SPY CASES - UNITED STATES

China

Fallout from the China Spy Case

May 1999

PFIAB Report on Chinese Spying

"Science at Its Best and Security at Its Worst": Report of a Special Investigative Panel of the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, Released on 15 June 1999

 

Text of the PFIAB report is available at:

http://www.fas.org/sgp/library/pfiab/index.html

http://www.zgram.net.

Members of the PFIAB panel include Warren Rudman, chair and former U.S. Senator; Ann Z. Caracristi, former deputy director of the National Security Agency; Sidney D. Drell, physicist, consultant, and chair of a University of California panel that helps manage the Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories; and Stephen Friedman, former chairman of Goldman, Sachs & Co.

Richard Carpenter has assisted by compiling many of the listed items.

Materials are arranged in reverse chronological order.

 

Freedberg, Sydney J., Jr. "Energy Labs Debate Boils Over." National Journal, 26 Jun. 1999, 1896-1897.

Discusses reaction to PFIAB report at the Energy Department, at the Labs, and in Congress. The focus is Energy Secretary Richardson's resistance to a semiautonomous agency responsible for national security work at the Energy Department.

Pincus, Walter, and Vernon Loeb. "Support Builds for Separate Nuclear Authority." Washington Post, 17 Jun. 1999, A18. [http://www.washingtonpost.com]

Although the House select committee that he chaired "did not include specific recommendations for reform," Rep. Christopher Cox (R-CA) said on 16 June 1999 that "he supports a proposal to transfer control over nuclear weapons production and research from the Department of Energy to an independent agency much like the old Atomic Energy Commission."

New York Times. "[Editorial:] New Management for the Nuclear Labs." 16 Jun. 1999. [http://www.nytimes.com]

The Rudman panel has produced a "powerful, balanced report." Of the options identified for improving security at the U.S. nuclear labs "a fully independent agency accountable to the highest political authorities seems best."

Pincus, Walter. "Energy's Nuclear Arms Oversight Hit: Panel Suggests Possibly Taking Complex Out of Department Hands." Washington Post, 16 Jun. 1999, A18. [http://www. washingtonpost.com]

PFIAB's report "cited ... several examples of 'substantial problems in management' that the panel said have undermined security at the Energy Department and its nuclear weapons laboratories."

U. S. Department of Energy. "Press Release -- Statement by Secretary of Energy Richardson on the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board Report." 15 Jun. 1999. [http://www.energy. gov]

"I agree with the Report's conclusion that serious change is needed in the department's organizational structure.... [But] I have strong reservations about the Board's recommendation to establish a semi-independent or independent agency for nuclear weapons matters."

Pincus, Walter. "Panel Urges Some Autonomy for Nuclear Weapons Program." Washington Post, 15 Jun. 1999, A2. [http://www.washingtonpost.com]

The PFIAB report recommends "making the Energy Department's nuclear weapons functions semi-autonomous inside the department or splitting them off into an independent agency reporting directly to the White House."

Risen, James. "Report Scolds Bureaucracy for U.S. Nuclear Lab Lapses." New York Times, 15 Jun. 1999.

The PFIAB report "argues that the Energy Department has mishandled the nation's nuclear secrets for 20 years." The report, briefed to President Clinton on 14 June 1999, says that "Clinton administration initiatives to tighten security at nuclear weapons laboratories are not being carried out fully because of bureaucratic arrogance and foot-dragging."

Hebert, H. Josef. "Panel Urges Nuke Security Changes." Associated Press, 15 Jun. 1999.

According to the report of the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, "[e]fforts to tighten security at the Energy Department and its nuclear weapons labs are being resisted by mid-level bureaucrats and a 'culture of arrogance' that has left atomic secrets vulnerable to theft for decades."

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