, before the Bush administration came to office. Department of Defense technology planning documents published in 2000, for example, included plans to “Demonstrate the effectiveness of nuclear weapon capabilities in defeating deep structures using precise, low-yield attacks by HE [high explosive] simulation.” U.S. Department of Defense, Deputy Under Secretary of Defense (Science and Technology), 2000, Defense Technology Area Plan, Table XI-3, p. XI-9. (Obtained through the Freedom of Information Act by Western States Legal Foundation).
It would be nice to see another round of digging by the Post–or somebody–to determine the purpose of the “Divine Strake” test. The U.S. is continuing to develop is ability to plan and fight wars with nuclear weapons–a part of the broad U.S. nuclear weapons research effort that receives little attention or debate. Large scale physical simulations to study the effects of low-yield nuclear weapons would appear particularly provocative, the more so in the context of a policy and practice of “preemptive”–really, preventive–warfare.
April 4th, 2006 at 9:39 am
[…] Andy Lichterman’s initial reporting […]
April 5th, 2006 at 9:15 am
DoD Bunker Buster Test is Nuclear…
From Federation of American Scientists (FAS):The Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) today confirmed to FAS that the upcoming ……
May 17th, 2006 at 1:11 pm
(a) the Planet’s plates will shift in its earth.
(b) the material will become part of the 5 mile
atmospheric metal particles held by gasses,
that surround R little Planet (thru precipitation & evaporation) become what our children breathe into their cells, our food into the food cells, etc.
(c) These metal particles DRY the hydrogen-helium gasses as they replace MINERALS with powered metals. The cells that have been replaced
will metals, will probably NEVER given minerals a
chance again, to fill that space. Therefore, the
cell, part of an organ, will become weak, permanently. It will also have a tendency to release toxic material.* *This toxic material is
released by the cells into the blood stream. When these metal particles fill the 5-mile-atmo.sph.air surrounding our planet, it is called
toxic air.or.noxous oxyde.
d) The filling shifting of the plates, also causes the roots of plants to shift.
May 18th, 2006 at 12:58 pm
Well, I got so angry when I read about this on care2´s whebsite so I almost got speachless. What I really thougt ( and still think!!) is not printable here. This country that say that it is a great democracy doing this to it´s own indigenous people???!!!! To it´s own land? Haven´t Hiroshima and the catastrophy of Tjernobyl learnt those people anything??!! And Bush says that he is a believer in God but I would like to ask him and the other guys that has decided to do this how God would like the idea that they destroy the beautiful land that God created???!!
September 1st, 2006 at 3:12 am
It appears that an underground test has just occurred at the Nevada Test Site. It may be the underground version of “Divine Strake.” Here is the story and the link:
US carries out subcritical nuclear test
Thursday, August 31, 2006. 9:27am
The United States says it has carried out a subcritical nuclear experiment successfully at an underground test site in Nevada - the 23rd such test since 1997.
The test came amid intensifying US-led international efforts to press North Korea and Iran to abandon their nuclear programs.
It was the 10th test under the administration of President George W Bush, despite persistent criticism by anti-nuclear groups.
The previous test was conducted on February 23.
Many activists and experts argue that the tests undermine the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty on nuclear weapons and that the Bush administration is carrying them out to use them to boost its efforts to develop new nuclear arms.
The US Government maintains the subcritical tests do not violate the treaty because they do not involve a nuclear chain reaction and are necessary to ensure the safety of nuclear stockpiles.
It also insists they are fully consistent with nuclear test moratorium it has maintained since 1992.
“The Los Alamos National Laboratory conducted the experiment to gather scientific data that provides crucial information to maintain the safety and reliability of the nation’s nuclear weapons without having to conduct underground nuclear tests,” the department’s National Nuclear Security Administration said in a statement.
The administration said the subcritical tests do not involve nuclear explosion because they are designed to “examine the behaviour of plutonium as it is strongly shocked by forces produced by chemical high explosives”.
“No critical mass is formed and no self-sustaining nuclear chain reaction can occur,” it said.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200608/s1728616.htm
September 1st, 2006 at 2:15 pm
Divine Strake is not a test designed to study particular nuclear weapons designs or design features or the behavior of nuclear weapons materials and components via physical tests combined with computer simulations, as in the case of ongoing hydrodynamic and subcritical tests conducted by the nuclear weapons laboratories. The recent test at the Nevada Test site was one such sub-critical test. You can find an overview of subcritical tests at the Los Alamos Study Group web site.
Divine Strake is part of a particular weapons effects testing program that in turn is part of far broader nuclear and non-nuclear weapons effects testing efforts. Their purpose is to determine how best to destroy particular kinds of difficult targets; in the case of Divine Strake, those buried underground. Such tests may inform decisions by the military to develop one or another particular kind of weapon, but they are not in themselves weapons development tests. The public descriptions of the program also note that one of its purposes is to develop tools for appropriate weapons selection, allowing the military to determine where nuclear weapons would be needed to destroy a target and where conventional weapons would do. All of this is part of a general attempt to achieve and sustain global military dominance, with an overt emphasis on developing weapons, conventional as well as nuclear, crafted for decisive “pre-emptive” (in actual fact, preventive or even purely aggressive) warfare.
December 12th, 2006 at 9:52 am
Did not know this:
“Divine Strake is part of a particular weapons effects testing program that in turn is part of far broader nuclear and non-nuclear weapons effects testing efforts.”
This is great information.
November 5th, 2010 at 11:32 am
[…] A few, including Albuquerque Journal and disarmamentactivist.org, have speculated that Divine Strake was a nuclear-related event, but DTRA has up till now declined to confirm or deny the nuclear connection. […]