lANDS Interdisziplinäre Arbeitsgruppe Naturwissenschaft, Technik und Sicherheitspolitik Interclisciplinary Research Group Science, Technology anel Security Policy

Arbeitsbericht Working Paper

IANUS-7j1992

AchiIn Seiler

THE CIVILIAN-MILITARY AMBIVALENCE OF HIGH TECHNOLOGIES AND ITS SIGNIFICANCE FOR TRANSNATIONAL COOPERATION IN '/VESTERN EUROPE

IANUS, c/o Institut für Kernphysik, Technische Hochschule Darmstadt, Schloßgartenstraße 9, D-6100 Dannstaclt, Germany Tel.: 06151-16:3016, -162480 Fax: 06151-164321 e-ulail: df41@bl'3,hrz,th-darmstadt.ele

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THE CIVILIAN-MILITARY AMBIVALENCE OF HIGH TECHNOLOGIES AND ITS SIGNIFICANCE FOR TRANSNATIONAL COOPERATION IN WESTERN EUROPE

Technologically induced, since acoupleof years all western industrialized nations are undergoing astate of transition which is characterized by profound changes of economic structures on the micro level as weIl as on the macro level. These changescan be roughly described by statingthat in the civilian sector as weIl as.in the militaryarea (a1though with some fundamental restrietions given here), the product's 1ife cyc1e is sharplyshortened. Onthe otherhandthe pressure to achieve better technological performance ~nd to meet the largescale demands in terms of investment capital and institutional arrangements, necessary to provide state-of-the-art technologies, is increasing dramatically. Starting from the technological components (here inthe military sector too, thelife cycle of components has been reduced from somewhere between 10-12 years in earlier times to less than 12. months today), thereare far reaching changes in the frame conditions for the generating of new products, production processes or services. These changes will be. outlined now and analysed in the following with a special view to the implications on arms control and disarmament. a) High technology - paramount in the civilian as weIl as in the military area can be described mainly by its nature as systems technology with the focus on the significantly redueed life time of many subsystems and components. These parts and components must be kept on the technologically mostsophisticated state-of-the-art and must be co-developed orupgraded in an homogenous, . complementaryway up to the stage oftheir final integration and . fitting into the architectur~ of an electronic product or a weapon system. ' Furthermore, the vertical boundaries between many fields of new (high) technologies are shifting (e.g.: the boundary between computer science and telecommunication or between eleetronics and optics). There are new technology fields arising - with new ranges of application - being given artificial names, as in the cases above: information technologies and optronics. The same holds true for the horizontal boundaries which have been defined by the OECD and have been vastly used in order to at least tentatively differentiate between the single stages of the research and developmentprocess (R&D): basic research, applied research, development, prototyping and testing, implementation, imitation, diffusion. Although the horizontal boundaries always lacked real practicability and have been defined more for statistical and academic reasons than for the timetable of research staffs (research can be easily understood but hardly undertaken in linear terms) the nature of the new technologies as component and system technologies inevitably leads to a complete upheaval of the horizontal criteria, which have been used so far with at least a modest utility. It is possible, for example that some applied development activities, designed for generating advanced lithographie tools in

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technology is developed in the civilian sector and then finds its way into defense applications".1 The results of civilian-oriented research projects could be systematically instrumentalized in the context of attached military follow-on activities as it is the case for some NATO weapon design projects and for some explicitly civilian funded research activities, organized by the German Ministry for Research and Technology (BMFT). This option to instrumentalize civilian research results for military purposes is being explicitely descrfbed and underlined in an official self-portrait of the research activities undertaken in the area of information technologies: "In the future there must be efforts to influence the so called dual-use-technologies in more intense ways, which means to try to have military needs taken into accounts weIl in advance when generating civilian technologies, or tälattach military add-on programs onto these dual-use technologies in order to meet military demands. 2 tt

Also NATO's SHAPE technoloqy centre in Belgium outlines a similar approach in gaining militarily useful technologies out of civilian developments in order to overcome. thus the enormous financial b()~tlenecks due to the rising costs. for research and development to"tbe undertakenin the area of short-living electronic components. The centre is now entering a course to simply buy cf!ilian parts off the shelf and integrate them later into up§raded weapon systems. (The official NATO acronym given for this approach is COTS: components - of - the- shelf).3

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conditions and the extent to which statesintervene

~ financially andpolitically in favour of certain strategic key

technologies are ofparamount importance. Apart from traditional single state support schemes,being civilian or military, there are recently a couple of transnational R&O support programes in Western .Europe whichare now gaining significant momentum in the international subsidy race. Theyappear to be an apt instrument for national and private ambitions in technoloqy and industrial poli cies as weIl as for the tighter pursuit of armament and military oriented interests. There are the single programs of the European Community (ESPRIT, BRITE/EURAM, RACE, etc.), designed mainly for the support of precompetitive research projects in the area of high technologies. Research and development projects, covering the same technological fields as the singleprograms, but already on a competitive, market oriented stage, are dealt with the French-Ied technology initiative EUREKA, another transnational framework for European research and development cooperation, but essentially

.1 US Congress, Office of Technology Assessment, Holding the Edge: Maintaining the Oefense Technoloqy Base, OTA-ISC-420, Washington OC: US GPO, April 1989, p.S 2 BMFT (1989) Zukunftskonzept Informationstechnik, Bonn: Bundesministerium fuer Forschung und Technologie, Bundesminister fuer Wirtschaft, August 1989, S. 122 3 ISSC (1990) Airborne Surveillance in Post-CFE Environment, International Seminar, Brussels, 26/27 November 1990

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goals behind which had to be taken into account weIl in advance when generating "civiIian" dual use technologies, thus reducing military costs and risks.

IANUS-Publikationsreihe IANUS Working Papers Seit 1989 werden Arbeitspapiere der IANUS-Gruppe in einer eigenen Publikationsreihe veröffentlicht und sind auf Anfrage (gegen Unkostenerstattung) erhältlich. Since 1989 working papers of the IANUS research group have been published and can be sent on request. • IANUS-1/1989: Egbert Kankeleit, Christian Küppers, Ulrich Imkeller, "Bericht zur Waffentauglichkeit von Reaktorplutonium" • IANUS-2/1989: Jürgen Scheffran, "Sicherheit und Stabilität - Versuch einer interdisziplinären Begriffserklärung" • IANUS-6A/1989: Annette Schaper, "Can Arms Control Already Start at the Early Stage of Research and Development? - An Investigation of the Example of Inertial Confinement Fusion" • IANUS-6B/1989: Annette Schaper, "Kann Rüstungskontrolle schon in dem frühen Stadium von Forschung und Entwicklung einer neuen Technologie einsetzen? - Beispiel Trägheitseinschlußfusion" , veröff. in: C.Hüttig (Hrsg.), "Rüstungstechnik und Internationale Sicherheitspolitik" , Band 45 der Schriftreihe der TH Darmstadt, Darmstadt, 1990 • IANUS-7/1989: Annette Schaper, "ICF-Experimente mit kernwaffenähnlichen Materialien" • IANUS-8/1989: Annette Schaper, "Die Rolle von Forschung und Entwicklung in der Rüstungsdynamik" und" Die Begrenzung rüstungsrelevanter Forschung und Entwicklung" • IANUS-9/1989: Dirk Ipsen, "Der Militär-Industrie-Komplex (MIK)", veröff. in: "Informationsdienst Wissenschaft und Frieden", Nr.2, 7.Jg., Seite 31-34 • IANUS-10/1989: Martin Kalinowski, "Verwendbarkeit und Produktion von Tritum für Kernwaffenprogramme" • IANUS-11/1989: Martin Kalinowski, "Nuclear Weapons Uses of Tritium and Multilateral Control Measures" • IANUS-12/1989: Kathryn Nixdorff, "New Potentials in the Area of Biological Weapons", Revised edition of an article appearing in: C.Hüttig (Hrsg.), "Rüstungstechnik und Internationale Sicherheitspolitik" , Band 45 der Schriftreihe der TH Darmstadt, Darmstadt, 1990 • IANUS-13/1989:Wolfgang Bender, "Kompetenz der Betroffenen - Heuristik der Furcht - Institutionen der Meinungserarbeitung" • IANUS-1/1990: IANUS-Zwischenbericht "Zwei Jahre IANUS: Struktur, Ergebnisse und Perspektiven", April 1990 • IANUS-2/1990: Uwe Reichert, "Warhead Development and Nuclear Testing" • IANUS-3/1990: IANUS-Arbeitsbericht "Einflußfaktoren der Rüstungsdynamik" • IANUS-4/1990: IANUS-Arbeitsbericht "Rüstungsrelevante Technologien - Material zur systematischen Beurteilung" • IANUS-5/1990: Jürgen Scheffran, "C31 and New Generations of Nuclear Weapons - The Uncertain Connection" • IANUS-6/1990: Volker Hammer, Marion Kremer, Günther Lutz, "Risiko-orientierte Systementwicklung"

• IANUS-7/ 1990: Kathryn Nixdorff und Isolde St.umm, "Ambivalence of Basic Medical Research Using Techniques of Genetic Engineering for t.he Development of Vaccines" • IANUS-8/1990: Isolde Stumm und Wolfgang Bender, "Was treibt die Rüstungsdynamik voran? Ein Einstieg in dieses Thema im Hinblick auf biologische Waffen" • IANUS-9/1990: Isolde Stumm, "Gentechnologie und Biowaffen" • IANUS-I0/1990: Martin Kalinowski, "Technical Problems with Safeguarding Tritium" • IANUS-ll/1990: IANUS-Arbeitsbericht "Erfahrungen mit drei interdisziplinären Seminaren" • IANUS-12/1990: Achim Seiler, "Neue Tedmologien und Riistungskonversion" • IANUS-13/1990: Wolfgang Liebert, Martin Kalinowski, Götz Neuneck, "Technologische Möglichkeiten des Irak für eine Kernwaffe" • IANUS-l/1991: Lars Coischen, Martin Kalinowski, "Die Kontrolle der militärischen Nutzung von Tritium" • IANUS-2/1991: Lars Colschen, Martin Kalinowski, Jan Vydra, "National Regulations of Accounting for and Control of Tritium" • IANUS-3/1991: Jürgen Scheffran, .lan Vydra, "The Application of Military-Related ReSOlIrCeS 1.0 Protect the Enviroment" • IANUS-4/ 199 1: Ulrike Benner, "Verantwol'tungsbegriffe und Verantwortungskonzepte" • IANUS-5/1991: Markus .lathe, .lürgen Scheffran, "Zivile und militärische Anwendungen Neuronaler Netze" • IANUS-6/1991: Martin Kalinowski, Andre Anders, "Fusionsenergie - Sichere und ökologisch verträgliche Energie der Zukunft'?" • IANUS-7/ 1991: Isolde Stumm, Kathryn Nixdorff, "Haben Toxinwaffen militärische Relevanz?" • IANUS-8/1991: Wolfgang Liebert, "Ambivalenz der Naturwissenschaft und Notwendigkeit von Wissenschaftsfolgenforschung" • IANUS-9/ 1991: Wolfgang Bender , "Erhaltung und Entfaltung als Kriterien für die Gestaltung von Wissenschaft und Technik" (+ english translation: "Preservation anel Development as Central leleas for Designing Science and Technology") • IANUS-I0/1991: Axel Schrader, "Militärausgaben und wirtschaftliche Entwicklung in eler Dritten Welt" • IANUS-ll/1991 Wilfrieel Engelmann, "Conditions for Disarmament - Game Theoretic Models of Superpower Conflict" • IANUS-l/1992 Achim Seiler, "Bericht von eier 41. Pugwash Konferenz" • IANUS-2/ 1992 Wolfgang Liebert, "Risks of Horizontal and Vertical Proliferation of Emerging Nuclear Technologies - The Case of Laser Isotope Separation" • IANUS-3/1992 Achim Seiler, "Technology Transfer

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Technology Embargo '?"

• IANUS-4/ 1992 Markus .l athe, .l ürgen Scheffran, "Security, Stability anel Costs m the Armament Dynamics: The SCX-Model Framework"

• IANUS-5/1992 Wolfgang Liebert, "Gesellschaftliche und subjektbezogene Bedingungen für Konversion von Rüstungsforschung" • IANUS-6/1992 Martin Kalinowski, "Die Problematik der Tritiumemissionen aus einem Endlager für radioaktive Abfälle" • IANUS-7/1992 Achim Seiler, "The Civilian-Military Ambivalence of High Technologies and its Significance for Transnational Cooperation in Western Europe" • IANUS-8/1992 Wolfgang Liebert, "Early Warning Signals in Science and Technology with Respect to the Necessity of Qualitative Arms Control" • IANUS-9/1992 Lars Colschen, Martin Kalinowski, Paul Leventhal, "Why and How Tritium Should be Considered Under a Verified Cutoff of Fissile Materials Production" • IANUS-I0/1992 Jürgen Scheffran, Wolfgang Liebert, "Ambivalence ofScience and Dual-Use ofTechnology Transfer" • IANUS-ll/1992 Achim Seiler, Martin Kalinowski, "Sustainability Requires Substantial Commitments from the Industrialized Countries" • IANUS-12/1992 Jürgen Scheffran, "The Transfer of Aerospace Technologies and the Proliferation of Sophisticated Arms" • IANUS-13/1992 Wolfgang Bender, "Gerechtigkeit und Frieden _. Zur Diskussion um zwei zentrale Themen der politischen Ethik" IANUS-Dokumentationen • I "Neue Technologien und Rüstungsdynamik" , Interdisziplinäres Seminar, Wintersemester 1987/88 • II "Methoden der Technikfolgenabschätzung und Technikgestaltung" , Interdisziplinäres Seminar, Sommersemester 1989 • III "Konfliktdynamik und Konfliktmodelle in der Sicherheitspolitik" , Interdisziplinäres Seminar, Wintersemester 1989/90 • IV "Lassen sich zivile und militärische Forschung trennen?", Interdisziplinäres Seminar, Wintersemester 1991/1992