Re: New Spy Satellite Debated On Hill

From: Revision (k_at_tdot-com)
Date: 12/13/04 

Date: Mon, 13 Dec 2004 04:00:44 -0600

"Scott Hedrick"
>An almost $10G satellite is fucking aburd.
I mean no *** even if it *is* yer brother-in-law. 

---
December 12, 2004  NY Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/12/politics/12spy.html?ei=5065&en=38d2c542cd65d913&ex=1103432400&partner=MYWAY&pagewanted=print&position=
New Spy Plan Said to Involve Satellite System
By DOUGLAS JEHL
WASHINGTON, Dec. 11 - A highly classified intelligence program that the
Senate Intelligence Committee has tried unsuccessfully to kill is a new
$9.5 billion spy satellite system that could take photographs only in
daylight hours and in clear weather, current and former government
officials say.
The cost of the system, now the single biggest item in the intelligence
budget, and doubts about its usefulness have spurred a secret
Congressional battle. The fight over the future of a system whose
existence has not yet been officially disclosed first came to light this
week.
In public remarks, senators opposed to the program have described it only
as an enormously expensive classified intelligence acquisition program
without specifically describing it as a satellite system.
Outside experts said on Thursday that it was almost certainly a new spy
satellite program that would duplicate existing reconnaissance
capabilities. The Washington Post first reported the total cost and
precise nature of the program on Saturday, saying that it was for a new
generation of spy satellites being built by the National Reconnaissance
Office that are designed to orbit undetected.
The officials would not say how many satellites were planned as part of
the program, but they said the system included the satellites themselves,
their launchers and the technology necessary to transmit the images they
collected.
Some current and former government officials expressed concern that the
disclosure of the existence of the highly classified program might be
harmful to national security. They said Congressional Republicans were
questioning whether the public hints first dropped by four Senate
Democrats opposed to the program, including John D. Rockefeller IV of
West Virginia, might have represented a violation of Congressional rules.
Mr. Rockefeller's office said earlier in the week that the senator had
consulted with security officials before making a carefully worded
statement on the Senate floor that described the classified program as
unnecessary and too expensive, but did not identify it further.
But other officials said the depth and intensity of opposition to the
program, expressed behind closed doors for more than two years by Senate
Republicans as well as Democrats, had finally tipped the balance between
secrecy and candor in a way that has led to an extraordinary disclosure.
Among the champions of the program, officials said, has been Porter J.
Goss, the new director of central intelligence, who served until this
summer as the Republican chairman of the House Intelligence Committee.
But critics, including Democrats and Republicans on the Senate
Intelligence Committee, have questioned whether any new satellite system
could really evade detection by American adversaries and whether its
capabilities would improve on those already in existence or in
development.
"These satellites would be irrelevant to current threats, and this money
could be much better spent on the kind of human intelligence needed to
penetrate closed regimes and terrorist networks," said a former
government official with direct knowledge of the program. "There are
already so many satellites in orbit that our adversaries already assume
that just about anything done in plain sight is watched, so it's hard to
believe a new satellite, even a stealthy one, could make much of a
difference."
A Central Intelligence Agency spokesman declined to comment about the
existence of any classified satellite program, as did the White House. A
spokeswoman for Mr. Rockefeller, who is the top Democrat on the Senate
Intelligence Committee, also declined comment. A compromise between the
Senate and House that was approved in both chambers this week authorized
spending on the program for another year. Money for the program had
earlier been allocated as part of a defense appropriations bill that
reflected strong support for the system among members of the House and
Senate Appropriations Committees.
But Mr. Rockefeller and other Democrats on the Senate intelligence panel,
including Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon, said in calling attention to the
issue this week that they would seek much more aggressively to scuttle
the program next year.
The idea that the disputed program might be a stealth satellite program
was proposed in an interview on Thursday by John Pike, a satellite expert
who heads Globalsecurity.org, a defense and intelligence database. The
existence of the first stealth satellite, launched under a program known
as Misty, was first reported by Jeffrey T. Richelson in his 2001 book,
"The Wizards of Langley: Inside the C.I.A.'s Directorate of Science and
Technology." Mr. Richelson said the first such satellite was launched
from the space shuttle Atlantis in March 1990.
A second Misty satellite is believed to have been launched in the late
1990's and is still in operation, current and government officials said.
The program now in dispute would represent the third generation of the
stealth satellite program, and is being built primarily by the Lockheed
Martin Corporation, the officials said. The company has refused to
comment on its involvement in any classified programs.
To date, the cost of the program has been in the neighborhood of hundreds
of millions of dollars a year, the officials said. But they said that the
overall price tag had recently soared, from initial estimates of about $5
billion to the new $9.5 billion figure, and that annual outlays would
increase sharply in coming years if the program is kept alive.
"Right now, it's not too late to stop this program, before billions of
dollars are spent on something that may never get off the ground and may
add nothing to our security," the former government official said.
In his public comments, Mr. Wyden did not mention Lockheed, but he
expressed concern about the rapidly escalating cost of the satellite
program and the way in which the contractor was selected.
The mere existence of the National Reconnaissance Office was not publicly
acknowledged until the early 1990's, and it remains the most secretive
among American intelligence agencies. Its main responsibility is building
and launching spy satellites to collect images and intercept
communications for the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency and the
National Security Agency.
There are many kinds of reconnaissance satellites, and some of them have
the capability, through infrared and radar technology, to acquire images
at night and in cloudy weather. Officials have suggested that new
technologies may also be able to detect the presence of objects
underground. The sharpest images come from photo reconnaissance, but
those satellites can generally operate successfully only during the day
and in sunny weather.
Officials critical of the new stealth satellite program now in dispute
said it would have only photo reconnaissance capability, though with high
resolution. The secret nuclear programs in North Korea and Iran are
widely believed to be developed underground or otherwise out of view of
photo reconnaissance satellites.
"These days, you really have to assume that if there's anything we see in
North Korea, it's something they intend for us to see," said Mr. Pike,
the private satellite expert.