First ’87 U.S. Nuclear Test Jolts Protesters’ Schedule

The United States detonated its first underground nuclear test of 1987 beneath a southern Nevada valley Tuesday, an event that the Soviet Union previously said would trigger an end to Moscow’s 19-month moratorium on weapons testing.

The blast of less than 20 kilotons caught by surprise hundreds of protesters massing here for what has been billed as the largest demonstration ever held at the Nevada Test Site, about 60 miles north of the city.

The protesters had expected the year’s first nuclear explosion to occur Thursday and planned a huge demonstration that day at the test site entrance. Organizers said Tuesday the demonstration will go on as scheduled and accused the U.S. Department of Energy of doctoring its testing schedule in an effort to quash the protest.

“Moving it up this way seems to be a clear attempt to undermine the efforts of American citizens to get their government to take steps ending the nuclear arms race,” said Peter Greenberg, a spokesman for American Peace Test, a Las Vegas-based group coordinating the protests.

Department of Energy spokesman Jim Boyer said protests are among a variety of factors that can determine the date of a test, but denied that the date was changed. “We don’t wake up in the morning and say ‘This is a great day for a test, let’s go out and do one,’ ” he said. “Our schedule is done way, way in advance.”

There was no immediate word from Soviet officials on a resumption in testing there, but the Soviet news agency Tass condemned the U.S. test.

“The President of the United States was given a chance to choose between silence at long last at all nuclear testing ranges in the world and a resumption of nuclear explosions with redoubled force,” Tass said. “In refusing to stop nuclear explosions, President Reagan decided to balance on the brink of the nuclear precipice.”

The Soviet Union stopped nuclear testing Aug. 6, 1985, the 40th anniversary of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, but after several six-month extensions announced that the moratorium would end with the first U.S. test in 1987.

Soviet Viewpoint

Soviet chief arms negotiator Yuli M. Vorontsov renewed that declaration in Geneva on Tuesday, only hours before the American test was announced. “Today is the 574th day since our nuclear test ranges fell silent and they will remain so until the first U.S. test this year,” Vorontsov told a session of the 40-nation Disarmament Conference.

The Reagan Administration has expressed fears that a testing moratorium would pose verification problems and would limit development of the President’s Strategic Defense Initiative, or “Star Wars” program.

DOE spokesman Boyer said the explosion, the 660th announced test at the Nevada site since 1951, was “among the smallest” detonated there. The government does not announce all tests.

Code-named “Hazebrook,” the bomb was touched off at 7:20 a.m. about 700 feet below the surface of Yucca Flat, 86 miles northwest of Las Vegas. Its purpose was classified, Boyer said, and federal officials would say only that its yield was less than 20 kilotons, or the equivalent of 20,000 tons of TNT.

Tests are routinely described by the Department of Energy as less than 20 kilotons or between 20 and 150 kilotons.

Change of Emphasis

The detonation of the blast Tuesday--not Thursday as the demonstrators had expected--put anti-nuclear activists in the awkward position of declaring the test date unimportant, although they had mounted a huge effort keyed to the supposed date.

“This ill-considered decision, while regrettable, is of little consequence,” said Greenberg.

“One U.S. test, more or less, is not particularly noteworthy. The present test will only be of significance if it proves to be the catalyst that restarts Soviet testing after a year and a half moratorium.”

Noteworthy or not, the presumed Thursday test was to draw hundreds of protesters into Las Vegas Tuesday and Wednesday.

Bus caravans and private autos carrying demonstrators were due in from California, Colorado, Oregon and other states. Several big-name anti-nuclear groups, such as Greenpeace and Physicians for Social Responsibility, had pledged their support of the protest.

Focus of Protests

Its focus, the Nevada Test Site, has been the home of nuclear testing since January, 1951, and protests against the facility have grown markedly since the early 1980s.

The test site, at 1,350 square miles in area, is larger than the state of Rhode Island. On Thursday, as they have in prior demonstrations, the protesters plan to gather at the Mercury entrance to the area.

Until now, the largest protest, in September, brought together 500 demonstrators. Organizers expect at least 1,000 Thursday.

Due to appear at the protest are astronomer Carl Sagan, several members of Congress and a rock ‘n’ roll band, protest organizers said. Press releases trumpeting two days of protest events--including nonviolence training and a speech and press conference by Sagan--have fluttered toward reporters in recent weeks.

Rep. Tom Downey (D-N.Y.), one of the congressmen scheduled to appear Thursday, criticized the Administration for conducting Tuesday’s test and warned it will force the Soviet Union and possibly China to resume their testing.

“We see this as a failure by the Administration to recognize that changes are occurring in the Soviet Union,” said Downey.

Some protesters launched into action earlier this week. Test Site security officers Monday afternoon arrested five who had traveled several miles inside the site’s boundaries, heading for “ground zero.” The five were taken to nearby Beatty, Nev., for booking on charges of trespassing, Boyer said.

But the early detonation did deflate the activists somewhat, coming as it did on the heels of another disrupted publicity maneuver.

More than 130 anti-nuclear protesters arrested at the test site in September were due to go on trial in Beatty two weeks ago, and they intended the case to be memorable.

Charges Dismissed

Defense attorneys had solicited testimony from people as diverse as Nobel Peace Prize winner Elie Weisel and a senior scientist from the Lawrence Livermore weapons laboratory in California.

But a week before the trial was to begin, the Nye County district attorney dismissed all charges, citing a technicality and hoping to rid the county of a disruptive public spectacle.

The cancellation forced the protesters to put their efforts into Thursday’s demonstration, which then lost some of its glitter with the Tuesday blast.

On Tuesday, it was left to a half dozen demonstrators to mark the detonation at the site. They stood at a cattle guard marking the site’s boundary line, peacefully waved protest signs--and left.