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South African Nuclear History

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Southern Africa

South Africa

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North America

United States

Photograph of the Port of Jaffa in Israel.

Middle East

Israel

Nuclear Proliferation

Soviet soldier taking a photograph of another soldier in Red Square, Moscow, 1959

Eastern Europe

Soviet Union

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Malan, Magnus

1930- 2011

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Western Europe

Great Britain

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Western Europe

France

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Reagan, Ronald

1911- 2004

Photograph of P.W. Botha

Botha, P. W. (Pieter Willem)

1916- 2006

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Vorster, B. J. (Balthazar Johannes)

1915- 1983

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Philip, Peter H.

-

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Sole, Donald Bell

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Israeli Nuclear History

Pakistani Nuclear History

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Documents

November 22, 2019	Leonard Weiss, 'My Involvement with the 1979 Vela Satellite (6911) Event' Statement made by Leonard Weiss about his memories of the 1979 VELA Incident.
November 8, 2019	The VELA Incident: A Statement Written by Dr. Alan Berman A statement written by Dr. Alan Berman about the 1979 VELA Incident.
November 21, 2019	Richard L. Garwin, 'More from a Ruina-panel Member' Accounts and memories of the 1979 VELA Incident and the Ruina Panel put together by Richard L. Garwin.
November 28, 1967	Letter from J.L. Stevenson to A.C. Stuart, 'East German Statements on Bonn-Pretoria Alliance' J. L. Stevenson concludes that recent East German statements about West German/South African military cooperation, including in nuclear energy, are baseless and that the recent cooperation appears benign.
August 10, 1977	Letter, Warren Christopher to William Hyland, 'Response to Soviet Message on South Africa' This draft reply to Leonid Brezhnev's August 1977 message to Jimmy Carter on the suspicious site in the Kalahari Desert includes a number of interesting points, among them a request for the "geographic coordinates, size, configuration, and exact nature of the facility." Presumably this information would be used by the US to better target its reconnaissance satellites on the site.
April 15, 1994	Telegram, US Defense Intelligence Agency, 'South Africa: Nuclear Program in Turmoil' With the liquidation of South Africa’s weapons program, “disgruntled” scientists under threat of lay-off “threatened to reveal closely guarded secrets … unless they receive severance pay.”
February 1980	Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Special Project Division, 'Proliferation Analysis and International Assessments' This issue of Proliferation Analysis and International Assessments includes a heavily excised article on Iraq, a piece on South Africa’s security prospects, and a apparently a third essay that has been wholly exempted. The essay on South Africa’s nuclear aims suggests that the arguments pro and con for a nuclear capability to deal with regional security threats are so powerful that “internal political and bureaucratic” consideration are probably more relevant for nuclear decisions.
December 1979	Interagency Intelligence Memorandum, US Director of Central Intelligence, NI IIM 79-10028, 'The 22 September 1979 Event' [2004 Release] This study begins, as the National Security Council requested, by assuming that the September 22, 1979 Vela event was a nuclear detonation. It discusses the possibility that the detonation could have occurred due to an accident, and noted the Defense Intelligence Agency’s suggestion that the Soviet Union might have had reasons to conduct a covert test in violation of its treaty commitments. But most of the study is concerned with other possibilities to explain the incident – a secret test by South Africa or Israel, or India, or Pakistan, or a secret joint test by South Africa and Israel. The 2004 version, in some instances, contains more information through page 10 than the 2013 version.
December 1979	Interagency Intelligence Memorandum, US Director of Central Intelligence, NI IIM 79-10028, 'The 22 September 1979 Event' [2013 Release] This study begins, as the National Security Council requested, by assuming that the September 22, 1979 Vela event was a nuclear detonation. It discusses the possibility that the detonation could have occurred due to an accident, and noted the Defense Intelligence Agency’s suggestion that the Soviet Union might have had reasons to conduct a covert test in violation of its treaty commitments. But most of the study is concerned with other possibilities to explain the incident – a secret test by South Africa or Israel, or India, or Pakistan, or a secret joint test by South Africa and Israel. The 2013 release (which is currently under appeal) includes some information from a “Secret Test by Others” (Pakistan, India) and the map on page 12 that had not been released before.
November 26, 1979	International Technology Office, Los Alamos National Laboratory, ITO-79-155, '22 September 1979 Event Report Draft' This Los Alamos study is another in the series of report and studies of the Vela event performed by US intelligence agencies, the national labs, and contractors.