Carroll H. Dunn
correlate the two names. That was how I found out about the assignment and
promotion. What went on in the background, I'm not sure. It was not too unusual for
an engineer to have that assignment since General [Leslie] Groves had been the first
director of the Armed Forces Special Weapons Project, later called DASA. Then
shortly after I got there, it became the Defense Nuclear Agency.
It was a challenge and an opportunity and, while I hated to leave the Corps, I realized
that my period of service was getting short. Incidentally, just before this time, late July
1971, I believe, I had had an offer from Con Edison to retire and go to work there. I
had turned it down. When the assignment to DNA came, I remember thinking that I had
made the right decision staying in the Army, and I appreciated the opportunity both for
the promotion and to take on an organization of my own. All in all, it was a welcome
assignment.
Defense Nuclear Agency,
What was the agency's mission?
A
It has basically three missions. One, and probably the primary mission, is testing of
nuclear weapons effects on people and equipment. It has a radiobiological laboratory
as a subordinate organization, located at Bethesda [Maryland], which carries out
nuclear effects tests on animals and sponsors other studies of nuclear effects. It also
does a lot of detailed research in all phases of the effects of a nuclear explosion,
whether it be on equipment or on people. DNA is responsible for setting up and
carrying out tests to determine the effects of nuclear radiation on new weapons; for
instance, determining how a new warhead is affected by radiation from a nearby nuclear
explosion. The underground testing at the Nevada test site is a major activity. DNA has
a field organization at Albuquerque, New Mexico, that carries out these tests. DNA is
also responsible for maintaining a capability to reinitiate atmospheric testing of nuclear
weapons using the facilities at Johnson Island in the Pacific. So weapons effects testing
is one of its major activities.
The second mission is, in effect, to keep an accounting of all atomic weapons regardless
of which service stores them. No weapon can be moved without orders from the
Defense Nuclear Agency. This provides a centralized accountability for all nuclear
weapons. It also involves inspecting for security and storage on a worldwide basis.
The third mission is the
with what was then the AEC, now the NRC [Nuclear
Regulatory Commission], as to the annual requirements for nuclear weapons for the
services. This is done in coordination with the Joint Chiefs of Staff and the Assistant
to the Secretary of Defense for Atomic Energy. They are the action agencies.
Previous Page
