If true - Info Operations by US against former USSR

[Gary Stoneburner <gary.stoneburner@nist.gov>]

re:
http://www.fcw.com/fcw/articles/2004/0426/feat-strange-04-26-04.asp

Title:  Tech sabotage during the cold war

Opening caviot:  IF TRUE :-), these are excerpts from the book
"At the Abyss: An Insider's History of the Cold War" by Thomas
Reed, a member of the National Security Council during the Reagan
administration.

"... Henry Kissinger's hopes were that "over time, trade and
investment may leaven the autarkic tendency of the Soviet system."
... Leonid Brezhnev did not quite see it the same way. In 1972 he told a
group of senior party officials: "We communists have to string along
with the capitalists for a while. We need their credits, their
agriculture and their technology. But we are going to continue massive
military programs, and by the mid-1980s, we will be in a position to
return to an aggressive foreign policy designed to gain the upper hand
with the West."  Reagan was inclined to ignore Kissinger's
theories of détente and to take Chairman Brezhnev at his word
..."

"According to an unpublished document known as the Farewell dossier,
the United States supplied the Soviet Union with faulty software that
eventually led to a major pipeline disaster. Reed said such a ploy would
never have been undertaken if the Soviet secret police, the KGB, had not
been engaged in the theft of Western technology."

"Within a few months, the shipments began. The Weiss project
targeted the Soviet military/industrial needs as set forth in the
Farewell dossier. "Improved" — that is to say, erratic —
computer chips were designed to pass quality-acceptance tests before
entry into Soviet service. Only later would they sporadically fail,
frazzling the nerves of harried users. Pseudosoftware disrupted factory
output. Flawed but convincing ideas on stealth, attack aircraft and space
defense made their way into Soviet ministries."

"Once in the Soviet Union, computers and software, working together,
ran the pipeline beautifully — for a while. But that tranquility was
deceptive. Buried in the stolen Canadian goods — the software operating
this whole new pipeline system — was a Trojan horse. ...   In
order to disrupt the Soviet gas supply, ...,  the pipeline software
that was to run the pumps, turbines and valves was programmed to go
haywire, after a decent interval, to reset pump speeds and valve settings
to produce pressures far beyond those acceptable to the pipeline joints
and welds.  The result was the most monumental nonnuclear explosion
and fire ever seen from space.  ..."

"... when the Soviets discovered in 1985 just what had happened,
they were left wondering what other systems were likely to fail as a
result — they had no idea what technology was legitimate and what was
bogus. But the Soviets couldn't complain without admitting to the Western
world that they had been stealing the technology in the first
place."

Cheers,
Gary

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* Opinions expressed are not intended to reflect an official position
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* Gary Stoneburner
* Computer Security Division, National Institute of Standards & Technology
* 100 Bureau Drive, Stop 8930, Gaithersburg, MD 20899-8930         
* Phone: 301-975-5394, FAX: 301-948-0279, Email: Stoneburner@nist.gov
* http://csrc.nist.gov/staff/stoneburner/gshome.html
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