G’day sher…@dsg59.nad.ford.com

20 Oct 94 20:51, sher…@dsg59.nad.ford.com wrote to All:

 >> For propellant needed in Earth orbit, that implies a fleet
 >> of fuel-tanker rockets ferrying fuel up into orbit.

 snfc> The tanker can be designed so that it is also the core of the Moon
 snfc> ship, an OTV, and provide Earth to LEO transport. That allows the
 snfc> basic design to be amortized over a larger market. This is much
 snfc> harder with a specialized Mars ship.

Then why not make the core of the ship the same as the Mars ship? From Earth
orbit escape to the Moon is 3.2kps delta V. To Mars its 3.6kps. The Moon ship
needs another 2.7 to land, the Mars ship needs only 1 as it can aerobrake.

Therefore have an seperate reusable interplanetary transfer vehicle that can
send cargo to both the Moon and Mars. If as you say, its only fuel, then the
.4kps difference is not important. After acellerating its cargo to the required
velocity we bring it back and reuse it. This way the amortized costs should
even be lower then it would be if it only serviced the Moon. Certainly if you
are sending humans to Mars the Mars ship has to have more room and a bigger
life support system. But the Moon ship need more fuel to land.

ta

Ralph
—
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What follows is a paper that I recently presented at the International
Astronautical Federation conference in Jerusalem.  Copies of the paper are
available via snail mail as well.

Dwayne A. Day
Space Policy Institute
George Washington University
Washington, DC 20052

The History of the National Reconnaissance Office

Abstract
Since 1960, the United States has maintained three national space
programs:  one civilian, one military, and one intelligence.  The military
and intelligence programs account for over half of all U.S. government
spending on space.  A product of the Cold War, their complicated
policy-making apparatus has been veiled in secrecy and virtually unknown
outside official channels.  The dramatically changed geopolitical
environment has precipitated the declassification of the largest element
of the intelligence space program, the National Reconnaissance Office (NRO).

But despite its declassification in September 1992, little has been
revealed about the NRO.  This paper is an attempt to outline a brief
history of the organization itself and to provide an overview of recently
declassified information on the NRO.  For the first time, an evolutionary
chart of the organization can be developed.

Introduction
The National Reconnaissance Office was born in an era of extreme tension,
when the desire to avoid another Pearl Harbor was one of the driving
forces behind the growth of the American intelligence bureaucracy.  Due to
the secrecy of the Soviet Union, overhead reconnaissance, first conducted
by U-2 spyplanes and later by photoreconnaissance satellites, represented
the primary means of getting information about Soviet capabilities.

The Creation of the NRO
Both the CIA and Air Force had competing satellite reconnaissance programs
underway in the late 1950s.  The CIA program, code-named CORONA, was based
upon the use of film-return capsules.  At the time, the technology for
this program was being tested on the Discoverer series of satellites.  The
Air Force program was known as SAMOS and involved the use of radio-relay
of satellite imagery.  It was far more ambitious than the CIA program and
offered far greater returns.  But the technology was totally unproven.  By
early 1960, both programs were in trouble.  The Discoverer capsules were
failing regularly and it was not clear why.  The SAMOS program was running
into technical hurdles which it could not overcome.
On February 5, 1960, George Kistiakowsky, head of the President’s Science
Advisory Committee, met with national security advisor Gordon Gray to
discuss the satellite reconnaissance program.  Kistiakowsky informed Gray
that he felt the Air Force’s program was "much too ambitious" and that
emphasis should instead be placed upon the CIA’s program.   On May 26,
Kistiakowsky met with Gray, Eisenhower, and Eisenhower’s staff secretary,
General Andrew Goodpaster, to discuss the problems with both programs.
Eisenhower instructed Goodpaster to draft a directive for a study of the
issue.  Eisenhower clearly wanted Kistiakowsky in charge of the study and
told Goodpaster to clear it with Secretary of Defense Thomas Gates, but
ignored Kistiakowsky’s suggestion that Gates set  up such a group.  Gray
also informed him that the CIA had no authority to establish "military
requirements" in the intelligence area.
On June 2, 1960,  Kistiakowsky mentioned to General Bernard Schriever,
head of the Air Research and Development Command, that he was seeking a
directive from Eisenhower to study the intelligence satellite issue.  
Later, on June 7, General Goodpaster showed Kistiakowsky a draft memo for
a study that would be limited to the Air Force’s SAMOS project.  
Kistiakowsky was unhappy at the restrictive nature of this directive,
since it would not allow him to look at the military requirements or the
management structure needed to manage space reconnaissance.  Apparently,
Kistiakowsky was able to obtain a broader mandate and to conduct a more
wide-ranging study.  But Goodpaster did not want him to look beyond the
narrow technical issues.  
Little is known about the specifics of the negotiations, but apparently
Gates authorized the study group and named Kistiakowsky as its chair,
which is what Eisenhower wanted all along.  The study included Assistant
Secretary of the Air Force Joseph Charyk and John H. Rubel, Deputy
Director of the Defense Directorate of Research and Engineering (DDRE).
Because Kistiakosky’s opinion of SAMOS was well-known, many in the Air
Force feared that the result of the study would be to recommend turning
SAMOS over to the CIA entirely.  Charyk, in particular, wanted to obtain
Air Force control of satellite reconnaissance.  But Kistiakosky assured
him that the control of the program would be higher up, at the level of
the Office of the Secretary of Defense, and that it would involve CIA
participation.
The study itself remains classified, but it is known that the three
recommended creation of a joint Air Force-CIA organization to manage U.S.
space reconnaissance efforts.  It was to be known as the National
Reconnaissance Office.  The recommendation was presented to Eisenhower in
a National Security Council meeting on August 25, 1960.  The committee
recommended that the Secretary of the Air Force be placed in charge of the
NRO and that the line of authority be straight from him to the officers in
charge of the satellite programs.
The following day, Eisenhower issued a presidential directive calling for
the establishment of such an office.   Projects then underway in both the
Air Force and CIA were to be incorporated into the new organization.
As one would expect, it took many months for the details of such an
organization to be worked out.  The NRO apparently did not formally enter
into existence until September 6, 1961, when Joseph V. Charyk, promoted to
the position of Under Secretary of the Air Force, was named its first
director.   The decision to name the Under Secretary of the Air Force as
head of the NRO was made sometime between the NSC meeting and the formal
establishment of the office.  The CIA’s Deputy Director of Research (soon
changed to the Deputy Director of Science and Technology) was assigned the
task of Deputy Director of the NRO.

The Struggle for Control of the NRO
The creation of the organization was an uneasy alliance between the CIA
and the Air Force, and fights over control of programs ensued.  These
fights occurred on many levels–over control of individual satellite
projects as well as larger organizational issues over how the product
would be treated.
The struggle for control of satellite imagery between the CIA and the Air
Force was more than simply a turf battle.  Both organizations had
legitimate interests in controlling this newly developing field.  The Air
Force, led by General Bernard Schriever, argued strongly that satellite
intelligence should serve the interests of the warfighter and that the
military needed to be in control to define these interests.  The CIA, on
the other hand, argued that satellite intelligence provided the primary,
and often the only, means of obtaining information from the Soviet Union.
In this argument the CIA was somewhat assisted by its own misfortune,
since U-2 overflights of the Soviet Union ended after Gary Powers was shot
down on May 1, 1960.  The sudden stop in photographic intelligence coming
out of the Soviet Union, coupled with the continuing Soviet attacks on
reconnaissance flights on the periphery of the U.S.S.R., strengthened the
CIA’s case that satellite intelligence had to be jealously guarded.
But the success of this argument had a cost and that cost was that the
extensive secrecy erected around the intelligence satellite program meant
that its products often did not reach people who would benefit from them.
For instance, General John Keegan, who was in charge of Air Force
Intelligence in the early 1970s, was stunned to learn that Strategic Air
Command bomber crews were not cleared to view photographs of targets they
were assigned to attack in the event of a nuclear war.  Keegan did much to
open up the product of overhead intelligence to more users, but this still
remained quite limited until the late 1970s, when it was apparently once
again opened up to more users.
By late 1989, apparently as a result of the creation of the position of
Deputy Director for Military Support, third in command under the Deputy
Director, even greater access was granted to satellite imagery.  By the
end of the war, the products were available on a far wider scale than they
had been before the war, to the point where anyone with a "Secret"
clearance and the need to know could gain access to satellite photographs.
 Much of the compartmentalization of the products of satellite imagery
have now been eliminated.
But while the products were opened up to the warfighter, control of the
systems was still primarily determined by strategic intelligence concerns.
 Most of the requirements and the programs themselves were designed and
developed within the CIA, and the Air Force remained the lesser partner,
despite the fact that the NRO was officially headed by the Under Secretary
of the Air Force.

Part 2 follows in the next post.

DDay
SPI

–
Dwayne A. Day
Space Policy Institute
George Washington University
Washington, DC 20052

The History of the NRO (Part 2)

The NRO Charter
The original charter of the organization, which probably went into effect
with Charyk’s assumption of the Directorship, remains classified.  The
responsibilities of the NRO were again formally established in June 14,
1962 in a still-classified Department of Defense Directive.  They were
rewritten in March 1964.  This Directive, dated March 27, 1964, outlines
the general organization and responsibility of the NRO, and describes its
relationships with other government agencies.  This directive apparently
remained in place for at least the next fifteen years, since an October 3,
1979 amendment refers to the original DoD Directive of March 27, 1964.   A
1992 Freedom of Information Act request for the current charter of the NRO
produced this document, so it is apparently still in effect.  The charter
is included as Appendix A.

Organizational Structure of the NRO
It is not clear how the early NRO was laid out.  From the beginning it may
have simply been the Under Secretary of the Air Force and the CIA Deputy
Director for Science and Technology and below them the individual
satellite program heads.  However, at some point the NRO developed its
rather unique "Program" structure.  These consisted of "Program A," the
Air Force program office, and "Program B," the CIA program office.
Program A was the Air Force Office of Special Programs, which had
developed out of the SAMOS program office.  Program B was officially
headed by the CIA’s Deputy Director of Science and Technology, who was
also the Deputy Director of the NRO.  But apparently in day-to-day
operations Program B was really run by the CIA’s Director of Development
and Engineering.
Some time in the early to mid 1960s, a third program office was added to
the NRO’s structure.  Labled "Program C," this was the Navy’s attempt to
get into the satellite intelligence game.  But the Navy program apparently
never really advanced for quite some time.  Various Navy proposals,
including a space-based radar system for locating enemy ships at sea, were
struck down.  Program C continued to exist, first housed apparently in a
branch of the Navy known as the Navy Space Project of the Naval
Electronics System Command, or "NAVALEX," and later in the Space and Naval
Warfare Systems Command, under the Space Technical Directorate at the
Naval Research Laboratory.  But it wasn’t until the second half of the
sixties when the Navy was finally successful in arguing in favor of
developing a passive ocean surveillance system.  For many years this
remained a limited mission for the service and the CIA and Air Force
continued to dominate the NRO structure.

The NRO and Airborne Reconnaissance
By the mid 1960s the NRO was restructured again and a fourth program
office was added.  This was appropriately enough labled "Program D" and
was run by the Air Force.   Program D had responsibility for U-2 and SR-71
Blackbird reconnaissance.  The other classified airborne reconnaissance
platform, the A-12 (which had actually predated the SR-71 program), was
operated by the CIA until 1968 and probably fell under the control of
Program B.  The NRO had been responsible for U-2 overflights during the
Cuban missile crisis in 1962, but it wasn’t until at least several years
later that Program D was created to control Air Force airborne
reconnaissance.   In 1969 a decision was made to turn airborne
reconnaissance over to the Strategic Air Command and thus Program D was
disbanded.
When the NRO was finally declassified in 1992, the press release which
announced it stated "The mission of the NRO is to ensure that the U.S. has
the technology and spaceborne and airborne assets needed to acquire
intelligence world-wide, including to support such functions as monitoring
of arms control agreements, indications and warning and the planning and
conduct of military operations." (emphasis added).   During the 1980s
there was much speculation that the United States was developing a new
hypersonic reconnaissance aircraft to replace the SR-71 Blackbird.   No
such aircraft has appeared and reports of mystrerious sonic booms and
unusual contrails have diminished in recent years.  It is more likely that
the NRO was responsible at least in part for the CIA’s unmanned aerial
vehicle program before the creation of the Defense Airborne Reconnaissance
Office in November 1993.  This program consists of different types of
UAV’s classified as "Tier 1," "Tier 2," "Tier 2+," etc.  "Tier 3," also
called the Advanced Airborne Reconnaissance System, referred to a large
stealth UAV with a long loiter time over its target.  The Tier 3 UAV was
originally supposed to have a wingspan of 150 feet and be capable of
loitering over its target for up to eight hours.  It was cancelled due to
its price tag some time in either 1991 or 1992 and has now been replaced
by a smaller version known as "Tier 3-."   It is likely that the NRO had
some hand in the development of this vehicle as well as the other programs
since the most likely place to manage this procurement in the CIA is
within the NRO.

NRO Restructuring After the Cold War
Most of the early photoreconnaissance satellite programs developed by the
NRO were apparently handled within Program B at the CIA.  In fact, the Air
Force apparently did not make strong inroads into the satellite
reconnaissance field until it developed the close-look satellite series
which was first launched in July 1963.  The Air Force also apparently
managed many of the early signals intelligence satellites fielded by the
NRO.  The two Programs constantly competed for the development and
management of satellite programs throughout their history.

No information exists on the NRO’s organization for the next two decades.
However, several recently declassified documents do indicate that the NRO
came under increasing criticism in the late 1980s.  On July 3, 1989,
Director of Central Intelligence William H. Webster and Secretary of
Defense Richard B. Cheney sent a letter to Senator David L. Boren,
Chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence.  In the letter
they detailed a number of changes they planned on making to the NRO.
These changes included:  forming a Joint Senior Advisory Board (later
renamed the National Reconnaissance Review Board) to advise the DCI,
Secretary of Defense, and Director of NRO on NRO issues; designating the
CIA’s Director of Development and Engineering as Director of Program B
(essentially formalizing the command structure that already existed); and
establishing within the NRO a Deputy Director for Command Support (later
renamed the Deputy Director for Military Support) to improve NRO support
to the military.
In February 1990, Webster and Cheney sent Boren a report completed in
January concerning a restructuring of the NRO.  This report included
recommendations from the Director of the NRO, Martin Faga, that at least
part of the NRO’s wide-ranging facilities be collocated at the same site,
but that no major reorganization take place.  Webster and Cheney stated:

"Additionally, we reaffirm our previous conviction, supported by the
DNRO’s current reassessment, that a business-line structure, that would
attempt to give each Program Office the responsibility for a unique
mission area, is neither a viable or effective restructure alternative.
We want to preserve a beneficial degree of competition between the Program
Offices and the ability to apply the resources of all three Program
Offices, as appropriate, to a problem.  Competition is also vital to
sustaining the motivation of the Program Offices and our ability to
develop creative solutions to intelligence requirements."

The overall NRO management structure, consisting of Programs A, B and C
remained unchanged until 1992, when, apparently bowing to continuing
Congressional pressure, the organization was overhauled and reorganized,
possibly giving each of the Program Offices responsibility for a unique
mission, as mentioned in Webster and Cheney’s letter.  An outline of the
changes in the NRO’s organizational structure is included as Appendix B.
The officially declassified organizational structure of the NRO today is
included as Appendix C.

Conclusion
Despite the declassification of the NRO, little information has been
revealed of its early history.  The number of documents released as a
result of Freedom of Information Act requests can be counted on two hands.
 To date, the original charter of the NRO has yet to be declassified.
Hopefully, with continued effort by historians, more will be revealed of
the early history of this extremely important organization.

Acknowledgement
The author would like to acknowledge the assistance of Jeffrey Richelson,
who provided some of the information on the organizational structure of
the NRO included in this paper.

(the limitations of this software prevent me from posting it in the same
form as on my computer and I don’t want to go in and manually include all
the footnote numbers, but I am including the footnotes for those of you
interested in the sources for this paper as well as additional comments)

Footnotes

  George Kistiakowsky, A Scientist in the White House, Harvard University
Press, 1976, p. 245.
  Ibid., p. 336.
  Ibid., p. 344.
  Ibid., p. 347.  Kistiakowsky may also be referring to the CIA’s
satellite program when discussing the SAMOS program, since he makes no
separate mention of the CIA program by name.
  Ibid., pp. 387-388.
  Presidential Directive/NSC-55, "Intelligence Special Access Programs:
Establishment of the APEX Program," January 10, 1980.  This document was
intended to end the special access system for classified information and
replace it with a new system known as APEX.  It refers to a document
establishing special access programs as a "Presidential memorandum of
August 26, 1960."
  Vincent Kiernan, "Faga:  Cutting Defense Threatens Crucial Spy Satellite
Capabilities," Space News, March 8-14, 1993, p. 10.
  Usually, the Under Secretary of the Air Force was also the Director of
NRO, but this was not always the case.  Charyk served from September 6,
1961 to March 1, 1963.  He was succeeded by Brockway McMillian, who served
until October 1, 1965.  McMillian was followed by Alexander H. Flax, who
served until March 11, 1969 and held the title of Assistant Secretary of
the Air Force for Research and Development.  On March 17, 1969, John L.
McLucas took over the position and served until December 20, 1973.  James
W. Plummer then served until June 28, 1976.  Thomas C. Reed took the
position on August 9, 1976 and served until April 7, 1977.  All held the
position of Under Secretary of the Air Force.  For almost three months the
NRO lacked a Director until the Under Secretary of the Air Force, Hans
Mark, took over on August 3, 1977 and served until October 8, 1979.  Mark
was later promoted to Secretary of the Air Force and took the Directorship
with him.  He was followed by Robert J. Hermann, who was Assistant
Secretary of the Air Force for Research, Development, and Logistics, who
served until August 2, 1981.  The Under Secretary of the Air Force,
Antonia Chayes, either knew little of reconnaissance satellites or was
denied the position because she was female.  Hermann was replaced by
Edward C. Aldridge Jr., who served from August 3, 1981, to December 16,
1988–the longest time of any single director.  Aldridge also started out
as Under Secretary of the Air Force, but later became Secretary of the Air
Force, and like Mark, taking the Directorship of the NRO with him.  Martin
Faga took over Directorship of the NRO on September 26, 1989, serving
until March 5, 1993.  Faga was the first person to be given the
unclassified title of Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Space.
What followed then was an extended period during which the NRO was without
a Director.  The longtime Deputy Director, Jimmie Hill, took over
responsibilities of the Director until a new person could be found.  In
May 1994 Jeffrey K. Harris, who had risen up through the ranks of the NRO
and headed one of its major satellite projects, took over as head of the
secretive organization.
  This amendment, originally classified "Top Secret," states that the NRO
shall:  "Work directly with the Defense Space Operations Committee (DSOC)
on policy, budgets, requirements and programs.  The Defense Space
Operations Committee is the principal advisory body to the Secretary of
Defense for the National Reconnaissance Program.  (Its members include the
Deputy Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Review; the Assistant
Secretary of Defense for Communications, Command, Control and
Intelligence; and the Secretary of the Air Force who will be the Chairman
of the Committee.)  The Director shall respond to tasks approved by the
Defense Space Operations Committee and will keep the DSOC informed, on a
regular basis, on the status of projects of the National Reconnaissance
Office."  Harold Brown, Secretary of Defense, Memorandum for Distribution,
"National Reconnaissance Office," October 3, 1979.  Contained in the
Documentary History Collection at the Space Policy Institute.
  Department of Defense Directive, Number TS 5105.23, "National
Reconnaissance Office," March 27, 1964.  Contained in the Documentary
History Collection at the Space Policy Institute.
  Originally this was the Office of Special Activities, then the Deputy
Director of Research and then the Deputy Director of Science and
Technology.  Jeffrey Richelson, The U.S. Intelligence Community, 2nd
Edition, Ballinger Publishing Company, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1989, pp.
26-29.
  Ibid.
  National Reconnaissance Office, "NRO Management Restructure – 1960′s,"
n.d. (declassified in September 1994).
  Memorandum of MONGOOSE Meeting Held on Thursday, October 4, 1962,"
October 4, 1962, contained in: The Cuban Missile Crisis, 1962, Project
Editor:  Laurence Chang, National Security Archive & Chadwyck-Healey,
Alexandria, VA, 1990.
  U.S. Department of Defense, "Memorandum for Correspondents," No 264-M,
September 18, 1992.
  The code-name "Aurora" has been applied to this aircraft.  However, it
has now been revealed that this code-name was actually applied to the
funding for the competition for the B-2 bomber.  See Ben R. Rich and Leo
Janos, Skunk Works:  A Personal Memoir of My Years at Lockheed, Little,
Brown and Company, Boston, 1994, pp. 309-310.
  Neil Munro, "Taking Off:  A New Airborne Reconnaissance Office Hits the
Pentagon," Armed Forces Journal International, June 1994, p. 46.  Also:
David A. Fulghum, "Secret Flying Wing Slated for Rollout," Aviation Week &
Space Technology, September 19, 1994, p. 27.
  William H. Webster, Director of Central Intelligence, and Richard B.
Cheney, Secretary of Defense, to the Honorable David L. Boren, Chairman,
Select Committee on Intelligence, United States Senate, February 26, 1990.
 This letter was declassified in August 1994 as a result of the
controversy surrounding the declassification of the Westfields NRO
headquarters complex.
  Ibid., p. 2.
  Another of the new revelations to emerge from the Congressional hearings
in August 1994 was the NRO’s seal.  This seal was developed after the
decision was made to declassify the organization in 1992.  It was approved
by former NRO Director Martin Faga in February or March 1993 and
registered with the Institute of Heraldry.  It is not clear if there was
another, classified, NRO seal before this one.

–
Dwayne A. Day
Space Policy Institute
George Washington University
Washington, DC 20052

Hi all,
   I am doing research on the cons of the space program. I was wondering
if anybody knew where I could get some info on this. I was thinking that
the budget for NASA might help. If anybody has NASA’s Budget 1960-present
it would be greatly appreciated. E-mail me because I don’t read this
group often.
 Thanks in advance,
-Ari Gold o…@indirect.com

>Or, more precisely it is a social problem when taxpayers’ money fuels this
>deplorable situation. If the situation were different–self sufficient
>persons making life style choices–it would fall into the category of "None
>of My Business." The reality is quite different however–billions of tax
>dollars assisting the expansion of terrible social pathologies.

let’s discuss ‘billions of tax dollars……..pathologies.’  The only
‘pathology’ I see subsidized by billions of tax dollars are the
tremendous subsidies recieved by US coporations.  The gov’t pays for
corporate advertizing overseas, it allows corporations to deduct
practically everything — 83% of taxes are paid by individuals, just
17 by corps (in 1960 it was 61-39)…..last year DOD paid defense
corps $300 million for ‘restructuring’ costs based on putative savings
on paper in the future.  According to the OMB, oil corporations have
paid no net taxes since certain exemptions were instituted in 1910
or 1912.  At the hieght of the energy crisis in 1975 oil companies
got $3.5 billion in tax exemptions alone.  I agree we should discuss
welfare, but lets get ALL the welfare out on the table, including
welfare for large business conglonmerations.
Meanwhile, due to environmental pathogens, sperm counts among US
males today are half of waht they were in 1930.  better loosen
that underway, boys…..

pardon, that underwear, boys.

Michael A. Turton                "The Gods are indifferent to our pleasure, but
tur…@rpi.edu               they are eager for our punishment"   — Tacitus

Greetings:

A question arose after looking at a previous thread:  Why not place a
hydrophonic farm(S) at the poles, where sunlight is constant and free for 6
months out of the year?  A small and generally manageable nuke could be
used to run the place, and I don’t think the CO2 would be a hugh problem
(particularly if the experiences with Biosphere in Arizona are any
indication).  Anyway, flames or other reasonable opinions are welcome.

Bruce
"Opinions are mine, and are not those of PNL or Battelle.  So there."

> them on the moon or mars (because of gravity it would be really hard
> to provide cosmic ray shielding and let in natural sunlight over large
> areas unless the domes were at least a couple of miles high), or, at best,

You use chevron shields, pretty much the same thing you would do on an
O’Neill cylinder or a Stanford Torus.

> Hm, read somewhere that the majority of private owners of airplanes learned
> to fly during WW II as USAF conscripts…is this correct? There are far more
> pilots per capita in the US than in Western Europe, but the number is
> decreasing now.

I soloed in 1984 and was driven out of the air by rising costs by 1986 when I
and my friends were forced to sell off our Cessna 172 (N3892S. If anyone ever
runs across her, give her my love!) The majority of those costs were insurance
and regulatory ones. The last time I flew, was two years ago when I visited
Pittsburgh and went up with my old instructor. It was sad to see. AGC Upper

West parking areas have been drastically cut back in size, and even at that
are mostly empty. In 1984 you practically had to get on a waiting list to
get a space when there were twice the tie down spaces. And people were already
complaining about the government trying to drive them out of the air. After
all, flying is a rich man’s hobby, so let’s tax and regulate and milk it for
all we can. And pilots are a minority, and no one will notice. Well, those
a******s in congress have created a self fulfilling situation. They drove
costs up to the point where private ownership is pretty damned hard unless
you have a great deal of cash. I watched it happen, I watched AOPA fight

against and lose a lot of the battles against regulation; I watched the
insurance problem grow into night mare proportions for the manufacturers…
And I watched General Aviation in america die. Well, not entirely. It’s still
there, but it ain’t what it used to be.

An interesting factoid: my former instructor told me that the used aircraft
from america were being bought up and ferried over here (Europe). Apparently
the insurance climate over here is not quite as severe, although the
fuel prices are far worse. US avgas is under $2/gallon, probably more like
$1.50…. I think I’m paying more like $5 gallon here in Belfast for low
octane petrol. Or was when I could still afford to keep a car on the road…

I finally received my copy of Brian Johnson’s book on the Soviet lunar program
-"only" had to wait three months after posting the cheque!! But it is a good
book, or perhaps "booklet" is a better word since it is only 40 pages. But you
do get an excellent overview of the Luna unmanned program, L-1 (aka Zond or
Soyuz-L) manned circumlunar project and the N-1/L-3 manned moonlanding program.
Johnson describes the same topics as Phil Clark and Ralph Gibbons did in
a series of articles in QUEST magazine last year. Those interested in the
Soviet moon program really need to get both as they complement each other.
The QUEST articles contain more illustrations and fascinating speculations
on the little-known "rival" UR-700/LK-700 project proposed by Chelomei. But
Johnson’s book describes the L-3M proposal that eventually succeeded L-3
after Apollo had won the race to the Moon – for some reason, QUEST chose to
virtually ignore it.
—
COSMOS BOOKS (the publisher) also sell other publications on the Russian space
program, including COSMONAUTICS; "a colorful history on the Soviet/Russian
space program". There is also a fascinating series of books on the Mir space
station titled SPACE STATION HANDBOOK:MIR USER’S MANUAL and THE COSMONAUT
TRAINING HANDBOOK. Six 3-page fold-out diagrams of all station modules,
diagrams on descent/docking sequences, crew training, station components,
operations, computer systems, electrical systems, environmental/thermal
control, guidance/navigation, communications, payloads, crew health & man
systems . . . PHEW!! Sounds like it is all there. Each volume costs $25.
Certainly a "must" if you are interested in space colonies or missions to Mars;
Mir is our only permanent space outpost at the moment and a lot of its systems
will be used on the International Space Station too.
—
Finally a word of CAUTION. I mentioned that 1/200 scale models of the N-1 and
Energia/Buran are available as well. These appear to be little more than
expensive toys ($200!) of poor quality, they might be made "at Baikonur by the
Baikonur engineers using the same materials used on the launch vehicles"
but do not seem to be very accurate. The Energia looks more like an
inflated condom than the real thing, for example:-)  

For more information, contact:

Cosmos Books
4200 Wisconsin Avenue, N.W.
Suite 106-381
Washington D.C.
20016-2141
(Fax:202-363-0958)
(Tel:800-819-8051 or 202-828-1954)

MARCU$

Here’s a letter I just posted to ‘Space News’ regarding an article where
they interviewed officials at Baikonur, who said that things were tough
and getting tougher but that they were holding on.

     Letter to Editor, Space News, re Oct 10-16, 1994, p. 7 article,
     "Cosmodrome’s Operators Cite Deteriorating Conditions".

     The latest reports from Baikonur confirm the continuing decay of the
     Russian launch facility upon which the International Space Station
     Alpha is utterly dependent. Since nobody has ever before witnessed
the
     death of such a high-tech facility, it’s impossible to judge how
close
     to collapse Baikonur is, from a few years down to a few hours. But
     pretenses that it is a "world class facility" (Al Gore), or that the
     Russians can magically tough it out on their own, are poor
substitutes
     for sound planning for rescuing it (if possible) and doing without it
     (if needed). So far, the American side seems determined to "wish
     things right", "maintain an air of positiveness", and keep its head
     planted deeply in Kazakhstan sands.

     Baikonur’s future faces a "triple threat" of hardware, social, or
     political catastrophe. Launch site equipment collapse (such as the
     fire in the Soyuz assembly building earlier this year) remains likely
     for equipment which has not been replaced or properly maintained for
     years. Sudden social collapse, as crucial human resources flee the
     grim living (and dying) conditions in Leninsk, looms. And political
     collapse, as Kazakhstan goes the way of all other former Central
Asian
     Soviet republics and becomes a "steppe Bosnia", may be staved off for
     the moment only by the force on one single personality, who is not
     immortal. Since these realities conflict with the rosy visions spun
in
     Washington for political purposes, officials just look the other way.

     Politics aside, we must never forget the sufferings of those Baikonur
     workers who are still grimly holding on, enduring hardships in order
     to keep their (and our) "road into space" open. They may well
succeed,
     by sheer willpower alone, but on sober consideration it’s clear that
     people under such unremitting stresses would never elsewhere be
     trusted to safely operate a nuclear power plant, or an air traffic
     control system, or nuclear armaments — the chances of inattention,
of
     resentment-born sabotage, of fatigue-induced errors are much too
     great. If our space program future truly is irrevocably linked to
     their uncertain capacity to endure and survive, then a massive relief
     effort — even if funded by individuals and space businesses — is
     needed now, this winter.

     James Oberg
     Rt 2 Box 350
     Dickinson, Texas 77539
     voice/fax 713-337-2838
     e-mail <jamesob…@AOL.COM>