Statement made by Leonard Weiss about his memories of the 1979 VELA Incident.

A statement written by Dr. Alan Berman about the 1979 VELA Incident.

Accounts and memories of the 1979 VELA Incident and the Ruina Panel put together by Richard L. Garwin.

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.

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.

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.

Forwarded to Ralph Earle, Director of US Arms Control and Disarmament Agency. The Interagency Intelligence Memorandum on the 22 September 1979 explosion, or Vela Incident, concludes that it was a nuclear explosion.

Background on US-South African nuclear relations and uranium cooperation from the end of the Second World War to the early 1980s. Also addressed is the Vela incident of September 1979 and the international community’s backlash against the South African government.