Lack of Intelligence: America's secret spy satellites are costing you billions . .

U.S. News ^ | 08/11/03 | Douglas Pasternak

[palmer]

They've probably got the same virus that has infected NASA.

[Ben Hecks]

Thanks for the post!

[FairOpinion]

Interesting article, butI think it's very much slanted against the NRO, not mentioning any of their successes. Since it is such a top secret organization, it's hard to know, or rather impossible to know what is really going on. They may need to reassess things, this one program may be in trouble, but I am sure that we need those secret satellites.

They are certainly no substitute for human intelligence and other things, but are an integral part of our intelligence operations.

I doubt that there is a "shift away" from NRO, just that previously all other type of intelligence was pretty much ignored and 9-11 demonstrated that even the best satellite imagery or electronic intercepts, or whatever they do, are no substitute for intelligence on the ground.

[gaspar]

Practically the only person quoted in this article is Jeffrey Richelson, Richelson uses the left-wing and George Washington University sponsored National Security Archives project in an effort to declassify the United States most sensitive secrets. Richelson, the classic hate-America type, is now at work attempting to have declassified material gathered by our intelligence agencies on India, China and French nuclear tests.

Regarding the article itself, the truth is that overhead imagery has been invaluable in thousands of intelligence cases and anyone with a ---- clearance damned well knows it.

[FairOpinion]

Oh, and as for the cost. People always ignore the right comparison: how much does just one terrorist attack cost us vs. the cost of preventing it.

The cost of prevention doesn't even compare to the cost of attacks, especially if we include the direct and indirect costs. I think the 9-11 attacks cost us over $80 B in direct cost and much more in cost to the economy, the airlines, lost travel, and so on.

[fooman]

NRO? What dat?

[Paleo Conservative]

I think the 9-11 attacks cost us over $80 B in direct cost and much more in cost to the economy, the airlines, lost travel, and so on.

I've seen estimates of well over a trillion dollars.

[FairOpinion]

NRO = National Reconnaissance Office.

As far as I know -- from open sources -- they launch super secret satellites which look down on earth and can see objects as small as licence plates, they also have satellites which can and do intercept electronic transmissions, and they also receive the information and process it. I think I read somewhere that there is so much information, that they are weeks behind, and that something that MAY have helped in learning about the 9-11 attacks didn't get processed and translated until after 9-11.

I think there was a book written about them some time ago too.

[risk]

>>>> They are certainly no substitute for human intelligence and other things, but are an integral part of our intelligence operations.

Agreed, this is like saying ABM spending isn't 100% effective, so let's stop it altogether. These kinds of specious arguments always have the same purpose in mind: spend less on the military so America isn't as strong.

[Texas_Jarhead]

All NRO need do to reduce cost is outsource this stuff to India or China. </ sarcasm>

[FairOpinion]

"These kinds of specious arguments always have the same purpose in mind: spend less on the military so America isn't as strong. "

--

Exactly. When I read the article, it smelled like a Dem plant with the very objective you mentioned.

[FairOpinion]

Good grief! I just looked at US News website, and they not only made the bad judgment of publishing this article, but they have this as their cover story, along with similar stories bashing military satellite programs.

The Watchdogs aren't watching

Birds of a (pricey) feather (The Air Force's satellite program is also costly and riddled with problems)

[wideminded]

The thing I find confusing is why spy satellites have seemingly not helped to find the WMD in Iraq. I am assuming that Saddam still had major WMD programs. Yet we don't seem to have a single clue about where he stashed the evidence. The satellites also didn't seem to help find Scuds in Gulf War I. And they seemed to have had problems identifying armored vehicles in the Kosovo war. Apparently they can focus on particular areas at particular times but:

1. We don't seem to have adequate methods for scanning an entire country to search for particular patterns.

2. There seems to be some problem in following a situation continuously to spot changes and movement.

[FairOpinion]

"The thing I find confusing is why spy satellites have seemingly not helped to find the WMD in Iraq. I am assuming that Saddam still had major WMD programs. Yet we don't seem to have a single clue about where he stashed the evidence."

---

Key word "we don't SEEM" to have a clue -- publicly. But I am sure we have watched Saddam take move his weapons to Syria. I think there was one such mention quite a while back, and Powell mentioned once that our satellites saw a chemical weapons test and missile launch is Syria.

As for him moving things around in the country, one truck looks like another from the sky, you can't tell which have WMD-s and which don't. That is why it is essential to combine satellite based intelligence with human intelligence.

[alnitak]

A chap called William E Burrows wrote a book called "Deep Black" about the development of US spy satellites, esp. the Keyhole series (think Hubble, but pointing down).

There is also some fascinating info in his book "This New Ocean", a history of space flight and exploration. The NRO's spy satellites are operated from the Satellite Control facility, a windowless building called the "Big Blue Cube" in Sunnyvale, California.

Perhaps some CA freeper could drive by and take some photos :-) On second thoughts, maybe we should stick to these:

http://209.165.152.119/af_track/bob_afscf_index.html

[alnitak]

3. There is only a small number of satellites and their orbits are known, so it easy to be "somewhere else" when they fly over - they are in Low Earth Orbit, so they cannot continuously monitor everywhere.

[George W. Bush]

The failure of NRO is, in part, spurring the development of long-range robotic spy drones. The newer ones are being designed for stealth, to evade radar and to mask any heat signature. The new visual stealth technology (LCD panels on at least the underside of the plane with cameras on top to relay a picture of the overhead background) will probably debut on these robotic drones. Then they'll be largely invisible even at close range to visual, infrared, and radar.

I expect that NRO will become increasingly irrelevant as the flexibility and capability of robotic drones increase. The cost of the giant spy satellites, their vulnerability to anti-satellite weapons, their reliability problems and their generally predictable orbital schedule (allowing the enemy to hide assets when they pass) are pitted against the lower cost and flexibility of drones.

Drones are the future.

[Publius6961]

Ok you convinced me!

Let's get rid of satellites, the NRO, the NSA, the CIA and the FBI.

Did I forget anything?

Inshallah!!

where are the WMDs dammit!

[Nick Danger]

One of the more brilliant comments I ever heard on this phenomenon came from IBM's Thomas Watson, Jr.

After breifing the press and the securities analysts about IBM's latest reorganization into a number of independent business units, he was aked, "But didn't you have a big reorganization only five years ago where you centralized everything? Would you say now that that was a mistake?"

His answer was that neither centralization nor decentralization was the right answer. The right answer was to periodically shake things up, to break down all the sclerosis, empire, and fiefdoms that would accumulate under either system, by shifting back and forth between them at surprise intervals.

This is essentially what Bush did with Homeland Security. He took a bunch of brain-dead bureacracies that hadn't had an idea in ten years, and ripped everything out by the roots and planted it somewhere else.

Rumsfeld is doing the same thing in the Pentagon. It has the brass hopping mad, but that's the point... break up the fiefdoms, identify fresh talent that was being overlooked, and get some juices flowing again.

The intelligence community probably needs a dose of the same thing, as does the Department of State.