Weapons Labs: Light-Years From the Teaching Mission : Arms research: UC management of Livermore and Los Alamos is an anachronism harmful to university values.

Should a university manage large-scale research and development of nuclear and sophisticated “conventional” weapons during peacetime? This will be the central question before the University of California regents at their September meeting, when they will decide whether to renegotiate the contracts under which the university operates the national weapons laboratories at Los Alamos and Livermore for the federal government.

The laboratories each have about 8,000 employees and a budget of $1 billion a year, of which 75% is used for military purposes and 25% for non-military work, such as energy research. The university’s net management fee is about $7 million a year.

Ever since the end of World War II, contract renewal has taken place every five years rather routinely. This time the situation is different. Last October, a special faculty committee, following an intensive 2 1/2-year study, concluded that UC’s management of the weapons laboratories was inappropriate in peacetime and recommended that it should be phased out in a timely and orderly manner. At the same time, the committee recommended maintaining cooperation between UC and the laboratories in non-military teaching and research.

The faculties of each of the nine campuses have endorsed these conclusions by a convincing overall majority, 64% to 36%. A strong majority of undergraduate and graduate students have supported the same position.

The faculty’s recommendations rest on a number of preliminary findings, including the following:

-- By the terms of the contracts, ultimate control of policies and programs rests (quite properly) with the government. The university thus acts as mere government agent, thereby surrendering its independence, one of its most essential values.

-- Mission-oriented weapons research and development is far removed from the university’s primary missions of teaching and independent research.

-- The university’s full freedom of expression is incompatible with the necessary secrecy and other restrictions applying to weapons work.

-- There are satisfactory alternatives to UC management.

-- Collaboration between UC and the laboratories in non-military areas does not require UC to be the manager. (Currently, most of the laboratories’ collaborations are with universities other than UC.)

It should also be mentioned that, because of environmental pollution which has occurred under UC’s management, the Livermore Laboratory has been placed on the Environmental Protection Agency’s Superfund cleanup list.

Until now, the university administration, recently supported by a committee appointed by President David P. Gardner, has favored renewing the contracts. The president’s committee sees the laboratory management as a public service and, while acknowledging that weapons R&D; is not a “normal” function of a university, seems little troubled by it. The committee paints a very bright picture for the future (unsupported by documentation) in which the laboratories’ weapons work will decrease and the university will exercise substantial control in the non-weapons area. Curiously, it does not see the need for changes in the contracts.

We believe that the committee’s forecast is unrealistic, and if the contracts are renewed without major changes, the present unacceptable state of affairs will continue.

The final decision is in the hands of the regents, who represent the general public of California. We believe that they will respect the position of the university’s faculty and students.

The state and the nation will be much better served if this great public university phases out an anachronistic management function and focuses its efforts on its primary missions of teaching and research, as well as on public service activities appropriate to a university. Weapons in peacetime just do not qualify.