African securityThe apartheid bomb: First comprehensive history of South Africa's nuke program

The Institute for Science and International Security has today (Friday) released a new book, Revisiting South Africa’s Nuclear Weapons Program: Its History, Dismantlement, and Lessons for Today, by David Albright with Andrea Stricker. It is the first comprehensive, technically oriented history of South Africa’s nuclear weapons program and its dismantlement. The Institute notes that lessons of this dynamic and complicated nuclear weapons program remain valid today. “Although none of the nine states that currently possess nuclear weapons appears on the verge of following South Africa’s example, the South African case contains many valuable lessons in non-proliferation, disarmament, export controls, and verification,” the Institute says.

Twenty five years ago South Africa acceded to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) after dismantling its nuclear weapons. Yet, the full story of that nuclear weapons program was not revealed publicly at that time, even after then-President F. W. de Klerk revealed South Africa’s nuclear weapons program in 1993. Parts were hidden from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) as well.

Now, after many years of work by the media and independent experts at the Institute for Science and International Security and elsewhere, and with the additional revelations and cooperation of a number of former members of South Africa’s nuclear programs, a much fuller picture of South Africa’s nuclear weapons program has emerged.

In particular, the new information and findings in Revisiting South Africa’s Nuclear Weapons Program include:

• Three generations of nuclear weapon production facilities are described for the first time publicly. The book includes many photos of these sites that were not available before.
• The book contains the first detailed chronicle of South Africa’s complicated struggle to make highly enriched uranium for nuclear weapons.
• It is a popular misconception that a change in the South African leadership, for example, a form of regime change, was the key factor in making dismantlement possible. In fact, the historical record shows that South Africa’s perceived security threats diminished first and then an internationally focused leader was able to make the decision to disarm.
• From an engineering standpoint, South African nuclear weapons were highly sophisticated and designed to be mated to advanced delivery systems, including a television guided glide bomb. At the end of the program, it had created the industrial wherewithal to mate a nuclear warhead to a ballistic missile. The South African nuclear weapon program explored, but was by no means rushing, to build boosted and thermonuclear weapons.