The Report of the Select Committee on U.S. National Security and Military/Commercial Concerns with the People's Republic of China, commonly known as the Cox Report after Representative Christopher Cox, is a classified U.S. government document reporting on the People's Republic of China's covert operations within the United States during the 1980s and 1990s. The redacted version of the report was released to the public on May 25, 1999.
The report was the work product of the Select Committee on U.S. National Security and Military/Commercial Concerns with the People's Republic of China. This special committee, created by a 409–10 vote of the U.S. House of Representatives on June 18, 1998, was tasked with the responsibility of investigating whether technology or information was transferred to the People's Republic of China that may have contributed to the enhancement of the nuclear-armed intercontinental ballistic missiles or to the manufacture of weapons of mass destruction.
A similar investigation had already begun in the U.S. Senate under the leadership of Senator Fred Thompson (Republican-Tennessee). Thompson had opened his hearings on China's influence in America's 1996 presidential and congressional elections 11 months earlier (on July 8, 1997).
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The Chairman of the committee was Republican Rep. Christopher Cox of California, whose name became synonymous with the committee's final report. Four other Republicans and Democrats served on the panel, including Representative Norm Dicks, who served as the ranking Democratic member. The committee's final report was approved unanimously by all 9 members. The redacted version of the report was released to the public May 25, 1999.
The Cox Report [1] contained five major allegations about China and nuclear weapons.
While several groups, including the People's Republic of China, contend that the Report is overstated or inaccurate, its authors and supporters maintain that its gist is undeniable. The report's basic findings were as follows, quoted from the above document's opening summary:
The People's Republic of China (PRC) has stolen design information on the United States' most advanced thermonuclear weapons. The Select Committee judges that the PRC's next generation of thermonuclear weapons, currently under development, will exploit elements of stolen U.S. design information. PRC penetration of our national nuclear weapons laboratories spans at least the past several decades and almost certainly continues today. The PRC has stolen or otherwise illegally obtained U.S. missile and space technology that improves PRC military and intelligence capabilities.
The Cox Report's release prompted major legislative and administrative reforms. More than two dozen of the Select Committee's recommendations were enacted into law, including the creation of a new National Nuclear Security Administration to take over the nuclear weapons security responsibilities of the United States Department of Energy. At the same time, no person has ever been convicted of providing nuclear information to the PRC, and the one case that was brought in connection to these charges, that of Wen Ho Lee, fell apart. [2]
In response to the allegations contained in the report, the CIA appointed retired U.S. Navy Admiral David E. Jeremiah to review and assess the report's findings. In April 1999, Admiral Jeremiah released a report backing up the Cox Report's main allegation that stolen information had been used to develop or modernize Chinese missiles and/or warheads. [3]
The Chinese government called all allegations "groundless". [4]
Richard L. Garwin remarked that stolen information regarding the W-70 and W-88 warhead would not appear to directly impair U.S. national security since to develop weapons based on this technology would require a massive investment in resources and not be in their best strategic interests with regard to their nuclear program. [5]
An assessment report that was published by Stanford University's Center for International Security and Cooperation said that the language of the Cox report "was inflammatory and some allegations did not seem to be well supported." [6]
Two of the U.S. companies named in the report – Loral Space and Communications Corp. and Hughes Electronics Corp. – were later successfully prosecuted by the federal government for violations of U.S. export control law, resulting in the two largest fines in the history of the Arms Export Control Act. Loral paid a $14 million fine in 2002, [7] and Hughes paid a $32 million fine in 2003. [8]
A warhead is the forward section of a device that contains the explosive agent or toxic material that is delivered by a missile, rocket, torpedo, or bomb.
A neutron bomb, officially defined as a type of enhanced radiation weapon (ERW), is a low-yield thermonuclear weapon designed to maximize lethal neutron radiation in the immediate vicinity of the blast while minimizing the physical power of the blast itself. The neutron release generated by a nuclear fusion reaction is intentionally allowed to escape the weapon, rather than being absorbed by its other components. The neutron burst, which is used as the primary destructive action of the warhead, is able to penetrate enemy armor more effectively than a conventional warhead, thus making it more lethal as a tactical weapon.
The Dongfeng series, typically abbreviated as "DF missiles", are a family of short, medium, intermediate-range and intercontinental ballistic missiles operated by the Chinese People's Liberation Army Rocket Force.
Wen Ho Lee or Li Wenho is a Taiwanese-American scientist who worked for the University of California at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. He created simulations of nuclear explosions for the purposes of scientific inquiry, as well as for improving the safety and reliability of the U.S. nuclear arsenal.
START I was a bilateral treaty between the United States and the Soviet Union on the reduction and the limitation of strategic offensive arms. The treaty was signed on 31 July 1991 and entered into force on 5 December 1994. The treaty barred its signatories from deploying more than 6,000 nuclear warheads and a total of 1,600 intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) and bombers.
The nuclear arms race was an arms race competition for supremacy in nuclear warfare between the United States, the Soviet Union, and their respective allies during the Cold War. During this same period, in addition to the American and Soviet nuclear stockpiles, other countries developed nuclear weapons, though none engaged in warhead production on nearly the same scale as the two superpowers.
The People's Republic of China has developed and possesses weapons of mass destruction, including chemical and nuclear weapons. The first of China's nuclear weapons tests took place in 1964, and its first hydrogen bomb test occurred in 1967. Tests continued until 1996, when China signed the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT). China has acceded to the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention (BWC) in 1984 and ratified the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) in 1997.
Iran is not known to currently possess weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and has signed treaties repudiating the possession of WMDs including the Biological Weapons Convention, the Chemical Weapons Convention, and the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). Iran has first-hand knowledge of WMD effects—over 100,000 Iranian troops and civilians were victims of chemical weapons during the 1980s Iran–Iraq War.
A thermonuclear weapon, fusion weapon or hydrogen bomb is a second-generation nuclear weapon design. Its greater sophistication affords it vastly greater destructive power than first-generation nuclear bombs, a more compact size, a lower mass, or a combination of these benefits. Characteristics of nuclear fusion reactions make possible the use of non-fissile depleted uranium as the weapon's main fuel, thus allowing more efficient use of scarce fissile material such as uranium-235 or plutonium-239. The first full-scale thermonuclear test was carried out by the United States in 1952; the concept has since been employed by most of the world's nuclear powers in the design of their weapons.
The W88 is an American thermonuclear warhead, with an estimated yield of 475 kilotonnes of TNT (1,990 TJ), and is small enough to fit on MIRVed missiles. The W88 was designed at the Los Alamos National Laboratory in the 1970s. In 1999, the director of Los Alamos who had presided over its design described it as "the most advanced U.S. nuclear warhead". As of 2021, the latest version is called the W88 ALT 370, the first unit of which came into production on 1 July, 2021, after 11 years of development. The Trident II submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) can be armed with up to eight W88 warheads or twelve 100 kt W76 warheads, but it is limited to eight warheads under the Strategic Offensive Reductions Treaty.
Intelsat 708 was a telecommunications satellite built by the American company Space Systems/Loral for Intelsat. It was destroyed on February 15, 1996 when the Long March 3B launch vehicle failed while being launched from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center in China. The launch vehicle veered off course immediately after liftoff and struck a nearby village, officially killing at least six people.
W70 was a two-stage, thermonuclear warhead that was developed for the MGM-52 Lance missile by the United States. Designed by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, the Mod 1 and Mod 2 version of the weapon entered service in 1973, while the enhanced radiation Mod 3 weapon entered service in 1981. The last W70 warhead was dismantled in February 1996.
The timeline of the Cox Report controversy is a chronology of information relating to the People's Republic of China's (PRC) nuclear espionage against the United States detailed in the Congressional Cox Report. The timeline also includes documented information relating to relevant investigations and reactions by the White House, the U.S. Congress, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), and United States Department of Justice.
Nuclear espionage is the purposeful giving of state secrets regarding nuclear weapons to other states without authorization (espionage). There have been many cases of known nuclear espionage throughout the history of nuclear weapons and many cases of suspected or alleged espionage. Because nuclear weapons are generally considered one of the most important of state secrets, all nations with nuclear weapons have strict restrictions against the giving of information relating to nuclear weapon design, stockpiles, delivery systems, and deployment. States are also limited in their ability to make public the information regarding nuclear weapons by non-proliferation agreements.
The Dong Feng 31 is a third-generation long-range, road-mobile, three stage, solid-fuel rocket intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) in the Dongfeng missile series developed by the People's Republic of China. It is designed to carry a single 1-megaton thermonuclear weapon. It is a land-based variant of the submarine-launched JL-2. It is operated by the Second Artillery Corps (SAC) which, in 2009, was estimated to have under 15 DF-31 missiles and under 15 DF-31A missiles in inventory. US Air Force National Air and Space Intelligence Center estimates that as of June 2017, five to ten Mod 1 and over fifteen Mod 2 launchers were operationally deployed.
The State of Israel is widely believed to possess nuclear weapons. Estimates of Israel's stockpile range between 80 and 400 nuclear warheads, and the country is believed to possess the ability to deliver them in several methods, including by aircraft, as submarine-launched cruise missiles, and via the Jericho series of intermediate to intercontinental range ballistic missiles. Its first deliverable nuclear weapon is thought to have been completed in late 1966 or early 1967; which would make it the sixth country in the world to have developed them.
This article deals with activities of the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency, specifically dealing with arms control, weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and weapons proliferation. It attempts to look at the process of tasking and analyzing, rather than the problem itself, other than whether the CIA's efforts match its legal mandate or assists in treaty compliance. In some cases, the details of a country's programs are introduced because they present a problem in analysis. For example, if Country X's policymakers truly believe in certain history that may not actually be factual, an analyst trying to understand Country X's policymakers needs to be able to understand their approach to an issue.
The United States has often accused the government of the People's Republic of China of attempting to unlawfully acquire U.S. military technology and classified information as well as trade secrets of U.S. companies in order to support China's long-term military and commercial development. Chinese government agencies and affiliated personnel have been accused of using a number of methods to obtain U.S. technology, including espionage, exploitation of commercial entities, and a network of scientific, academic and business contacts. Prominent espionage cases include Larry Wu-Tai Chin, Katrina Leung, Gwo-Bao Min, Chi Mak and Peter Lee.