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D 

CRITICAL TO US SECURITY: 

THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE GAMBIT AND HEXAGON 

SATELLITE RECONNAISSANCE SYSTEMS 

GERALD K. HAINES 

NRO HISTORIAN 

1997 

Handle Via BYEMAN 

Control System 

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25X1 
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TABLE OF CONTENTS 

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 4 

~CLc1t~rOUI1(l • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •• 9 

G.AMB.IT • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •• 14 

Origins of the Program • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •• 14 

GAMBIT Development • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •• 18 

Getting Pictures • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •• 21 

Problems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 25 

First Launch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 35 

Continuing Problems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40 

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GAMBIT-l Su.nunary • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •• 45 

The Development of GAMBIT-3. • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •• 45 

GAMBIT-3 Becomes Operational • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •• 52 

A Chance Encounter • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •• 56 

The Block II Program • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •• 56 

A Fully Mature System. • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •• 58 

Su.nunary. . . • • . . . . . . . . . . . . . • . • . . . • .. 59 

HEXAGON. • • • • • • • • • • . • • • • • • • • • • • • • •• 61 

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 61 

Origins. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 62 

Project FULCRUM. • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •• 65 

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HEXAGON Development ••••••••••• • • • • • • • •• 74 

The Sensor subsystem • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •• 76 

The Mapping Camera Module. • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •• 80 

The Satellite Vehicle. • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •• 81 

Attempts to Cancel HEXAGON • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •• 84 

One More Challenge for Perkin-Elmer. • • • • • • • • • • •• 87 

Launch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 89 

A Change in Management • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •• 94 

Swmnary 95 

Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 99 

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Critical to us Security: 

The Development of the GAMBIT and HEXAGON Satellite 

Reconnaissance Systems 

Introduction 

Since the early 1960s, US policymakers have come to rely 

increasingly on photo-reconnaissance satellite imagery for timely 

and accurate intelligence. Photo-reconnaissance satellites and 

the information they provide have become virtually indispensable 

to the US Intelligence Community and its intelligence 

assessments. Developed, operated, and managed by the National 

Reconnaissance Office (NRO) , these satellite systems sparked a 

revolution in intelligence collection. Operating in a crisis 

atmosphere, the NRO forged a unique working partnership with US 

private industry to design and build these new satellite systems. 

The NRO/industry partnership drove space reconnaissance 

technology beyond current limits. It made possible a new 

generation of photo-reconnaissance technologies that resulted in 

the acquisition of never-before-seen, detailed intelligence data 

for US officials. 

CORONA, the first US reconnaissance satellite program ushered in 

this new era in intelligence. A stop gap film recovery system, 

CORONA focused primarily on the Soviet Union and other denied 

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areas. CORONA imagery provided US decision makers with vital 

information on Soviet weapons development, order-of-battle, and 

its nuclear program. During the 1960s, CORONA satellites were 

this nation's primary search system. 1 Covering wide swaths of 

the Soviet Union, CORONA cameras swept the Soviet land mass for 

signs of missile development and nuclear testing activity. 

Although its contribution to US intelligence was "virtually 

immeasurable," CORONA imagery also had limitations. In 1961, for 

example, it could resolve no object smaller than 10-15 feet. US 

photointerpreters and US planners needed, and demanded, higher 

resolution imagery for their intelligence estimates relating to 

Soviet weapons systems and target identifications. 

To fill this gap, DNRO, Joseph Charyk, pushed the development of 

a high-resolution spotting satellite system, GAMBIT. Also known 

as the KH-7, GAMBIT was to provide resolution of one to two feet. 

After overcoming a series of developmental problems, both 

technical and managerial, the first GAMBIT satellite flew in July 

lTraditionally, photointerpreters divided reconnaissance 

photography into two categories. One was II search. " It was 

dedicated to finding something. CORONA was a search system. Its 

cameras were designed to photograph large contiguous areas in a 

single frame of film. The second observation function was 

"surveillance. " Once it was determined there was something of 

interest there, the surveillance system provided detailed 

information on the particular target. 

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1963. The returned film product whetted the appetite of US 

intelligence analysts for more. Although GAMBIT, a surveillance 

system, covered far less area than CORONA, it produced 

photography with a much better resolution. Objects as small as 

six feet could now be located and observed. 

An improved GAMBIT, known as GAMBIT-3 or the KH-8, flew in 

1967. Capable of stereo photography and a resolution, 

it proved highly successful replacing GAMBIT-1. The GAMBIT 

program eventually flew 54 missions over 20 years, concluding ln 

1984. It provided us officials with unique, highly detailed 

imagery of sensitive targets, and became a major tool for photo 

analysts during the Cold War. 

Film-recovery payloads culminated with the development of 

the HEXAGON series of satellites. Approved for design and 

• 

development by the united States Intelligence Board (USIB) ln 

1964, the CIA designed HEXAGON as both a high resolution and wide 

area coverage system. It was one of the largest and most complex 

reconnaissance satellites ever built. Known to the American 

public as "Big Bird," it was 10 feet in diameter and 55 feet ln 

length. It rivaled NASA's Space Lab in size. HEXAGON featured 

two panoramic counterrotating optical-bar cameras and four 

recovery capsules (later CORONA and GAMBIT satellites carried 

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two). Later HEXAGONs also contained a fifth capsule to return 

film from a separate mapping camera. Accompanying stellar and 

terrain cameras in HEXAGON made it possible to extract mapping, 

charting, and geodetic data for the Defense Mapping Agency and 

other organizations of the Intelligence Community. The NRO 

launched twenty HEXAGON's between June 1971 and April 1986. The 

only failure to mar this remarkable satellite program occurred on 

the twentieth and last flight when the launch booster exploded 

above Vandenberg Air Force Base on 18 April 1986. 

In the 1980s, the next generation of US photoreconnaissance satellites (which eliminated the need for film 

return), replaced both GAMBIT and HEXAGON. During their years of 

operation, however, GAMBIT and HEXAGON proved invaluable to us 

policymakers. For much of the Cold Wart these systems kept watch 

over the Soviet Union and other communist bloc areas. They proved 

critical to US security by providing detailed intelligence on US 

adversaries. Their search and surveillance capabilities also 

made possible arms limitation negotiations and the verification 

of nuclear reduction treaties. 

This study traces the origins and development of the GAMBIT 

and HEXAGON programs. It details the technological problems, 

breakthroughs, and accomplishments they encountered as NRO, CIA, 

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Air Force, and private industry engineers, designers, and program 

managers, pushed the cutting edge of space reconnaissance 

technology. It outlines the evolving close partnership and 

working relationship developed between the NRO and industry ln 

pursuing far-reaching scientific and technological goals. It 

also describes the bureaucratic battles among the CIA, the NRO, 

and the Air Force over control and management of these systems. 

Finally, it places the development of these unique satellite 

systems squarely in the crisis atmosphere of the Cold War and the 

constant demands of US officials for more and better pictures. 

It is a remarkable story. 

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Background 

Deeply concerned over Soviet boasts about the success of 

their missile program and the growing "missile gap," controversy, 

President Dwight D. Eisenhower, despite reservations, authorized 

a u-2 penetration flight of the Soviet union for 1 May 1960. The 

Department of State and the CIA strongly supported the decision. 

The intelligence objective of gathering information on the Soviet 

missile program was overwhelming in spite of the dangers. 2 

The most experienced u-2 pilot, Francis Gary Powers was 

selected to fly Operation GRAND SLAM from PeshawaY, Pakistan to 

Bodo, Norway. According to CIA analysts, this route offered the 

2For a review of the missile gap controversy see Roy E. 

Licklides, "The Missile Gap Controversy," Political Science 

Quarterly 85 (1970): 600-615. For a detailed review of the U-2 

program see Gregory W. Pedlow and Ronald E. Welzenbach, The Central 

Intelligence Agency and Overhead Reconnaissance: The U-2 and OXCART 

Programs 1954-1974 (CIA, 1992) (S). In August 1957, the Soviets 

launched a long-range ballistic missile. On 4 October 1957, they 

rocked US policymakers by orbiting Sputnik I (the first artificial 

earth satellite; it weighed 84 kg or 185 pounds) and in November 

1957 the Soviet union announced the launching of another earth 

satellite weighing 900 kg or 1,980 pounds. See Gerald K. Haines, 

The National Reconnaissance Office, Its Origins, Creation, and 

Early Years (NRO, 1997), pp. 12-13, Cargill Hall "Post-War 

Strategic Reconnaissance and the Genesis of Project CORONA," and 

Robert A. McDonald, ed., CORONA: Between the Sun and the Earth, 

The First NRO Reconnaissance Eye in Space (American Society for 

Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing, 1997), pp. 25-58 .. No U-2 

operations were to be carried out after 1 May because the President 

did not want anything to disrupt the Paris Summit scheduled to 

begin 16 May 1960. 

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best chance of photographing suspected locations of Soviet ICBM 

sites. Powers first target was the Tyuratam Missile Test Range; 

he was then to head for Chelyabinsk, just south of Sverdlovsk. 

Powers never made it past Sverdlovsk. Four and a half hours into 

the mission, a Soviet SA-2 surface-to-air missile disabled his 

aircraft 70,500 feet above the Sverdlovsk area. The Soviets had 

succeeded in downing the United States' most advanced 

reconnaissance aircraft. When Eisenhower finally admitted US 

responsibility for the U-2 overflight, he suspended all future U2 flights over the Soviet Union. The United States was now 

primarily blind regarding Soviet missile advancements. 3 

At the same time the U-2 was successfully overflying the 

Soviet Union, 1956-1960, and following the dramatic Soviet space 

successes in 1957 with Sputnik I and Sputnik II, President 

Eisenhower formally endorsed a stop-gap US satellite program In 

February 1958. The new CORONA project, managed jointly by the 

same CIA-Air Force team which had built the U-2, was to produce a 

satellite imaging reconnaissance system that would take pictures 

3For a discussion of the shoot-down and the aftermath of the 

U-2 downing, see Pedlow and Welzenbach, pp. 177-187. The Soviets 

prepared an elaborate show trial for Powers which began on 17 

August 1960. The Soviets sentenced him to 10 years in prison. On 

10 February 1962, the Soviet exchanged Powers for captured Soviet 

spy Rudolf Abel. 

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from space and deorbit a capsule with film back to earth. Like 

the U-2, this was a bold initiative to counter the closed 

societies of the Sino-Soviet bloc. 4 

A string of twelve successive failures, however, threatened 

to end the CORONA program before it even succeeded in returning a 

single film capsule from space. As the failures continued to 

mount, Bissell and the CORONA team became frustrated. It was not 

like the development of the U-2 where, if something failed, the 

pilot, unless it was a fatal error, could usually relate what 

happened. With satellites, according to Bissell, "they spun out 

of control, burned up in the atmosphere, crashed, hopelessly lost 

In the ocean, or exploded. Because the whole system was 

destroyed on reentry, it was often impossible to retrieve it and 

do an assessment. "5 

Discouraged, on 10 August 1960, the CORONA team launched a 

diagnostic payload in an attempt to determine what was going 

4CORONA was to be a stop-gap effort until the much larger and 

complex Air Force Wl17L Samos Satellite became operational. See 

Hall, pp. 42-51; Haines, pp. 14-15; and McDonald, pp. 61-74. At 

the same time, Eisenhower approved plans for the CIA to develop a 

follow-on plane for the U-2. 

SRi chard M.Bissell, Jr., with Jonathan E. Lewis and Frances T. 

Pudlo, Reflections of a Cold warrior: From Yal ta to the Bay of 

Pigs, ( New Haven: Yale University Press, 1996) p. 137. 

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wrong. The launch from Vandenberg, AFB, California, was perfect, 

the Agena rocket sent the spacecraft into the proper orbit, and 

on its 17th revolution, it successfully returned to earth, the 

first payload from space. 

Buoyed by this success, the CIA/USAF team launched a cameraequipped CORONA on 18 August. Like the earlier mission, CORONA 

Mission 9009 worked perfectly and deorbited its film payload on 

Friday, 19 August 1960, exactly 100 days after the Soviets shot 

down Powers and his U-2. The two recoveries did not make a 

successful program, however. Of the next four launches, only 

three went into orbit and one of these suffered a camera 

failure. 6 

CORONA Mission 9013, recovered on 10 December 1960, revealed 

Soviet construction work on its SS-6 missile sites at Plesetsk 

and at Yurya. photo reconnaissance was beginning to payoff. 

CORONA photography obtained in June 1961 also revealed a new 

Soviet missile project around Leningrad. Some CIA analysts 

believed this new system was an anti-ballistic missile (ABM) 

system designed to counter US intermediate-range missiles. The 

John F. Kennedy administration, anxious over this new 

development, turned to the CIA and the CORONA program for more 

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data. CORONA, however, was not able to perform the required 

task. Even its newest camera, the stereo KH-4, known as MURAL, 

was not good enough to provide technical data on the design of 

objects as small as the surface-to-air missile. Moreover, CORONA 

engineers were still grappling with keeping the satellite cameras 

in focus. According to the Satellite Intelligence Requirements 

Committee (SIRC) I new US satellite systems were needed that could 

resolve objects as small as 6, 1.5, and 0.3 meters. CORONA 

cameras called only for a resolution of 6 meters. This was in 

accordance with its role of performing wide-area, low resolution 

"search" missions.' 

'The Air Force had the task of developing a high-resolution 

"spotting" satellite. 

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GAMBIT 

Origins of the Program 

The NRO GAMBIT satellite program evolved from the Air 

Force's larger developmental plans for building reconnaissance 

satellites -- the WS-117L program in the mid 1950s. As 

originally envisioned, the Air Force sought to create a multifaceted satellite observation system. Little came of these 

efforts, however, as the Department of Defense struggled to 

eliminate "non-critical" defense expenditures and the Eisenhower 

administration stressed a "space for peace" theme. Following the 

Soviet space successes of 1957, however, Defense Secretary Neil 

H. McElroy authorized the acceleration of WS-117L to proceed "at 

the maximum rate consistent with good management. liS 

Upon the urging of his civilian scientific advisors, 

SSee *. In early 1958 President Eisenhower set up a 

Satellite Intelligence Requirements Committee (SIRC) within the 

Intelligence Advisory Committee (lAC) to establish requirements for 

satellite reconnaissance. In July 1960, the United States 

Intelligence Board (USIB) (The lAC was the predecessor body to the 

USIB.) merged the Ad Hoc Requirements Committee (ARC), originally 

established by Richard Bissell as an intragovernmental unit to 

oversee the tasking requirements for the U-2, with SIRC to form a 

new unit, the Committee on Overhead Reconnaissance (COMOR). 

See * and William M. Leary, ed., The Central Intelligence Agency, 

History and Documents (Birmingham, Alabama: University of Alabama 

Press, 1984). 

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President Eisenhower in 1958 ordered a small part of the WS-117L 

program, a satellite with a returnable film capsule, be taken 

from the Air Force over-all program and given to the same team 

that had built the U-2: the CIA's Richard Bissell and the Air 

Force's Brig. Gen. Osmund Ritland, for quick development. CORONA 

was to be a stop-gap measure until the larger Air Force effort 

produced results. 

In the aftermath of the U-2 shoot-down, the suspension of U2 operations over the Soviet Union in May 1960, and the mounting 

failures of the CORONA and Samos programs, US officials urgently 

sought new sources of high resolution reconnaissance 

photography. 9 The imagery was critical to US national security 

interests. 

The U-2 shoot-down triggered a serles of top level meetings 

9Samos originally had two planned photographic capabilities E1 and E-2. These involved the on-orbit exposure and processing of 

film, translation of that imagery into an electrical signal by 

means of a flying-spot scanner, and transmission of the signal to 

earth for recomposition as a picture. E-3 was the designator for 

a system which substituted photosensitive electrostatic tape for 

film; E-4 was used to identify a proposed mapping/geodetic 

photographic system; E-5 was a recoverable satellite with a large 

recovery vehicle; and E-6 was a recoverable-film search system with 

several times the capability of CORONA. E-1, E-2, and E-3 were 

readout systems, E-5 and E-6 were film-recovery systems. Only E1, E-2, and E-6 ever flew. See * 

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on the status of the Air Force's Samos programs. The Eisenhower 

decision to stop all aircraft overflight operations meant the 

loss of high-resolution observation of the Soviet Union. Even if 

CORONA achieved success, and at this point it had not, there was 

an immediate need for much better resolution than it could 

provide. George B. Kistiakowsky, who had succeeded James Killian 

as President Eisenhower's science advisor, was pessimistic about 

the Samos programs. 

On 26 May 1960 Eisenhower directed Kistiakowsky to set up a 

group to advise, as quickly as possible, on the best way to 

expand satellite reconnaissance options. Kistiakowsky turned to 

James Killian, Edwin H. Land, Carl Overhage of Lincoln 

Laboratories, Richard M. Bissell, Jr., and Air Force Under 

Secretary Joseph V. Charyk. They all echoed Kistiakowsky's 

concerns over Samos and suggested a Department of Defense 

streamlined, super-CORONA program. Charyk also argued strongly 

for keeping the program in the Air Force. If given the chance, 

Charyk believed he could create a successful covert satellite 

program within the Air Force. 

On 25 August 1960, Eisenhower approved the recommendation of 

the Kistiakowsky Study Group. Charyk got his wish and Samos 

became part of a new Air Force organization known as the Air 

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Force Project Office which subsequently became the Secretary of 

the Air Force Special Project Office (SAFSP). The new Samos 

project office in Los Angeles was to be housed in the same 

building as the new Space System Division. It would have direct 

access to all Air Force resources: Atlas booster; Agena 

spacecraft; launching site at Vandenberg AFB; tracking and 

control services at Sunnyvale, California; and recovery services 

at Oahu t Hawaii. Brig. Gen. Robert E. Greer became the first 

SAFSP director. He had previously been the Air Forcets assistant 

chief of staff for guided missiles. At the same timet under a 

security strategy called "Raincoat t " Charyk hid the sensitive 

space program by forbidding any publicity releases on an Air 

Force space project .10 

Another factor that affected the GAMBIT program was the 

formal establishment of the National Reconnaissance Office In 

September 1961. Now, all national collection requirements went 

through the NRO and its Satellite Operations Center (SOC) located 

in the basement of the Pentagon. Joseph Charyk became the first 

Director, NRO and GAMBIT became the first full-scale venture of 

the new organization. Charyk assigned the GAMBIT Project to 

Program A (Air Force) at SAFSP. It proceeded independently from 

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the CORONA project and the CIA satellite effort (Program B) . 

GAMBIT Development 

Two months earlier in March 1960 Eastman Kodak submitted 

proposals to the Air Force and the CIA for the development of a 

77-inch (focal length) camera for satellite reconnaissance. 

Building on its development work for the CIA's OXCART aircraft 

program, Kodak suggested that the new high performance 

catadioptric lens camera might be suitable for satellites. ll 

In June, Kodak proposed a 36-inch camera system to provide 

convergent stereo coverage of Soviet territory. Termed 

"Blanket," Kodak claimed the new system could be made operational 

in a short period of time because it was based on existing 

technology from the OXCART program. Kodak officials, Arthur 

Simmons and Herman Waggershauser, showed the proposal to Edwin H. 

(Din) Land, one of Eisenhower's scientific advisors. Land 

enthusiastically brought the proposal to the attention of Air 

Force Under Secretary Joseph V. Charyk. Charyk, too, was 

llOXCART was the next generation of manned reconnaissance 

aircraft. Al though originally developed to overfly the Soviet 

Union, it never did. Improvemen ts in Soviet radar and the SAM 

missile made such overflights impossible. The Air Force version 

of OXCART was known as the SR-71 or Blackbird. 

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interested. He liked the Kodak proposal, a film-only recovery 

scheme like CORONA with a very high-acuity, long focal-length 

camera. In discussion with Charyk, Kodak officials confidently 

projected the feasibility of providing a surveillance camera with 

2- to 3-foot ground resolution with high-acuity stereo coverage. 

A month later, on 20 July, Kodak offered a modified proposal 

which integrated the 77-inch camera with the stereo features and 

film recovery techniques embodied in "Blanket." It termed the 

new proposal "Sunset Strip" after the popular television series. 

This was promising technology for new orbital reconnaissance 

systems. 

In September 1960, Charyk met with Greer, Col. Paul J. Heran 

(Chairman of the E-6 Source Selection Board) and Lt. Col. James 

Seay (Greer's procurement chief) to review proposed satellite 

programs. All agreed to proceed with both E-6 (which had the 

potential of being twice as good as CORONA) and the Kodak "Sunset 

Strip" proposal. Charyk directed that "Sunset Strip" be 

developed on a cover basis, hidden in the E-6 program. He set 

initial funding at $4.3 million for R&D study funds for the 

balance of FY 1961. Greer named the new "black" program GAMBIT. 

By keeping the physical and environmental limitations of E-6 and 

GAMBIT compatible, it seemed possible to develop and test GAMBIT 

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without any outward indication that such a program existed. 12 

At the same time Charyk moved to hide the GAMBIT project, he 

also shielded it from the over-all Air Force Samos program, 

cutting out the Strategic Air Command, the Air Force Ballistic 

Missile Division, and the Air Force System Command. They all 

objected strongly to "losing" Samos. Charyk later reflected that 

it was extremely difficult limiting "need to know" especially 

when everyone believed they were working on a strategically 

important program. On the one hand he was telling them that 

Samos was extremely important and on the other that it would be 

drastically cut back.l3 

Since the 77-inch camera development program was well 

publicized, Charyk and Greer followed the earlier CORONA 

precedent. They terminated the Kodak study contract for "Sunset 

Strip" as "no longer required" and simultaneously authorized 

Kodak to continue the development as a covert effort. As the 

"Sunset Strip" activity closed and Kodak personnel nominally 

shifted to other Kodak projects, they actually moved into a new 

facility in a different building and resumed their work. 

In establishing the CORONA program, Bissell and Ritland followed 

12 * 

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much the same procedures. 14 

The complex, involved, security procedures for GAMBIT 

"cover and deception," in retrospect seem overdone. There were 

few challenges or threats to the system or the disclosure of 

GAMBIT. is 

Getting Pictures 

While putting the rather elaborate security system ln place, 

both Charyk and Greer agreed that their real job was to "get 

pictures," the objective of the national satellite reconnaissance 

program. Although Charyk initially balked at Eastman Kodak's 

demand for a seven-percent profit margin on camera development, 

by January 1961, he and Kodak had reached agreement. 

Greer supported Kodak. According to Greer, the fee was not 

excessive. He based his judgment on the U-2 camera expenses and 

Kodak's "unique capability." Moreover, the 25 August National 

Security Council directive ordered the Samos "take to be 

processed by the same agency that processed U-2 take" Eastman 

14Kevin C.Ruffner, ed., CORONA: America's First Satellite 

Program, (Washington, DC: CIA History Staff, 1995). 

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Kodak. There were no alternatives ."16 General Electric I s Space 

Division was to build the orbital-control vehicle. By mid-1961, 

GAMBIT had evolved into a 15-foot long, five-foot diameter space 

vehicle. 

The GAMBIT payload embodied a Maksutov f/4.0 lens (both 

reflecting and refracting elements) similar to an astronomical 

telescope with a 77-inch focal length and a clean aperture of 

19.5 inches. This lens, when flown at a nominal 95 nm altitude 

was to produce a ground resolution, at nadir, of from 2 to 3 

feet. GAMBIT was to carry 3,000 feet of 9.50-inch diameter, thinbase film through a strip camera, which would provide imagemotion compensation by moving the film across the image exposure 

slit at the same velocity that the projected image moved over the 

earth. The camera would image a strip on the earth 10.6 nm wide. 

It possessed the capability of photographing specific targets 

which were off the immediate orbital track through oblique 

pointing. The planned weight of the total photographic system 

was 1,154 pounds. 

The high resolution requirement for GAMBIT imposed a need 

for accurate orbit maintenance over a period of several days and 

for an ability to rotate the camera section about the vehicle's 

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roll axis. The GE orbital control vehicle (OCV) was to be 

capable 

of varying the roll attitude from 0° to 45° and of performing 350 

roll maneuvers at an average role of one per second. The command 

system was to receive, accept or reject, and execute both realtime or stored commands. 

The attitude control system was a two-axis gimballed 

platform on which were mounted infrared horizon scanners and an 

integrating gyroscope. The horizon sensors measured pitch and 

roll error; the gyro measured yaw error. Control movements were 

dependent on several jet-nozzle apertures. A set of four rocket 

engines, each capable of producing 50 pounds of thrust, would 

provide orbit maintenance. 

The initial GAMBIT launch vehicle was an Atlas Agena-D. The 

Atlas used 123 tons of liquid oxygen and refined kerosene (RP-1) 

to power the booster engines -- each generating 154,500 pounds of 

thrust and a 57,200-pound thrust sustainer engine. The Agena-D 

upper stage used 13,234 pounds of fuel to power its 16,OOO-pound 

thrust engines. 

After exposure, the cameras film was wound up in the 

recovery vehicle (RV). At the end of the mission, the RV was 

separated from the OCV, spun up on its axis of symmetry by a 

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cold-gas system, and then deboosted from orbit. Parachute 

deployment was to occur at 55,000 feet. The initial recovery 

vehicle was intended for land recovery. In fact, in October 

1961, Charyk approved the use of the Wendover AFB in Utah for 

GAMBIT land recovery operations and the State Department opened 

negotiations for an additional I Ifor 

controlling the orbital vehicle and for safeguarding the proposed 

land recovery process. 17 At this point, both Kodak and GE 

appeared to be ahead of schedule in completion of their design 

concept. By 1 August 1961, a GAMBIT launch date in January 1963 

appeared possible. 

Even with progress in the GAMBIT program, by January 1962, 

the need for an on-orbit, high-resolution, photographic 

reconnaissance system was even more critical. The Samos E-5 

program had been cancelled after a series of failures and CORONA 

was experiencing operational difficulties. DNRO Charyk{ under 

constant pressure to get quick and effective results from the 

satellite reconnaissance program{ wanted to accelerate the pace 

of GAMBIT development and improve its product. In discussions 

with Greer and Quentin A. Riepe, the program director for GAMBIT, 

however, it soon became clear serious problems remained and that 

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any quick fixes would seriously degrade the photography. There 

was general agreement that the earliest possible date for the 

initial launch would be May rather than February 1963. 

Problems 

The National Security Council (NSC) program directive ln 

1960 approving GAMBIT specified the development of a land 

recovery program. In the climate of the early CORONA program, 

land recovery appeared to be a useful option, less risky, more 

reliable, and less costly than the ocean recovery used by CORONA. 

Moreover, the projected weight of the GAMBIT RV would exceed the 

capability of the C-119 recovery aircraft. By July 1962, 

however, the reasons for distrusting air-sea recovery methods 

seemed less valid. The improving capability of the CORONA RV and 

the good performance of the overwater recovery system convinced 

Greer of the feasibility of using a CORONA-like RV on GAMBIT. 

The GAMBIT RV was then 500 pounds over design weight and 

most of the overweight derived from complications introduced by 

the land recovery requirement. Over-water recovery, as developed 

in the CORONA program, seemed to Greer a very simple process when 

compared to the planned land recovery scheme. In its descent 

toward the ocean, a CORONA reentry vehicle could safely shed all 

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sorts of accessories - hatch covers and ablative cones, for 

example. They simply fell into the ocean and sank. A land 

recovery vehicle could shed nothing, lest it became a lethal 

projectile. Greer asked GE to do a quiet study of "gluing the 

DISCOVERER capsule on the front end of GAMBIT. "18 

Greer was attracted to the concept by the potential of major 

savings on weight, cost, and launch schedule. More than 600 

pounds of orbital weight could be saved by going to an overwater 

recovery mode. Over $6 million in facility funds for the 

Wendover range could be cut from the budget. Most importantly, 

with a modified CORONA RV, GAMBIT could maintain its launch 

schedule. After listening to the various arguments, including 

the GAMBIT program office which felt that the land recovery 

approach was still the better option, on 18 September Charyk 

authorized Greer to begin immediate development of a CORONA-type 

recovery system for GAMBIT in preparation for a June 1963 first 

flight date .19 

The switch to a CORONA-type water recovery vehicle markedly 

simplified the entire GAMBIT system and probably saved the 

program. It did not, however, eliminate all problems. While 

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work on the camera payload at Eastman Kodak continued to 

progress, major problems threatened the launch date schedule. 

The optics for GAMBIT were to be larger and lighter than any 

previously built for space. The Corning Glass Company made the 

primary and stereo mirrors. Using large boules of very pure 

fused silica glass, Corning engineers joined the sections in an 

"egg-crate" fashion. The fusion operation was extremely 

delicate: heated too long or at too high a temperature, the 

structure became a molten blob, too Iowa temperature or too 

short a time prevented the parts from fusing properly. Corning 

shipped the large, lightweight blanks to Kodak for figuring and 

polishing at its special facility, Hawkeye Works.20 

Frederic Oder, director of Special Projects at Kodak and 

familiar with the CORONA RV from his previous work on WS-117L, 

favored the use of CORONA technology on GAMBIT. Kodak had 

originally planned to keep the film path pressurized including 

2°Kodak set up a special unit to deal with GAMBIT. The entire 

project was located at Hawkeye Works. Dr. Frank Hicks directed the 

program at Kodak. He reported to the director of Special Projects, 

Dr. Frederic C. E. Oder. The Special Proj ects organization 

reported to Arthur Simmons, director of research and engineering 

of the Apparatus and Optical Division. The GAMBIT proj ect received 

the highest priority within Kodak because of its national priority. 

Earlier, as an Air Force officer, Oder was the original WS-117L 

project officer and was witting of the entire CORONA effort. 

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the film chute and take-up cassettes. Using his CORONA 

background, Oder urged the adoption of a nonpressurized film 

path. This simplified the process and allowed the GAMBIT film 

load to be accommodated in a CORONA-like RV without serious 

modifications. 

Kodak was also having problems attaching or cementing the 

silica mirrors to their metal case and with the platen drive 

which caused the film to move irregularly over the exposure slit. 

Although the problems were not considered major, they added to 

existing pressure on delivery time and flight schedules. 21 

The Orbital Control Vehicle (OCV) development by General 

Electric, in its Valley Forge, Pennsylvania facility, was another 

story. Repeated failures in such varied experiments as the 

harnesses, power supplies, batteries, command systems, horizon 

sensors, rate gyros, environmental doors, and pyro devices, caused 

major cost over-runs and severely threatened delivery 

schedules. 22 

The prevalence of cost over-runs, particularly at General 

Electric, the threat of new schedule slippage, and the increasing 

cost of the GAMBIT program greatly concerned Charyk. At the same 

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time, pressures continued to increase for hard intelligence on 

the Soviet Union. The Cuban Missile Crisis of October 1962 added 

to the sense of urgency. 

At a meeting with the President's Foreign Intelligence 

Advisory Board and the "special group" of the National Security 

Council, Charyk characterized GAMBIT as "imperative" and urged 

that the program be pressed with a "maximum sense of urgency." 

"No reasonable steps," Charyk argued, "should be omitted to 

guarantee its success at the earliest possible time." According 

to Charyk, GAMBIT offered the most promising approach to 

discovering whether or not the Soviet Union was actively 

preparing for war. 23 

Discouraged about the rate of GAMBIT progress, Charyk 

suggested to Greer a management change. He wanted an exhaustive 

technical review of the program to locate any remaining problems. 

Greer was reluctant to relieve Col. Riepe, the original program 

manager. Nevertheless, on 30 October 1962, Greer replaced Riepe 

with Col. William G. King. King had a long experience with 

satellite reconnaissance. He had been Samos program director In 

23See*. Most of the Samos program's photo-oriented 

reconnaissance had been canceled and the E-6 program was 

experiencing grave technical problems four failures in four 

tries. 

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the late 1950s and was one of the first to recognize the 

advantages of film recovery techniques over the technically more 

difficult readout systems. At the time of his appointment to 

head the GAMBIT program, he was serving as Greer's special plans 

officer.24 

Immediately upon taking over the GAMBIT program, King 

discovered that the GE adaptation of the CORONA capsule to GAMBIT 

was seriously off course. Greer's original intent, confirmed by 

Charyk, was to "glue on" the CORONA recovery vehicle. Elaborate 

or extensive modification of the capsule was neither intended nor 

desired. In the course of changing over from land recovery to 

air-sea recovery, however, GAMBIT officials had authorized GE to 

develop a recovery vehicle capable of accepting the original 

pressurized GAMBIT take-up cassette and film chute. 25 Responding 

to the request to convert GAMBIT to a CORONA recovery vehicle, GE 

24Greer's instruction to King emphasized these goals: 1) stay 

within budget; 2) stay on schedule; and 3) obtain one good picture. 

See*. 

25Because of rigid compartmentation of programs, only Col. 

Riepe in the GAMBIT program office had a working knowledge of the 

CORONA program. Lacking any indication that unpressurized 

operation was possible, (The CORONA experience with unpressurized 

operation had been employed successfully for two years.) GAMBIT 

officials assumed that the pressurization of the film cassette 

would have to be continued in the new recovery capsule. See * 

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scaled up the CORONA capsule, making it deeper and increasing its 

base diameter. The result was a completely new capsule which 

required an extensive test program. The cost also escalated. 

King suggested that the original intent of the CORONA 

modification be reinstated and that the rapidly expanding GE 

development effort be stopped. Greer, who had originally ordered 

that changes to the CORONA capsule should be minimal, agreed. 

King imposed an "absolute minimum" change policy in his 

instructions to GE on adopting the CORONA recovery system to 

GAMBIT. 

At the same time, King was sorting out the technical 

problems with GAMBIT, Charyk and Greer decided to strengthen 

GAMBIT management further by transferring the program from the 

Space Systems Division to SAFSP. Such a move would give GAMBIT 

the prestige and authority of the office of the Secretary of the 

Air Force. This set off a fire storm in the Air Force Systems 

Command (AFSC). General Bernard Schriever, commander of AFSC, 

had been a"major force in establishing the Air Force space 

program. Schriever believed strongly that all Air Force space 

activity should be under AFSC management. He made several 

determined but ultimately unsuccessful attempts to regain 

"ownership." High priority space programs would from now on 

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report directly to the Office of the Secretary of the Air 

Force. 26 

King continued his technical review of the GAMBIT program by 

questioning GE's untested OCV and its attitude-control subsystem. 

In order to improve the probability of early GAMBIT flight 

successes, King and Greer suggested that the Agena, at least for 

the first three flights, remain connected to the OCV. The 

reliable Agena, while not as precise as the GAMBIT system, could 

provide a stabilization and control mechanism to stabilize the 

GAMBIT camera long enough to secure operating experience and 

proof of system feasibility. Flying in this "hitch-up" 

configuration would not allow the demonstration of GAMBIT's full 

capability and it would only permit near-nadir photography, but 

King and Greer were determined that the first GAMBIT should 

return at least "one good picture." 

King and Greer also envisioned using a roll-joint coupling 

(invented for an interim high resolution satellite developed by 

the CIA, known as Project LANYARD and its KH-6 camera) between 

the spacecraft (Agena) and the camera system. Should the GE OCV 

prove unreliable, the introduction of the LANYARD roll-joint 

could stabilize and control the vehicle. 

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As was the case with the CORONA reentry capsule, the rolljoint technology was unknown to most GAMBIT people. Because of 

the high degree of security compartmentation in the 

reconnaissance program structure, CIA security officials were 

reluctant to disclose even the existence of LANYARD to GAMBIT 

personnel. Charyk got around this problem by "suggesting" to 

Greer (Greer actually drafted the suggestion.) that he contact 

Lockheed Corporation about the roll joint as " ... he (Charyk) 

believed a similar idea was once proposed and possibly designed 

in connection with another space program. II Lockheed thus 

delivered the finished roll joints to the GAMBIT program as 

though they were new items with no relationship to any other 

reconnaissance program. 27 

On 14 December 1962 Greer and King proposed yet another 

technical innovation. The latest change advocated incorporating 

"Lifeboat" provisions into GAMBIT. "Lifeboat" was another CORONA 

originated technique. It involved providing independent reentry 

command circuitry (including a receiver), a separate 

magnetometer, and its own stabilization gas supply. All were 

independent of the main systems. If the primary reentry systems 

became inoperative, "Lifeboat" could be separately activated. 

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"Lifeboat" had proven its value on several occasions with CORONA. 

Charyk formally approved adding "Lifeboat," "hitchup," and 

"roll joint" to GAMBIT on 19 December. "Lifeboat" was to be a 

permanent part of GAMBIT, "hitchup" was to be used on just the 

first four vehicles and then on a flight-by-flight basis. "Roll 

joint" was to be developed as an operational substitute for the 

OCV roll system. At the same time, in order to maintain the 

launch schedule, Greer and King deleted a substantial portion of 

the test program for GAMBIT. There was no alternative if GAMBIT 

was to meet its proposed schedule of June. Both knew the risk, 

but additional overruns or schedule slippage could put the 

program in danger of being cancelled. 28 US policymakers demanded 

useful intelligence images of Soviet targets. 

When Charyk resigned as DNRO on 1 March 1963, Dr. Brockway 

McMillan of Bell Telephone Laboratories replaced him. All seemed 

to be proceeding well with GAMBIT. By May GAMBIT was in its 

first flight checkout sequence. On the afternoon of 11 May, 

however, a faulty valve and a deficient fuel loading sequence 

caused a loss of internal pressure on the Atlas 190D. The 

booster collapsed on the pad, dumping both the GE orbital vehicle 

28The CIA program LANYARD at this point had some prospect of 

filling the proposed GAMBIT role. See * 

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and the Agena on the concrete slab. The GE vehicle was severely 

damaged, the Agena to a lesser degree. Surprisingly, there was 

no explosion or fire, although 13,000 gallons of liquid oxygen 

and a full load of fuel sloshed over the pad. The camera system 

was damaged beyond repair, a large part of the optics demolished. 

The GAMBIT project team worked furiously to repair the damage and 

keep the pre-flight checkout on schedule. Despite their efforts 

the original 27 June launch date slipped back to July.29 

First Launch 

22 months and 17 days after the National Security Council 

decision to proceed with a covert high-resolution satellite, 

GAMBIT flight vehicle No.1 lifted off from its Vandenberg 

launching pad on 12 July 1963 at 1344, Pacific Daylight Time. 

For an instant during the launch, most observers experienced the 

horrified sense that disaster had come again to the NRO/Air Force 

satellite reconnaissance program. The splashing rocket exhaust 

of the Atlas knocked out all electrical connections to telemetry 

and cameras. It gave the impression of a major launch start 

explosion. Seconds later, however, the Atlas could be seen 

29Charyk resigned to become president of the newly formed 

Communications Satellite (Comsat) Corporation See also * 

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climbing steadily towards its launch window. Climbout, 

separation, and orbital injection went smoothly. Greer and King 

knew, however, it would be another 90 minutes before they would 

have proof that the bird was in a proper polar orbit. It would 

take another five orbits before the GAMBIT payload came to life. 

After another nine "working' passes, a recovery attempt would be 

made. There would be another wait as the capsule re-entered the 

earth's atmosphere, hopefully survived its passage through the 

upper atmosphere, arrested its descent by parachute, and was 

recovered. 

On the fifth orbital revolution, command controllers turned 

on the camera for light strip exposures of 20 seconds each. On 

orbits eight and nine, two stereo pairs, and five, 2-second 

strips were exposed. A premature exhaustion of Agena 

stabilization gas then forced the discontinuance of camera 

operations. With the Agena out of fuel, "Lifeboat" became the 

only means of recovering the film capsule. On the eighteenth 

orbit, a ground station commanded "Lifeboat" and GAMBIT back 

toward earth. A C-119 aircraft waiting near Hawaii swept the 

parachuting reentry capsule out of the sky. The first GAMBIT was 

a success. But what about the film? 

Evaluation of the recovered film, only 198 feet was exposed, 

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indicated an out-of-focus condition for most of the flight caused 

apparently by uncompensated temperature changes that affected the 

face of the primary mirror and by faulty image motion 

compensation settings. Nevertheless, the best resolution was 

close to 3.5 feet, the average resolution about 10 feet. It was 

the best photographic return ever obtained from a reconnaissance 

satelli te. 30 

Greer, gratified by the success of the first flight, 

inf ormed King that he very much wan ted "two in a row. 11 31 The 

very success of the first flight raised Intelligence Community 

expectations for subsequent flights. 

The second GAMBIT flight took place on 6 September 1963. 

All went well. During fifty-one hours on orbit, the hitched 

vehicle completed 34 orbits and exposed 1930 feet of film. It 

covered 10 different intelligence targets. On the 34th 

revolution, the reentry vehicle was detached and successfully 

recovered by air catch. An analysis of the photographs recovered 

from the second GAMBIT showed consistently high quality until the 

31st orbit. The resolution achieved during the initial portion 

of the fight meant the photointerpreters could distinguish such 

30 * 

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detail as aircraft engine nacelles, small vehicles, and even 

maintenance equipment. For the first timel a satellite 

reconnaissance camera had returned detail at levels previously 

obtained only from reconnaissance aircraft. Only three years 

after Eisenhower ordered manned reconnaissance flights over the 

Soviet Union discontinued, US satellites had filled the 

intelligence gap. First, CORONA had returned coverage of areas 

most U-2s could not reach or safely overfly, and now GAMBIT had 

returned detail not greatly inferior to that produced by U-2 

cameras. 32 GAMBIT imagery, however, was limited to only ten 

targets and 1930 feet of film from GAMBIT's second flight. 

Although GAMBIT's achievements were remarkable, it did not yet 

provide recurring coverage of the Soviet Union. Such coverage, at 

resolutions much better than CORONA could provide, was still an 

urgent national goal. 33 

McMillan, under constant pressure for more pictures, wanted 

future GAMBIT missions to concentrate on obtaining the best 

possible ground resolution over larger numbers of "denied area" 

targets. 34 McMillan informed Greer, " ... the name of the game is 

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specific coverage of specific, known targets with stereo 

photography of the best possible quality." Greer was 

increasingly confident GAMBIT could produce the desired results. 

GAMBIT flight three of 25 October 1963 produced photography 

"better and more consistent than that of either of the first two 

missions." Imagery was the first to show identifiable figures of 

people on the ground from a distance of 90 miles. The scene 

was a football field in Great Falls, Montana. In one photo, a 

place kicker could be seen putting the football in place while 

the other players moved into position. In a second photo, the 

players had lined up I ready for the kickoff. 35 

Despite the superb resolution, however, the first three 

GAMBIT flights produced little intelligence. They did, however, 

whet the appetite of the US Intelligence Community for more and 

better satellite imagery. 

GAMBIT No.6, launched on 11 March 1964, seemed to bring the 

program to maturity. Despite some continuing problems, GAMBIT 

No. 6 returned substantial quantities of highly useful 

intelligence data on 209 targets.36 

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Continuing Problems 

The year 1964 1 however 1 brought serious problems to the 

program. From May through October 1964 1 six GAMBIT flights 

produced coverage on only 397 targets. Half of the flights 

produced no coverage whatever. The best resolution degraded to 

seven feet. Despite some successes in early 1965 1 the GAMBIT 

program was seriously ill.37 

Maj. Gen. Robert Greer retired on 30 June. He was replaced 

by Brig. Gen. John L. Martin who had been chief of the NRO Staff 

in the Pentagon and deputy to Greer. The summer of 1965 brought 

key personnel changes as well. Dr. Alexander H. Flax, Assistant 

Secretary of the Air Force for Research and Development replaced 

McMillan as DNRO on 1 October. Only Col. King continued in place 

as proj ect director for GAMBIT. 38 

As Greer's deputy, Martin had a detailed knowledge of 

GAMBIT. He had witnessed the agonies of the early GAMBIT 

operations and years later recalled the emotion of "watching a 

bird go dead." "You simply cannot imagine," he said, "the 

frustration you feel when a healthy-looking GAMBIT suddenly 

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became a zombie. "39 

Shortly after assuming command, Martin faced the issue of 

whether or not GAMBIT No. 20 should hold to its early July flight 

date. Martin decided to go ahead with the previous schedule. On 

12 July Martin witnessed a comprehensive failure, the Atlas 

booster shut down prematurely and GAMBIT No. 20 flew a 682 mile 

arc into the Pacific Ocean. Martin demanded immediate changes. 

He and King set about tightening quality control and the 

incentive contracting system. They subjected the GAMBIT system 

to new and more stringent test and inspection procedures. 

Despite their efforts, GAMBIT No. 21 became the third successive 

GAMBIT to experience catastrophic failure when the AC/DC power 

converter in the OCV failed, resulting in the loss of 

stability.40 The Intelligence Community, increasingly dependent 

on high-resolution photography to determine Soviet ICBM activity 

expressed its major concern with the gap in detailed coverage of 

the Soviet program. 41 

41CORONA operation continued reasonably successfully during the 

summer of 1965, only one major mission failure in three flights, 

but CORONA did not return the detail that intelligence analysts 

needed to interpret Soviet force status. 

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Martin, although under pressure to produce detailed imagery, 

delayed the next scheduled GAMBIT launch. He turned his 

attention to GE'S OCV, which had, on balance, provided most of 

the program difficulties. Traveling to GE Philadelphia, he and 

King mystified GE management by requiring exclusive use of a 

dining room, ten tables, ten white tablecloths, and ten completed 

GAMBIT electronic boxes. with GE management looking on, Martin 

produced his own screwdriver and removed the cover-plates from 

the first box. He raised the box above the cloth-covered table 

and shook it hard. He paused to inventory the native and foreign 

items which fell on the table. He and King moved from table to 

table repeating the operation with each box. Martin concluded by 

stating that someone or someones had to be responsible for the 

debris on the table. GE management responded by revamping its 

organization and production and testing procedures. They were 

determined that GE hardware would become a quality member of the 

GAMBIT components family. 

GE was not the only errant contractor King and Martin took 

to task. Lockheed and Kodak were both criticized for shipping 

unfinished products to Vandenberg and then attempting to complete 

their work ln Vandenberg's Missile Assembly Building (MAB). 

Determined to guarantee hardware integrity, King even threatened 

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to close the MAB, forcing all contractors to deliver flightready hardware to the launch site. 42 

Martin also made an exhaustive study of the incentive 

contracting in effect for the GAMBIT program. He was amazed to 

find that the system of rewards paid more for under-cost, ontime delivery than for high quality performance on orbit. He 

observed, for example, that such a set of values placed GE in 

position to collect a healthy bonus for providing the OCV under 

cost and on time despite the failure rate on orbit. To the 

contractor, the arrangement stressed the cost factor far more 

than the performance factor. The result was that GE was 

motivated to delete as many control and test procedures as 

possible in order to save money and time in producing the OCV. 

Taken to its logical extreme, the incentive formula could result 

in the delivery of a minimum cost vehicle which failed 

catastrophically, but, nonetheless, earned a premium for the 

contractors. Martin shifted the focus of the incentive system 

from cost to performance. Martin's new system placed the 

emphasis on orbital performance and provided large bonuses for 

on-orbit success .43 

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GAMBIT No. 23, launched on 8 November 1965, was the first 

satellite to have full benefit of the new test and inspection 

regime. Unfortunately, it too quickly succumbed to flaws and 

during its l8-revolution lifetime photographed only 76 targets. 

The Martin-King plan for improvement in the GAMBIT program, 

however, continued unrelenting. It finally paid off. The next 10 

flights were all qualified successes. From January to October 

1966, the NRO launched GAMBIT satellites at a rate of about one 

per month. They routinely returned photographic intelligence of 

high quality, covering more than a thousand targets in each 

flight. "Best resolution" range from 2.5 feet to 1.9 feet and 

averaged about 2.0 feet. By the third anniversary of the GAMBIT 

flight program, 12 July 1966, GAMBIT had extended its longevity 

from one to eight days on orbiti had increased the number of 

targets from 3 to 1,636 and had improved resolution from 3.5 feet 

to 2.00 feet. The last GAMBIT mission, No. 38 (KH-7), flew on 4 

June 1967. It was replaced by the highly successful GAMBIT-3 

program. 44 

44See later discussion of GAMBIT-3. 

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GAMBIT-l Summary 

GAMBIT was the first operational US satellite system to 

return high resolution photography consistently. An AtlasAgena booster combination launched the GAMBIT into orbit. 

General Electric built the orbital control vehicle which housed 

the camera system. Eastman Kodak developed and manufactured the 

camera system itself which was originally designed around a lens 

of 77-inch focal length, producing photographs with a ground 

resolution of two to three feet. GE built the recovery capsule 

which was adapted from the CORONA program. The first GAMBIT was 

launched in 12 July 1963 and flights continued until 4 June 1967 

when GAMBIT-3 replaced the GAMBIT-l system. 

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The Development of GAMBIT-3 4s 

Even before the launch of the first of the GAMBIT 

reconnaissance satellites in July 1963, US planners discussed the 

need for an even greater capability system. GAMBIT, with its two 

to three-feet resolution, (three to five times better than 

anything CORONA produced) could produce significant operational 

and technical details on Soviet weaponry. But, they believed, 

even greater intelligence on the Soviets could be obtained if the 

United States developed an imaging system that could return 

ground details of less than 1 foot. Intelligence Community 

analysts wanted "more." 

In the early 1960s, the dominant factor in obtaining higher 

resolution tended to be focal length and pointing accuracy. Long 

lens systems created enlarged images of relatively small areas. 

Eastman Kodak worked on such a system with its VALLEY program. 

By August 1963 VALLEY research and GAMBIT-1 experience convinced 

many NRO officials that long focal lengths were feasible for 

45When first considered, GAMBIT-3 was informally referred to 

as Advanced GAMBIT, and G3, or G-Cubed. G-3 eventually became the 

accepted designator for the successor program, although upon the 

completion of the original GAMBIt program and the start of GAMBIT3 operations that suffix was dropped and it became simply the 

GAMBIT program. For the sake of clarity, this study will continue 

to distinguish between the two systems using GAMBIT-1 for the first 

program and GAMBIT-3 for the follow-on. 

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satellite operations. In December 1963, Kodak employees, Charles 

P. Spoelhof and James H. Mahar, presented their ideas for an 

advanced GAMBIT system to DNRO Brockway McMillan and Gen. Robert 

Greer. Following the presentation, McMillan approved the 

development of an improved, higher resolution, GAMBIT program. 

The crux of Kodak's proposal was a system that would exploit 

the pointing accuracy of GAMBIT-l and a camera with a 160-inch 

focal length lens. Kodak engineers believed that resolution of 

less than one foot could be obtained, assuming imagery from an 

orbital altitude of 90 miles. Spoelhof and Mahar also proposed 

that the new system incorporate a IIfactory to pad" concept to 

provide greater modularity, instead of an orbital control vehicle 

enveloping the camera system (GAMBIT-1). They proposed using two 

modules, one containing the camera and the recovery vehicle, the 

other housing propulsion and the on-orbit initial subsystems. 

Kodak also incorporated the Lockheed roll-joint concept between 

the forward photographic payload/recovery vehicle section and the 

satelli te-control section. 46 

Kodak also planned to use a special, very-Iow-coefficientof-thermal-expansion Invar (an iron-nickel alloy) for both the 

optical barrel and related assemblies, and a new thin-base (1.5 

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mil) high-resolution film with an exposure index of 6.0. (The 

film was roughly three times more sensitive than the film then in 

use on GAMBIT-1.) 

Concerned that the new program might have major problems in 

producing the larger optics and that the improved film could not 

be delivered on schedule, DNRO McMillan sponsored a host of 

alternative technologies. This caution was also evident In the 

selection of the booster. Although King and Greer favored using 

the Atlas and Agena booster combination, McMillan wanted an 

option of using the new Titan-III booster which would provide for 

a greater payload weight. 

King and Greer worked out the remaining major elements of 

the GAMBIT-3 concept in January 1964. Their plan called for the 

entire GAMBIT-3 program to operate under the purview of the SAFSP 

They called for an initial flight in July 1966. The GAMBIT-1 

system would continue until GAMBIT-3 became operational. 

Because of DNRO McMillan's strong interest in the Titan as a 

possible booster for GAMBIT-3, Greer and King tasked Lockheed In 

July 1964 to study Agena compatibility with the Titan-III (x) . In 

October 1964, on the basis of the Titan III{x)-Agena study 

carried out by Lockheed, Greer's staff prepared cost estimates 

for switching from the Atlas-Agena. Consideration for making the 

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change included the desire to use the Titan III family of 

boosters for other Air Force space missions, the potential 

versatility and on-orbit weight-growth capability, and the 

likelihood that a new search system replacing CORONA would rely 

on Titan III boosters. Despite the fact that the Atlas was 

considered the standard launching vehicle for the Air Force, DNRO 

McMillan officially approved the switch to Titan in October 1964. 

Although this increased cost and caused a slippage in the initial 

launch date, the choice of the Titan, in hindsight, was a major 

improvement. It allowed future system changes with less 

consideration of the limited lift capacity of the Atlas. 

At Lockheed, the GAMBIT-3 program came under the direction 

of the Space Systems Division. The program manager was Harold 

Huntley who reported directly to James W. Plummer, assistant 

general manager for Special Programs. (Plummer would become DNRO 

in 1974.) While Lockheed's work on the Agena modifications 

proceeded and never seriously threatened the planned launch date 

of July 1966, payload development by Eastman Kodak was behind 

schedule by the fall of 1964. The major problem for Kodak 

centered on the manufacture and mounting of the two large mirrors 

of GAMBIT-3 optics. The primary mirror (aspherical) was 44-

inches in diameter and the stereo mirror (flat) was a 58-inch by 

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46-inch ellipse. These optics were larger than those of many 

earth telescopes, but needed to be much lighter to operate in 

space. Kodak experienced several failures in attempting to 

manufacture the mirrors. In addition, the figuring and polishing 

processes were far more difficult than originally anticipated. 

Kodak originally estimated that each of the two mirrors would 

require around 800 hours of grinding, polishing, testing, and 

coating to finish. The early mirrors took 3,000 hours per 

mirror. Because of mirror-fabrication problems, Kodak was three 

months behind schedule. Kodak's problem was compounded by its 

underestimation of the needed engineering manpower. The company 

experienced a major shortage of technical people, apparently 

from an over commitment of resources. Kodak was working 

simultaneously on GAMBIT-l, GAMBIT-3, a lunar camera for NASA, 

the covert camera for DORIAN, a manned orbital laboratorYr and a 

proposed new search system that later became the HEXAGON program. 

The final determination for fabrication, fused silica with 

egg-crate constructionr for the primary aspheric mirror substrate 

and the return to conventional polishing techniques, pushed the 

production schedule ahead. By January 1966 there still existed 

considerable doubt that the high-speed {E.I.G.}, high resolution 

film on which GAMBIT-3 depended, would be ready for use in 

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initial flights. If it was not ready, the fall-back film, with 

an index of 3.6 and a resolution capability of 110 lines per 

millimeter, as against the 130 lines ASA 6.0 film would be used. 

It would build a certain amount of smear but there was no 

alternative. In fact, the new film did not become available 

until June 1968. 

Given their experience with GAMBIT-l, Greer and King also 

introduced another innovative management technique. In contrast 

to the extensive testing at the launch site that characterized 

GAMBIT-l, testing that frequently brought substantial repair work 

in the Missile Assembly Building, Greer and King initiated a 

command system for GAMBIT-3, featuring an automated checkout 

system that allowed telemetry readout of functions. These 

readouts directly indicated whether or not various subsystems 

and components operated within acceptable limits. This automated 

checkout was normally performed during final assembly at Kodak 

and Lockheed, the principal manufacturers. The components, 

therefore, went directly from factory to launch pad. 47 

NRO planners took no chance with the success of the first 

launch of GAMBIT-3. By the time of the launch, recovery 

operations had become rather routine, using Air Force C-130 

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aircraft and Navy range ships. An NRO agreement with the US Navy 

provided for the Navy to support these recoveries with two such 

range ships. As the first GAMBIT-3 launch approached, the Navy, 

however, had only one ship on duty station. NRO program officers 

requested additional Navy support through the Office of the 

Commander-in-Chief, Pacific Forces (CINCPAC), which controlled 

all Department of Defense assets in the Pacific. CINCPAC 

responded that because of the Vietnam conflict, the usual 

recovery support could not be provided. Col. King took the issue 

to DNRO John McLucas. This was a serious threat to the successful 

completion of the mission. McLucas took up the matter with the 

Chief of Naval Operations (CNO), Adm. David L. McDonald, who, In 

turn, sent a flash precedence message to CINCPAC ordering the 

support. CINCPAC signaled back to SAFSP, "We don't know whom you 

know, but how many battleships do you want and where do you want 

them del i vered? "48 

GAMBIT-3 Becomes Operational 

On 29 July 1966 at 11:30 PDT, the first GAMBIT-3 roared off 

the launch pad at Vandenberg. (The initial launch had been 

projected nearly three years earlier for 1 July 1966.) Two hours 

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later, Sunnyvale reported, "All systems appear normal." The 

first GAMBIT-3 performed exceptionally well. The satellite 

achieved a near-nominal orbit. Its mission lasted five days 

during which it acquired a total of 717 targets of which 463 were 

successfully "read out. "49 

The overall quality of the imagery from the first GAMBIT-3 

mission was 25 percent better than that obtained from any GAMBIT1 mission (a 17-inch best resolution as opposed to a GAMBIT-1 

best of 21.6 inches) .50 Although the primary optics fell short 

of the design goal of ~I ______ ~l the intelligence provided by this 

mission was the highest of any reconnaissance satellite to date. 

The fate of GAMBIT-1 was now sealed, although DNRO Alexander 

Flax was extremely reluctant to cancel any planned GAMBIT-1 

launches until GAMBIT-3 actually demonstrated a consistent level 

of capability. Director of Central Intelligence Richard Helms, 

however, felt strongly that the success of GAMBIT-3 warranted 

cutting back GAMBIT-1 launches. The United States Intelligence 

Board's (USIB) Committee on Overhead Reconnaissance (COMOR) 

49The dominant cause for differences between targets programmed 

and targets readout in the entire GAMBIT-3 program was cloud cover. 

The introduction of weather satellites helped, but the problem 

persisted as long as cloud cover data was delayed. 

SOThe best GAMBIT-1 would ever achieve would be 19.2 inches. 

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proposed, after listening to the arguments, that nine GAMBIT-1's 

and eight GAMBIT-3's be approved for the FY 1967 flight schedule. 

Contemporary launch schedules called for the launch of GAMBITl's at the rate of one per month. The decision to proceed with a 

mix of GAMBIT-1 and GAMBIT-3 was based on the perceived greater 

cost of the new system (GAMBIT-3), and the concern that success 

in all of the scheduled missions would cause the exploitation and 

analytical elements to be inundated with high resolution imagery. 

The concern was real. 

During the 11-month period, July 1966 to June 1967, the very 

success of GAMBIT-3 created a new problem for US officials by 

returning huge quantities of surveillance-quality photography. 

The shear volume overwhemed US photointerpreters. The United 

States now had three successful satellite systems routinely 

returning large quantities of imagery: CORONA, GAMBIT-1, and 

GAMBIT-3. The Satellite Operation Center (SOC) in the Pentagon 

was also feeling deluged. It was barely able to cope with GAMBIT 

and CORONA. GAMBIT-3 made it possible, for the first time, to 

identify and count ! 

~--------------------------------------~ 

~ __________________________________________________ ~IUS 

officials could, and did, for example, observe the rate the new 

Soviet T-62 tanks were being delivered to regiments along the 

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Soviet-Chinese border. 51 

Despite the success, DNRO Flax was less than euphoric. Best 

resolution of 19 inches fell well short of the planned resolution 

of I I He, nevertheless, cancelled the final five GAMBIT-l '---------~ 

missions on 30 June 1967. GAMBIT-3 was to be the main 

surveillance satellite system. Unlike Flax, DCI Helms 

characterized the take from GAMBIT-3 in November 1967 as 

providing "extremely important intelligence. 1152 He saw it as a 

striking success. Flax's more cautious optimism proved 

prophetic. 

By late 1967 the inadequacy of the GAMBIT camera system 

remained an unsolved problem. Despite the fact that it was 

better than that of GAMBIT-l, it did not obtain the 1 

'--------~ 

resolution originally specified. Some at NRO believed GAMBIT-3 

would never achieve the I resolution for which it had 

been designed, much less the long coveted ~I __ ~ resolution 

desired by photointerpreters. Improvements were on the way, 

however, as Kodak continued its work on improving the mirror 

51Se e *. In September 1966 Col. King transferred to command 

the Air Force Satellite Control Facility. He was later promoted 

to the rank of brigadier general. He was replaced as director of 

the GAMBIT System Program Office by Col. Roy A. Smith. 

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substitute materials and the high-speed emulsion on its ultrathin base film. Kodak introduced its new film on the 14th 

GAMBIT-3 flight on 5 June 1968. By the 27th flight it exceeded 

all expectation. 53 

A Chance Encounter 

GAMBIT program officials strongly believed that neither the 

Soviets, nor anyone else, knew the capability of the GAMBIT 

program. In 1969, however, officials held their breath as a 

Soviet satellite, Cosmos 264, began to make orbital adjustments, 

which, US engineers calculated, would bring it within 70 miles of 

GAMBIT-3. Eventually the two satellites passed within 15 miles 

of each other as NRO controllers held their breath, wondering if 

Cosmos was a "killer satellite." 

The Block II Program 

One of the major innovations in the GAMBIT-3 program was the 

introduction of a second recovery vehicle. It eventually became 

known as the Block II program. Growing national interest during 

the period of GAMBIT-3 development in creating a satellite 

capability of quick reaction to world-wide crisis situations 

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drove concepts for improving GAMBIT-3. As early as January 1965, 

DNRO McMillan informed Secretary of Defense, Robert McNamara, of 

studies underway for providing GAMBIT-3 with such a capability. 

The CORONA program had demonstrated the feasibility and utility 

of using two recovery buckets. The premise behind the change was 

that a long-life, mUltiple capsule, film return system, could 

provide urgently required images that would be taken and 

returned to earth for evaluation, while at the same time 

continuing the satellite's routine surveillance duties. 54 

Fortunately, owing mostly to McMillan's foresight, the Titan 

booster used for GAMBIT-3 had excess lift capability. The 

addition of a second reentry vehicle and more film capacity, 

while they greatly increased GAMBIT-3's weight, did not exceed 

the Titan lift capacity. work began on the Block II series of 

GAMBIT-3 in late 1966. The double-bucket GAMBIT was ready by the 

fall of 1969. The first Block II vehicle (GAMBIT-3, no. 23) flew 

on 23 August 1969. After this first successful Block II flight, 

the program suffered a series of annoying problems, from poor 

orbits, to failed parachutes, to program malfunctions, which kept 

it from reaching its full potential. 55 

54 * 

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Despite the nagging problems, the resolution of GAMBIT-3 

cameras continued to increase. It went from a previous best of 

Operational longevity also increased 

from ten days to 27 days. The R-5 lens, under development by 

Kodak for several years, was finally introduced in 1971. It 

brought an immediate I I performance improvement in the 

camera system. With a focal length of 175 inches, the R-5 lens 

permitted GAMBIT resolution to surpass even the c==J previous 

best. Target coverage also increased from 4,000 to a normal 

6,000 to 10,000 for the R-5 version of GAMBIT. 

A Fully Mature System 

By August 1977 GAMBIT-3, with 48 vehicles flown, was a fully 

mature, successful satellite program. During the next seven 

years, GAMBIT-3 continued to steadily improve its performance. 

Time-on-orbit went to three to four months for each flight. 

Resolutions of ~I __________ ----"Ibecame normal. Target coverage 

also increased significantly. All 38 GAMBIT-1 missions 

photographed only 27,534 targets. GAMBIT-3 mission no. 53 of 15 

April 1983, alone acquired 49,372 targets. By the time of the 

last GAMBIT-3 flight in April 1984, GAMBIT-3 was still producing 

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the high quality imagery which maintained its preeminence ln 

technical collection. 56 

Summary 

The CORONA program provided US policymakers, for the first 

time, a capability to monitor military and industrial 

developments over vast areas of the Soviet Union and other denied 

areas of the world. Although CORONA provided immeasurable 

contributions to national security, its resolution was not good 

enough to answer numerous critical intelligence questions 

regarding Soviet weapons development. Nor could it provide the 

image quality needed to provide true science and technology 

analysis. GAMBIT filled this gap. By the end of the program, 

GAMBIT routinely collected imagery of ~I ____ ~Iground resolved 

distance (GRD) or better. 

GAMBIT imagery closely monitored the Soviet production rate 

of various ballistic missiles and submarine construction rates. 

GAMBIT imagery could identify I 

~------------------------------------~ 

GAMBIT also provided insight into Soviet and 

Chinese missile and space development and operational procedures 

56The development of near-real time imagery systems made the 

GAMBIT-3 film return system obsolete. 

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by observing major missile test facilities on a regular basis. 

This information was vital to US strategic planners. GAMBIT 

information was also used to provide Soviet order-of-battle 

information. Its high resolution allowed US photointerpreters to 

perform I 

~ _______________ IUS 

policymakers and defense planners also were able, through GAMBIT 

imagery, I 

The GAMBIT system proved to be an invaluable intelligence 

collection tool during the Cold War. 

In August 1984 President Ronald Reagan emphasized GAMBIT's 

contribution to US intelligence in a message to DNRO Pete 

Aldridge: 

When the GAMBIT Program commenced we were in the dawn of the 

space age. Technologies we now take for granted had to be 

invented, adapted, and refined to meet the Nation's highest 

intelligence information needs while exploiting the unknown and 

hostile medium of space. Through the years you and your team 

have systematically produced improved satellites providing major 

increases in both quantity and quality of space photography. 

The technology of acquiring high quality pictures from space 

was perfected by the GAMBIT Program engineers; Through the 

years, intelligence gained from these photographs has been 

essential to myself, my predecessors, and others involved with 

international policy decisions. These photographs have greatly 

assisted our arms monitoring initiatives. They have also 

provided vital knowledge about Soviet and Communist Bloc 

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scientific and technological military developments, which is of 

paramount importance in determining our defense posture. 

A generation of this Nation's youth has grown up unaware 

that, in large measure, their security was ensured by the 

dedicated work of your employees. National security interests 

prohibit me from rewarding you with public recognition which you 

so richly deserve. However, rest assured that your 

accomplishments and contributions are well known and appreciated 

at the highest levels of our Nation's government. 

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HEXAGON 

Introduction 

GAMBIT was primarily an NRO/Air Force program to develop a 

high-resolution "spotter-type" satellite. It caused few 

bureaucratic turf battles and became highly successful. 

Proposals for and the development of a second-generation search 

satellite to follow CORONA, however, became embroiled in major 

bureaucratic conflicts between the NRO and the CIA. 

Despite the bureaucratic in-fighting, the development and 

operation of the HEXAGON photo-reconnaissance satellite system 

provided us policymakers and planners with a unique collection 

capability. HEXAGON's ability to cover thousands of square 

nautical miles with contiguous, cloud-free, high resolution 

imagery in a single operation, provided us intelligence users 

with vast amounts of intelligence information on the Soviet Union 

and other denied areas. It also collected unique mapping, 

charting, and geodesic data, large-scale contiguous lmagery 

within specific geometric accuracies. Used in combination with 

the GAMBIT program, HEXAGON was of paramount importance in 

confirming or denying Soviet strategic weapons development and 

deployment. Its ability to detect quickly any new Soviet ICBM 

complex or mobile missile placement became invaluable to US 

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negotiators working on arms-limitation treaties and agreements. 

Origins 

In May 1963, DCI John A. McCone convened a Scientific 

Advisory Panel under the chairmanship of Edwin Purcell, Nobel 

laureate and professor of physics at Harvard University, "to 

determine the future role and posture of the United States 

Reconnaissance Program." The Purcell Panel recommended a CORONA 

improvement program rather than an entirely new satellite system: 

We believe that an attempt to make a completely new (search) 

system which would provide equally wide coverage (as CORONA) with 

a modest improvement in resolution (5-feet, say, instead of 10-

feet ground resolution) would not be a wise investment of 

resources. 

Not entirely satisfied with the Purcell Panel 

recommendation, in the fall of 1963, McCone directed his Deputy 

Director of Science and Technology (DDS&T), Albert D. (Bud) 

Wheelon, to explore the requirements and possible configuration 

for a second generation search satellite to replace CORONA. One 

of the major questions confronting Wheelon and his staff was the 

degree of resolution needed to fulfill the various requirements 

of the Intelligence Community. Wheelon directed his newly 

created Systems Analysis Staff, headed by Jackson D. Maxey, to 

review the types and characteristics of United States 

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Intelligence Board (USIB) targets to determine the kinds of 

coverage needed. A detailed experiment, which included 25 

National Photographic Intelligence Center (NPIC) 

photointerpreters, concluded that the majority of USIB targets 

could be properly identified using imagery with a resolution in 

the 0.6 to 1.2 meter (2 to 4 feet) range. Due to the cost of 

booster rockets, Wheelon concluded that an entirely new camera 

system with a longer focal length covering a large swath would 

have to be developed to meet such target requirements. 

While Wheelon and Maxey continued to work on their study, 

CORONA's Performance Evaluation Team (PET) also looked at the 

problem. The PET investigation effort examined the possibility 

of "scaling up" the CORONA camera from the existing 610 mm (24-

inch) lens to a one meter (40-inch) lens while maintaining the 

same "acuity." According to the PET report, "scaling up" could 

improve CORONA resolution without having to design an entirely 

new camera and satellite. 57 

570ne way of obtaining greater resolution is to use a longer 

focal-length lens. The other is to improve "acuity" of the 

existing system by enlarging and enhancing the imagery. In the 

beginning of the CORONA program there were finite limitations on 

the size of the lens because of the weight restraints of the 

booster vehicle. The optimum focal length was a 610 mm refracting 

lens. Throughout the 14-year CORONA program, the focal length of 

the system never changed -- it was 610 mm for the KH-1, KH-2, KH3, KH-4, KH-4A, and KH-4B cameras. Any increase in the focal 

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DNRO Brockway McMillan and his NRO staff strongly supported 

the Purcell Panel and PET recommendations. This sparked a 

growing debate between the NRO and the CIA over the development 

of a follow-on system to CORONA. 58 

Critical of the NRO position, McCone asked for a meeting 

with Deputy Defense Secretary, Rosewell L. Gilpatric, to discuss 

the issue. On 22 October 1963, McCone and Gilpatric agreed to 

form a separate CIA-NRO/Air Force sponsored research group of the 

nation's leading optical experts to explore the issue of 

improving satellite photography. Chaired by Sidney Drell of 

Stanford University, the group met on 13 November 1963 to study 

image quality. The Drell group findings basically supported the 

CIA contention that the united States needed a new system which 

length would have required a spacecraft with a larger diameter and 

greater payload capacity. It would have meant abandoning the heavy 

refracting-type lenses and developing reflecting-type systems that 

used mirrors and smaller lens cells. Given the limitations of the 

launch vehicles, the CORONA team concentrated on improving the 

acuity of the 610 mm system. 

58McMillan was at odds with McCone and Wheelon over a host of 

NRO/CIA issues. He wrote to Secretary of Defense, Robert 

McNamara, on 12 December 1963, that "the final price of peace with 

the CIA 'considering the temperament of its leaders' was at least 

to give the CIA carte blanche for development of a new search 

system. II McMillan believed that unless something like this was 

done, or the CIA management changed, there would be continued 

obstruction to the NRO and its activity. See * 

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would provide CORONA-type coverage with consistent GAMBIT-type 

resolution. At the same time, in order to augment these studies, 

Wheelon asked for additional reports from Itek and Space 

Technology Laboratories (STL) of the Thompson-Ramo-Wooldridge 

(TRW) Corporation. All seemed in agreement. A new system was 

needed to meet the growlng requirements of the Intelligence 

Community for high quality imagery and expanded coverage. 

Project FULCRUM 

Following up these studies, in May 1964, Wheelon directed 

Itek and STL to prepare a joint proposal for a satellite system 

that could replace both CORONA and GAMBIT. The Itek-STL proposal 

recommended a 2,495 kg (5,500 pounds) payload containing two, 

counter-rotating Itek cameras in an STL three-axis stabilized 

spacecraft with a simple recovery system. A modified Titan II 

booster with no second stage, would place it directly in orbit. 

The camera was to be a dual Maksutov reflective system with f/3.0 

lenses having a 1.5 meter (60-inch) focal length employing a 

corrective lens, beryllium mirror, and eggerate quartz main 

plate. The cameras would provide a nadir resolution from 0.8 to 

1.2 meters (2.7 to 4 feet) at an altitude of 185 km (100 miles). 

In his memorandum recommending NRO/CIA funding for Project 

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FULCRUM, Wheelon suggested the program could be developed within 

24 months. He also stressed the cost savings. According to 

Wheelon, by replacing the CORONA and GAMBIT programs, the 

government could save $100 million to $177 million by the end of 

FY 1969. 59 

McMillan was furious. Wheelon and the CIA were contracting 

for satellite systems and subsystems studies without even 

informing the NRO, which theoretically had responsibility for all 

reconnaissance satellite development. Deputy Director Research 

and Engineering (DDR&E), Eugene Fubini, sympathetic to McMillan's 

position, questioned the entire FULCRUM proposal. Fubini 

reported that the recent CORONA missions seemed to confirm the 

Purcell Panel recommendations that substantial improvement in the 

CORONA camera results could be obtained. Over the strong 

objections of McMillan and Fubini, DCI McCone asked Gilpatric to 

direct the DNRO to establish FULCRUM as an NRO development 

project and assign responsibility for research, development, and 

operation to the CIA. 

Looking for further support, McCone also asked Polaroid's 

Edwin H. (Din) Land to convene a panel of experts to consider the 

59Wheelon estimated that a single FULCRUM launch could return 

as much film as the CORONA and GAMBIT programs and cost less. 

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technical feasibility of the FULCRUM proposal. The group met on 

26 June 1964 and issued its recommendations the same day. Land 

called the proposed system "extremely attractive," and "praised 

the ingenuity of the idea." The Land Panel also noted several 

problem areas but added that the system looked good enough to 

fund study efforts. 

Armed with the Land Panel recommendation, Wheelon, on 2 July 

1964, formally presented a plan to McMillan for initiating 

FULCRUM. After conferring with McMillan, on 8 July, Deputy 

Secretary of Defense, Cyrus Vance, cautiously suggested that the 

DNRO complete comparative studies and explore all possible 

alternatives before committing to the new system. He, 

nevertheless, authorized the CIA to pursue "design tests 

necessary to establish the feasibility of the proposed FULCRUM 

camera concept." 

McCone's and Wheelon's plan went far beyond design studies. 

They wanted to build a strong CIA space system development and 

management capability. Wheelon and McCone received the backing 

of the USIB on 27 July 1964. The Board approved the 

recommendation of its Committee on Overhead Reconnaissance 

(COMOR) that there was an urgent need for a search and 

surveillance system capable of CORONA coverage and GAMBIT 

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resolution. This echoed Wheelon's justification for FULCRUM.50 

In August 1964, Wheelon created a Special Projects Group (SPG) 

within DS&T to handle all CIA satellite reconnaissance programs. 

He named Jackson D. Maxey FULCRUM Project Manager. (Maxey was one 

of several senior engineers Wheelon hired from industry.) He 

also brought in Leslie Dirks as project engineer. In addition, 

Wheelon proposed to McCone that the CIA sponsor two competitive 

design efforts for the film-handling system for the FULCRUM 

camera. At the same time, Wheelon initiated spacecraft and 

recovery vehicle competitions. Itek won the camera competition. 

General Electric (GE) became the spacecraft contractor and Avco 

the reentry vehicle designer. These CIA efforts touched off a 

bureaucratic donnybrook with the NRO and DoD that threatened the 

very fabric of the US National Reconnaissance Program (NRP) .61 

McMillan and the NRO believed Wheelon and the CIA had 

exceeded their authority and gone far beyond preliminary design 

concepts. McMillan took sharp exception to CIA's development of 

a spacecraft and a satellite recovery vehi~le (SRV). Such 

development, McMillan believed, was contrary to the Third NRP 

Agreement that gave the NRO specific responsibility for the 

61See* . 

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spacecraft and SRV. McMillan protested that the CIA should limit 

its activity to developing the sensors carried by the satellites. 

McMillan requested a suspension of further CIA efforts until the 

situation could be considered by the ExCom. 62 

Meanwhile, CIA officials learned that DNRO McMillan had 

authorized Secretary of the Air Force/Special Projects Office 

(SAFSP) to begin preliminary designs for a photographic payload 

that would include an optimal search and broad-coverage satellite 

system. McMillan authorized this SAFSP study in early 1964, even 

before the CIA's FULCRUM project. These efforts became known as 

S-2. Eastman Kodak and Itek completed S-2 preliminary designs by 

September 1964. Even after the formal approval of the CIA's 

FULCRUM project, McMillan approved further camera studies at 

Fairchild Camera and initiated studies for a new orbiting vehicle 

at both Lockheed and General Electric in support of S-2.63 

Relations between the NRO and the CIA continued to 

deteriorate. Even before Deputy Secretary Vance established a 

steering group to evaluate the most promising search and/or 

62The ExCom was made up the DCI, John McCone, the Secretary of 

Defense Robert McNamara, and the President's Scientific Advisor, 

See * 

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surveillance satellite and the CIA agreed to participate, 

cooperation between the CIA and the NRO became virtually nonexistent. When McMillan asked Wheelon to furnish a FULCRUM 

briefing to the steering group for "the new NRO Search 

ISurveillance Satellite system," Wheelon refused. He replied 

that "he would have to await instructions from 'his boss' before 

agreeing to brief the steering group as requested." Wheelon 

added that, "his organization was not persuaded that the steering 

group was a proper or good idea. "64 Given this attitude, the 

steering group accomplished little. 

In this fight, McMillan and his NRO staff stood virtually 

alone in attempting to defend the authorities of the NRO. 

Secretary of Defense McNamara and most of the Defense Department 

were preoccupied with Vietnam. The regular, or White Air Force, 

totally ignored space activities. The Air Force Space Systems 

and Air Staff were still smarting from being excluded from most 

satellite developments. Even SAFSP took a limited interest. 

Located in Los Angeles, California, SAFSP officers concerned 

themselves solely with operations. They saw their role as 

strictly "birding" (launching and operating satellites) . Future 

systems were not their concern. Nor was politics. They saw 

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politics as strictly a function of their "Washington branch." 

Moreover, coming from Bell Laboratories, McMillan had few inside 

connections either in Congress, the White House, or the 

Department of State. 65 

To get around the DoD's steering group, McCone turned to Din 

Land and his panel of experts to evaluate FULCRUM.66 Convening 

at Itek headquarters in Boston on 23 February 1965, the panel 

heard presentations on FULCRUM as well as the other search system 

studies funded by the NRO (S-2) by Eastman Kodak, Itek, and 

Fairchild Camera. Itek officials startled CIA officials when 

they announced to Land that Itek was withdrawing its support from 

the FULCRUM program because of disagreements with CIA over the 

systems specifications. 67 

McCone and Wheelon had hoped and expected that the Land 

Panel findings would be the basis for early approval of FULCRUM 

66The Panel 

Dr. Donald Ling, 

Purcell, and Dr. 

consisted of Land, 

Dr. James Baker 1 

Joseph Shea. 

chairman, Dr. Sidney Drell, 

Dr. Allen Puckett, Dr. Edwin 

67CIA and Itek squabbled over the angle through which the 

camera system would scan. The CIA demanded a 120-degree scan. 

Itek officials felt this angle was too large and would seriously 

prejudice the FULCRUM design. See * 

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by the ExCom. 68 In order to preserve FULCRUM sensor work and the 

momentum of the project, Wheelon quickly arranged to transfer 

Itek's government-funded Itek-design plans for the FULCRUM camera 

system to Perkin-Elmer of Norwalk, Connecticut. Perkin-Elmer had 

been working on a smaller back-up design for the CIA since June 

1964. 69 

The steadily growing hostility between the NRO and the CIA 

and the constant battles between Wheelon and McMillan brought the 

program to a near standstill. On 13 July 1965, in a report to 

Vance and new DCI Vice Admiral William F. Raborn, Jr., McMillan 

indicated he intended to select the $-2 system for a new search 

satellite. Upon the advice of Wheelon, Raborn countered by 

asking Vance to delay any decision pending the Land Panel's 

report. On 26 July 1965, the Land Panel finally issued its 

recommendation. It satisfied no one. The Panel recommended that 

all three camera system studies (the CIA effort at Perkin-Elmer 

and the NRO $-2 programs at Itek and Kodak) be funded for an 

68In fact, the Land Panel had made no recommendation on the new 

camera system by the time McCone resigned as DCI in April 1965. 

President Lyndon Johnson replaced McCone with Vice Admiral William 

F. Raborn, Jr. 

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addi tional three months. 70 

At this point work on FULCRUM virtually came to a standstill as DCI Raborn and Deputy Secretary of Defense Vance worked 

out a new NRP Agreement the fourth. Signed on 13 August 1965, 

the new agreement gave the CIA responsibility for developing the 

optical sensor subsystem of the advanced general-search satellite 

(FULCRUM) and the engineering development of the spacecraft, 

reentry vehicles, and booster to the NRO and the Air Force. Both 

sides hoped this carefully crafted agreement would provide the 

in-coming DNRO, Alexander Flax, with the authorities and leverage 

to resolve the bitter, divisive debate between the NRO and the 

CIA over roles and responsibilities for the new satellite system. 

It did not. 

McMillan departed the NRO on 30 September 1965, disappointed 

that the new agreement was less explicit in stating the 

authorities of the DNRO than the old agreement had been. The new 

agreement did not please many in the CIA either. Maxey, who 

headed the FULCRUM effort and was chief of the Special Projects 

Staff (SPS), resigned because he felt strongly that the new NRP 

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pact was too restrictive on the CIA.71 

HEXAGON Development 

Flax moved quickly to get the new system on track and mend 

relations with the CIA. DDCI Richard Helms also moved to develop 

a more cooperative relationship between the Agency and DoD. He 

wrote to Flax that the CIA was consolidating all CIA elements 

supporting the NRO into an organization headed by Huntington 

Sheldon, the Director of CIA Reconnaissance, and that all CIA 

satellite activities would be placed in a new Office of Special 

Projects (OSP) under John Crowley. Aiding the situation was the 

fact that Crowley, the new chief, and Flax got along well. Flax, 

in turn, established a Technical Task Group and a Project 

Management Task Group to study the various forms of program 

development and program partnership. Nevertheless, the bickering 

continued. 72 

Faced with a lack of consensus on the "right" way to do the 

project, Flax devised his own plan for the management and 

7lWheelon recruited Donald W. Patterson as 

program chief and John J. Crowley as Chief SPS. 

the time, heading the CORONA project. 

72See* 

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the new FULCRUM 

Crowley was, at 
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technical development of FULCRUM. On 22 April 1966, Flax 

submitted his plan to the ExCom for consideration and approval. 

Now called the HELIX program, Flax recommended a management 

approach that would make the CIA OSP responsible for the entire 

sensor subsystem and SAFSP responsible for the remaining system 

elements. He proposed making the Director, SAFSP, the project 

director for the entire system, stating that SAFSP was "the only 

NRP component possessing the personnel, facilities, operational 

resources, experience, and technical competence to be designated 

Special Project Director (SPD) for the new general search and 

surveillance satellite system." CIA officials countered that the 

CIA's in-house technical personnel and its relationship with the 

contractors built up over the years, gave it the capability of 

program management commensurate with that of SAFSP.73 

Despite continuing CIA protests, the ExCom, meeting In 

executive session on 26 April 1966, approved Flax's HELIX/HEXAGON 

program proposal as submitted. 74 Finally, more than two years 

after the original FULCRUM planning, the ExCom gave formal 

73See * 

74The ExCom consisted of 

Defense Vance and Presidential 

Horning. 

DCI Raborn, 

Scientific 

73 

Deputy 

Advisor, 

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Secretary of 

Dr. Donald 
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authority for developing a new search and surveillance satellite 

system -- HEXAGON. Flax's compromises did not resolve all issues 

between the CIA and the NRO but they did reduce the "turf 

battles" and allowed development of HEXAGON to proceed. 

The Sensor Subsystem 

The CIA awarded Perkin-Elmer the contract for the design, 

development, and fabrication of the camera system for HEXAGON in 

October 1966, in a cost-plus-fixed-fee contract. Funding for the 

period 10 October 1966 through 30 June 1967 was $30 million. 

Realizing that the HEXAGON contract was the largest single 

program ever undertaken by Perkin-Elmer, OSP chief, Crowley, 

traveled to Perkin-Elmer headquarters to urge the company's 

executives to use a new System Engineering/Technical Support 

(SETS) System developed by the TRW Corporation. 75 Despite 

Crowley's concern and special effort to warn Perkin-Elmer of the 

immense size of the HEXAGON project, by the end of 1966, work at 

Perkin-Elmer was already several weeks behind schedule. Just 

manning the program was a major problem. Perkin-EImer's original 

75Total Perkin-Elmer employment in the Norwalk, Connecticut, 

area was 2,800 (1,350 of these in the Optical Group, of which 150 

were involved with HEXAGON) . 

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proposal called for growth from 150 to 600 people within four 

months and to 700 by the eighth month. This rate proved 

impossible to achieve, especially given the long delays in 

security and clearance approvals. Perkin-EImer's lack of 

extensive electronic-design experience and shortage of electronic 

engineers also created serious problems. In addition, the 

general Perkin-Elmer management structure was simply inadequate 

for the magnitude of the HEXAGON program. In January 1967, 

Crowley decided the situation required drastic action. He 

invited the key Perkin-Elmer managers, including company 

president, Chester W. Nimitz, Jr. (Rear Adm. USN ret.) to CIA 

headquarters for a management planning session. Crowley told the 

Perkin-Elmer officials that he was "deeply distressed and vitally 

concerned" about the lack of progress and even more concerned 

about Perkin-EImer's attitude toward deficiencies that had 

surfaced in both management and technology. Crowley's frank talk 

resulted in a management overhaul at Perkin-Elmer. 76 

The HEXAGON sensor subsystem developed by Perkin-Elmer 

consisted of a two camera assembly, the film supply, and four 

take-ups. Located in the HEXAGON satellite mid-section, the 

camera assembly contained a pair of panoramic cameras mounted in 

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a frame. One camera looked forward on the satellite vehicle 

(camera A, port side) and the other looked aft (camera B, 

starboard side). Each camera had a 60-inch focal length, f/ 3.0 

folded Wright optical system. This optical system, which 

contained both reflection and refracting optical elements, was 

mounted in an optical bar. 

Perkin-EImer's optical bar involved two, one-meter diameter 

tubes, each containing a 75-cm (30-inch) optically flat mirror, 

mounted at a 45-degree angle to reflect the ground images passing 

g beneath the satellite and through a corrector plate, into a 91 

cm (36-inch) concave main mirror at one end of the tube. Images 

collected in the main mirror were then focused through a hole in 

the flat mirror and into a compound lens, located behind the flat 

mirror. The compound lens then projected the images onto the 

film platen at the opposite end of the optical tube. As the 

satellite moved through space, each optical bar tube rotated 

about its longitudinal axis, in opposite directions. This 

provided a panoramic image, up to 120 inches wide. Each opticalbar was longer than the payload part of CORONA. Just to test the 

tubes, Perkin-Elmer built an entirely new facility at Danbury, 

Connecticut. 77 

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Early on, Perkin Elmer had difficulties with the 91-cm main 

mirror. InitiallY, the West German firm supplied the mirror 

blanks, which were quartz optical surfaces fused to ceramic 

cores. The first blanks exhibited faults in the bonding of the 

face plates to the cores. These first, fused quartz, blanks were 

also very heavy and brittle for use in space. CIA and PerkinElmer engineers searched for a different material that was 

lighter weight, with a lower coefficient of expansion. 

Beryllium, a relatively rare and lightweight metal, met all 

their requirements. It was one third as heavy as aluminum, had a 

very low coefficient of linear expansion, resisted oxidation, and 

was capable of being polished to a very high degree of 

reflectance. Its reflectivity extended beyond the visible 

spectrum into the infrared area, where many other mirrors failed. 

Unfortunately, beryllium was toxic. Inhalation of beryllium 

salts caused a reaction similar to chlorine poisoning. 78 

Despite the hazards, Perkin-Elmer undertook a program to 

develop a beryllium folding mirror for the twin-60 cameras. It 

soon abandoned the project as too expensive and dangerous. 

Eventually, Perkin-Elmer decided to use a heavier but less 

expensive and less dangerous product produced by the Corning 

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Glass Company, known as ultra-low-expansion (ULE) glass. ULE 

glass has several advantages as well. It was of lightweight, 

almost 100 pounds less per mirror blank then fused quartz, and it 

had a much lower coefficient of expansion. Its cost, however, 

was 20 percent greater than the German blanks. HEXAGON managers 

reverted to the West German product. 79 

The Mapping Camera Module 

In order for imagery to be useful for measurement purposes 

(measuring distance and determining the size of objects on the 

ground), satellite altitude and position information needed to be 

recorded at the exact moment a picture was taken. In the CORONA 

system, this was accomplished by using a stellar-index camera, a 

separate unit which took pictures of both the star fields and the 

ground, thus allowing analysts to determine vehicle altitude and 

position accurately. This made it possible to prepare maps from 

CORONA imagery. The Defense Mapping Agency also desired a map 

making capability from HEXAGON imagery. In July 1968 Itek became 

the prime contractor for the stellar-terrain camera and GE for 

the RV. This was nearly 20 months after Perkin-Elmer won the 

contract for the main HEXAGON cameras. First launch date was 

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projected for April 1970. 

Itek Corporation had far less trouble with the mapping 

camera module than Perkin-Elmer had with the main camera. Itek 

developed and built a mapping camera module that contained a 

stellar-terrain camera with a 12-inch f/6.0 metric lens with 

eight elements. It used 9.5 inch film. The stellar camera, 

which imaged stars above sixth magnitude had two 10-inch f/ 20 

systems -- one looking out each side of the module. It used 70-

mm film. The GE RV was simply an improved version of the vehicle 

originally developed for the CORONA program, modified to 

accommodate the 9.5 inch and 70 mm film take-ups.8o 

The Satellite Vehicle 

It was not until 20 July 1967 that DNRO Flax finally 

approved a contractor, Lockheed, for the spacecraft. Under the 

leadership of program manager, Stanley I. Weiss, the general 

vehicle configuration for HEXAGON soon began to emerge. HEXAGON 

would be a satellite vehicle 10 feet in diameter and with an 

overall length of nearly 47 feet. One section would be devoted 

to the satellite control unit (the brains of HEXAGON), one to the 

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sensor subsystem (the cameras), and a recovery section of four 

RV's. To grasp the sheer size of HEXAGON, the spacecraft weighed 

five times more than the CORONA payload - - 22,500 pounds 

compared to 4,280 pounds. It was designed to be well within the 

lift capabilities of the Titan III-D booster. 

The spacecraft design and development experienced few major 

problems. In early 1971, however, Lockheed itself became involved 

in a serious financial imbroglio which nearly brought about the 

collapse of the company. Rolls-Royce Motors Ltd. of Great 

Britain was under contract to provide the jet engines for 

Q~~'~"') 

Lockheed's new wide-body TriStar airliner. ROllAs financial 

collapse threatened Lockheed's promised delivery of its TriStar's 

to several airlines. This in turn created a cash-flow problem 

for Lockheed (Lockheed was already claiming heavy losses 

connected with its Air Force C-5A Galaxy aircraft) . 

In order not to delay the highly classified work then being 

performed by Lockheed for CORONA and HEXAGON, the firm spun off 

its missiles and space division. It became Lockheed Missiles and 

Space Company, a wholly owned subsidiary. It was, however, now 

protected if Lockheed found it necessary to declare bankruptcy. 

Eventually, the US Government provided a $210 million loan to 

help Lockheed avoid bankruptcy. It, nevertheless, was a close 

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call for some of the United States' most closely held programs. 81 

Although progress on the various HEXAGON components 

continued, mounting cost overruns and delays brought slippage to 

the projected launch schedule. By late 1967, Flax and the entire 

Intelligence Community began to fear that further slips in the 

HEXAGON launch schedule might result in a period during which 

there would be no photo coverage of the Soviet union. 82 

Bickering between NRO officials and the CIA continued as 

well as CIA and SAFSP fought over the development of on-orbit 

operational control software for the system. CIA officials 

wanted to control the satellite from the Satellite Operations 

Center (SOC) in Washington, sending specific commands to the STC 

in California for re-transmission to the satellite. This was the 

system used for the CORONA program. SAFSP maintained that the 

complexity of the new system required that all control of the 

satellite be done by the Satellite Control Center (SCC) at 

Sunnyvale, California. In a compromise, Flax finally decided 

that the SOC in Washington would send a list of requirements with 

82The number of CORONA vehicles was now severely limited. 

There were only 11 left in the barn. They could only be stretched 

out so far. 

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their priorities to the SCC where the actual target selection for 

a particular revolution would be made, given weather conditions 

and vehicle health. Although the CIA was not entirely happy with 

the decision, it was, nevertheless, a semi-victory for the Agency 

since the CIA now controlled the requirements which drove the 

system. 83 

Attempts to Cancel HEXAGON 

From the origins of the HEXAGON (FULCRUM) program, critics 

maintained that system requirements could be satisfied less 

expensively by improving CORONA or by using some other less 

sophisticated system. When the cost of HEXAGON at Perkin-Elmer 

alone rose dramatically in February 1968 and other contractors 

began showing similar cost increases, the critics intensified 

their efforts. In 1968, new Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul 

Nitze questioned the need for HEXAGON. Echoing Nitze's concerns 

and confronted with escalating Vietnam costs, the Bureau of the 

Budget (BoB) recommended that HEXAGON be cancelled in early 1968. 

HEXAGON was the single most expensive item in the 1968-1970 

National Reconnaissance Program (NRP). As an alternative to 

HEXAGON, the DNRO, Flax, asked the CIA for cost estimates for 

83See * 

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developing an Improved CORONA system. The CIA reported that an 

improved CORONA, without a complete redesign, (with costs 

estimated to be equal to those of completing HEXAGON) could never 

provide the search resolutions needed for verification of arms 

limitation agreements (resolutions of 3.0 feet or better). After 

reviewing the CIA estimates, $91 million to $93 million for 20 

Improved CORONA satellites, an NRO study group recommended to the 

ExCom that HEXAGON be continued. The ExCom agreed and nothing 

came of the Bureau of the Budget's recommendation. 84 

The Presidential election in November 1968 and the 

inauguration of Richard M. Nixon as President in January 1969 

brought a series of personnel changes and another look at the 

HEXAGON program. Melvin Laird became Secretary of Defense and 

John L. McLucas, a former DDR&E and head of the MITRE 

Corporation, replaced Flax as DNRO. In the spring of 1969, the 

Bureau of the Budget renewed its recommendation to cancel 

84See *. The CIA reported that even an Improved CORONA could 

never provide search resolutions much better than 4.5 feet. The 

Budget Bureau questioned whether a 1.5 foot difference in 

resolution could possibly be worth the major cost it estimated it 

would take to complete the HEXAGON program. The decision was 

already made, however. 

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HEXAGON. 85 Bureau officials reasoned that the Air Force's 

Project DORIAN, with its Manned Orbiting Laboratory (MOL) and its 

larger KH-10 camera, took precedence. 

The concept behind the Air Force's Manned Orbital Laboratory 

(MOL) was that having humans aboard the spacecraft would make the 

KH-10 camera more responsive to intelligence demands. CIA 

studies, however, challenged that assumption. According to the 

CIA reports, the movement of personnel within the MOL would cause 

the spacecraft to oscillate thereby blurring the photography. 

The CIA added that a human operator could simply not point the 

KH-10 camera as fast as the HEXAGON cameras could point and take 

their broad-coverage panoramic photographs. 

As Perkin-Elmer began to layoff employees in response to 

the Bureau of the Budget recommendation, DCI Richard Helms 

mounted a major effort to have HEXAGON reinstated. He called 

upon Roland Inlow, who had been deeply involved in planning for 

the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks (SALT) to study the impact of 

the loss of HEXAGON on arms limitations negotiations. Inlow 

found that all SALT proposals being made by US officials were 

predicated on the availability of large-scale search photography 

85The Bureau of the Budget was simply dismayed at the size of 

the satellite programs underway in the CIA, Air Force, and NRO. 

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from HEXAGON satellites. 86 Helms urged Inlow to brief James R. 

Schlesinger, the Bureau of the Budget's Director for 

International Relations, on his findings. Inlow did. Helms and 

Inlow also invited Schlesinger, Vice President Spiro Agnew, and 

DNRO McLucas for a briefing at NPIC on the HEXAGON and DORIAN 

projects. After hearing the briefing, Schlesinger and Agnew 

recommended to President Nixon that the HEXAGON program be 

reinstated. On 15 June 1969, the BoB reversed its decision, 

cancelled Project DORIAN and reinstituted Project HEXAGON. Fullscale work resumed on the camera system at Perkin-Elmer but the 

cost continued to escalate. 

One More Challenge for Perkin-Elmer 

One of the most difficult engineering problems confronting 

Perkin-Elmer and CIA engineers was the challenge of moving film 

at very high velocities over many rollers and around sharp bends 

to deliver it to the focal-plane platen and then transfer it to 

the take-up reels in the film buckets. The high speeds and shiny 

surfaces created many problems, including the familiar Van de 

Graaff effect which had plagued CORONA. Another problem was the 

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heat generated by the friction of the film as it rubbed over 

rubber rollers or on shiny metallic bearing surfaces. In 

prototype models, the film heated up, became gummy, and stuck to 

these surfaces 

Perkin-Elmer engineers, headed by Rod Scott, attacked the 

film transport problem by adapting a unique air-bag (a gascushioned bearing surface) approach Scott had designed for the 

OXCART (SR-71) cameras. This method permitted moving the film 

through the spacecraft without it touching either rubber or metal 

until it reached the focal-plane platen, and then not again until 

it reached the take-up reel. The 168 mm film, traveling at 6.6 

meters (21.6 feet) per second, left the supply spool, entered the 

film channel, traveled nearly four meters to the focal-plane 

platen, stopped to accept images from the optical-bar lenses, and 

moved along another 6 meters to the take-up reel. In between the 

film-supply reel and the platen and between the platen and the 

take-up reel, the film was allowed to go slack ln a buffer 

chamber known as a "looper" so that the torque of starting and 

stopping would not stretch or tear it. 87 

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Launch 

Despite the set backs, all appeared ready for a first launch 

on 15 June 1971. One final glitch appeared when Lockheed 

attempted to move the flight vehicle from Sunnyvale to Vandenberg 

Air Force Base for launch preparation. The State of California 

restricted use of the vehicle transporter (a mammoth vehicle some 

14 feet high, 14 feet wide, and 70 feet long) to daylight, 

weekday, and non-rush hours. It was 28 May, the start of the 

Memorial Day weekend. The satellite could not be moved to 

Vandenberg until after the holiday. 

The HEXAGON spacecraft itself was as big as a locomotive and 

16.7 meters (55 feet) long, almost as large as NASA's Spacelab, 

and weighed several metric tons. It contained two giant, 

rotating optical-bar tubes, each with a 91 cm mirror and a 

camera. There were also four satellite recovery vehicles (SRV's) 

for returning film to earth and a 208,000 foot film supply. At 

1141 PDT 15 June 1971, the first HEXAGON, sitting atop a Titan 

III-D missile, roared over the launch pad. The Lompoc, 

California Record reported the launch and nicknamed the satellite 

"Big Bird." 

On 20 June 1971, during orbital revolution 82, the first 

film bucket separated from the satellite and reentered the 

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earth's atmosphere in the Hawaiian recovery area. Recovery teams 

sighted the capsule and its badly damaged parachute. It hit the 

ocean but the recovery teams got to it before it sank. The film 

was immediately flown to Eastman Kodak in Rochester, New York for 

processing. An NPIC representative at Eastman Kodak remarked 

after reviewing the film, "My God, we never dreamed there would 

be this much, this good! We'll have to revamp our entire 

operation to handle the stuff. "88 

The second film bucket was brought back to earth on 26 June 

and recovery teams successfully snatched it in midair. Both the 

first two buckets provided extensive coverage of Soviet missile 

sites and other sensitive targets. The US Intelligence Community 

greeted the product enthusiastically. Unfortunately, when the 

third RV deorbited on 10 July, its main parachute failed 

completely and the bucket made a high-speed impact into the 

Pacific Ocean. It sank in several thousand meters of water 

before the recovery team could reach it. A recovery team 

snatched the fourth film bucket without incident on 16 July. 

Approximately 75 percent of the photography in the three 

recovered film buckets was free of clouds, a considerable 

improvement over earlier satellite photography. This was due to 

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a revolutionary new system named the HEXAGON Targeting Program 

(HTP). The HTP effort was a computer-based method for 

determining, prior to launch, the accessibility on the intended 

targets for each mission as well as the likelihood of their being 

cloud-free. The major features of the HTP included: the use of 

World Aeronautical Chart (WAC) divisions known as World 

Aeronautical Grid (WAG) cells, which were a uniform 12 by 18 

nautical miles, computer routines for forecasting cloud cover, 

and maintaining a WAC cell climatological history. Eventually, 

HTP became part of a much larger NRO effort known as TUNITY. It 

was used in coordination with the Air Force's advanced Defense 

Meteorological Satellite Program and increased the efficiency of 

HEXAGON cameras to 90 percent. 

During its 52-day mission (31 days active phase) this first 

HEXAGON conducted 430 photo operations and produced an average 

ground resolution of 3.5 feet and a best Controlled Optical Range 

Network (CORN) target resolution of 2.3 feet. It used 175,601 

feet (1,350 pounds) of film. Of this 123,601 feet (930 pounds) 

was recovered. In comparison, the first successful CORONA 

recovery (August 1960) carried 20 pounds of film. Later CORONA 

flights carried 40 pounds, the two-capsule version, 80 pounds. 

In the GAMBIT program, GAMBIT-1 carried 45 pounds of film and 

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surface, most of the film stacks fell back to the ocean floor. 

Only a fraction of the film was salvageable and it held no 

intelligence value. It was a major disappointment for HEXAGON 

officials. 91 

The fourth HEXAGON mission, no. 1204, launched on 10 October 

1972, involved an extraordinary effort by CIA and NRO officials 

to test color film and analyze camera focus. This exercise 

deployed Controlled Range Network (CORN) targets throughout the 

Southwest United States to evaluate HEXAGON camera operations 

with color film. A 28-man team, traveling from southern 

California to Texas, cleared sites and erected and dismantled 

various configurations of CORN targets from 11 October to 17 

December. These targets, large cloth panels, known as tribars, 

because of their alternating black-grey-white colors, were 

carefully placed along the ground trace of the HEXAGON satellite 

so they were photographable as the HEXAGON passed overhead. 

Known as ground-truthing, CIA and NRO engineers used the 

photographs of these targets to analyze the focus accuracy of the 

HEXAGON optical system. Toward the end of the mission, the team 

deployed specially prepared colored targets to test the color 

film attached on to the end of the regular HEXAGON film supply. 

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NRO and CIA officials considered this 68-day mission highly 

successful. 92 

The fifth HEXAGON flight, mission 1205, launched on 9 March 

1973, was the first to carry the separate Mapping Camera System. 

Both the stellar and the terrain cameras functioned well during 

the mission. Defense Mapping Agency analysts rated the results 

"outstanding." Numerous small man-made features were easily 

detected and often identifiable; a baseball diamond, a small 

aircraft on a taxiway, individual homes with driveways and 

automobiles. This was quite remarkable for a 12-inch focallength lens at a 92-mile altitude. The stellar photography also 

provided adequate star images in both magnitude and quality.93 

A Change in Management 

When President Nixon approved the CIA proposal for a followon imaging system as the next photo reconnaissance system in 

September 1971, Carl Duckett, DDS&T, and other CIA officials, 

began to look for ways to ensure that the new program was 

properly staffed. They asked DNRO John McLucas to consolidate 

all aspects of the HEXAGON program under Program A (SAFSP) so 

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that Program B (CIA) could concentrate on the new revolutionary 

system. McLucas agreed and transferred Program B 

responsibilities for HEXAGON to Program A. The transfer went 

smoothly and on 1 July 1973, General David D. Bradburn, Director 

SAFSP, formally assumed all responsibility for management of the 

HEXAGON system, wiring the CIA "we will do our very best to 

continue the proud record." The CIA's Office of Special Projects 

was now free to focus on the next generation of imagery 

satellites. 

The HEXAGON program continued to fly with ever-improving 

results after the transfer. Unfortunately, the HEXAGON program 

ended sadly on 18 April 1986. A catastrophic Titan 34D failure, 

nine seconds after lift-off, terminated the 20th and final 

HEXAGON mission. Nevertheless, during its 13 year-life, HEXAGON 

proved to be an invaluable intelligence collection tool. 

Summary 

Despite numerous delays and large cost over-runs, HEXAGON 

met 70 to 80 percent of all the US Intelligence Community's 

surveillance requirements. A typical HEXAGON mission imaged 

nearly 21,000 targets. Considering that the Soviet Union 

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encompassed an area of almost 7 million sq. nm, the mature 

HEXAGON system would image about 80 percent of this area, cloudfree, on a typical mission. During its lifetime, HEXAGON played 

a key role in monitoring Soviet research and development, 

production, and deployment of strategic offensive and defensive 

weapons systems. It made possible the first Strategic Arms 

Limitation Treaty (SALT) in 1972. HEXAGON's broad area coverage 

capability provided US officials a high degree of confidence, 

that the United States could detect any new Soviet installations 

or activities early in the construction phase. The ability of 

HEXAGON to furnish high quality imagery of military installations 

also allowed US intelligence analysts to develop and maintain 

very accurate, order-of-battle information on Soviet, Warsaw 

Pact, and Chinese forces. 94 Entire Soviet military districts, 

for example, could, at times, be imaged on a single mission. 

These images provided current and accurate force-structure 

assessments. HEXAGON's broad area coverage provided the US 

analysts opportunities to monitor large-scale Soviet military 

exercises. In March 1979, for example, when the Soviets staged a 

94The high quality of HEXAGON imagery is often overlooked 

because the GAMBIT program which produced imagery of the very 

highest quality, overlapped HEXAGON. Nevertheless, HEXAGON was 

capable of meeting most Intelligence Community requirements. 

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major military exercise in Mongolia, in response to the Chinese 

attack on Vietnam, HEXAGON captured the Soviet mobilization. 

HEXAGON was also tasked to provide coverage of Soviet and 

Chinese nuclear test sites; often providing complete coverage of 

these test sites often in a single image. This allowed US 

officials to closely monitor test preparations and assemble data 

on the tests themselves. HEXAGON also played a key contributing 

role in US economic forecasts and projections regarding the 

Soviet economy. During its lifetime, HEXAGON provided economic 

intelligence on Soviet heavy metal production, oil and natural 

gas exploitation, nuclear production, and conventional electrical 

power capacity. It also photographed Soviet grain-growing 

regions allowing accurate US predictions on Soviet grain 

production. 

In addition to its coverage of the Soviet Union and China, 

HEXAGON produced more detailed knowledge of third world 

development than any system before or since. From HEXAGON, the 

US located the I 

~------------------------------------------~ 

~ _____ ~I Moreover, the Defense Mapping Agency and other 

government agencies that produced maps and charts were almost 

solely dependent on HEXAGON for mapping source materials. Not a 

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bad job for an over-sized "big bird." 

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Conclusion 

During the heart of the Cold War, the NRO, with its CIA and 

Air Force components and their industry partners, designed, 

developed, built, and operated the GAMBIT and HEXAGON photoreconnaissance satellite systems. The growing reality of a 

Soviet nuclear arsenal, the development of Soviet nuclear-tipped 

ICBM's, and a vigorous Soviet nuclear weapons program, combined 

with an increasingly complex and divisive Vietnam conflict, 

created a global crisis atmosphere for US policymakers during the 

1960s and 1970s. A sense of extraordinary urgency swept over 

Washington as US officials searched for intelligence on the 

Soviet Union and its allies. 

This crisis atmosphere drove the NRO effort to develop the 

next generation of search and surveillance satellites and to 

provide US decision makers with ever more detailed imagery. 

Building on the pioneer efforts and accomplishments of the CORONA 

program, US designers, engineers, scientists, and managers pushed 

photo-reconnaissance and space flight technologies to their limit 

in order to meet the demand for more and better photographs from 

space of Soviet activities. Most program officials felt the 

security of the United States depended upon their success. 

The years of GAMBIT and HEXAGON program development were 

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marked by great vision, repeated disappointment and failure, and 

finally by extraordinary triumphs. GAMBIT, an NRO/Air 

Force/private industry effort strove to capture clear details of 

Soviet weapons activity. Under constant pressure to achieve 

results quickly and operating almost totally in a "black" 

environment, the GAMBIT program suffered from excessive 

compartmentation and secrecy. CORONA program development, with 

its successes and failures, for example, remained virtually 

unknown to GAMBIT officials. This resulted in duplication of 

effort and long delays in design and testing time. Only the 

introduction of CORONA technologies such as the stabilizing Agena 

second stage "hitchup, 11 the state-of-the-art, Lockheed developed, 

roll-joint, "Lifeboat," and CORONA recovery techniques saved the 

early GAMBIT program from cancellation and catastrophic failure. 

Frustrated time and again with system problems, the GAMBIT team 

finally reached its goal of routinely providing US intelligence 

analysts with I I resolution imagery. It was a giant step 

from the fuzzy, 20-30 feet resolution imagery provided by the 

early CORONA cameras. This imagery was even better than manned 

reconnaissance photography. It amazed US photointerpreters. 

Overcoming technical uncertainty, GAMBIT scientists and 

engineers not only brought a revolution to space photography but 

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they made major improvements in satellite command and control 

systems, time on orbit, and target coverage. Its impact on us 

intelligence capabilities was enormous. Combined with the 

imagery data from CORONA and HEXAGON, GAMBIT provided the US 

Intelligence Community with over 90 percent of its hard data on 

the Soviet Union. For the first time, using GAMBIT imagery, US 

officials had detailed factual information and accurate 

mensuration data to actually develop engineering drawings on 

Soviet weapons capabilities. This helped US officials save 

billions of dollars in US weapons development alone. President 

Lyndon Johnson expressed his appreciation for these satellites 

when in early 1967 he told a meeting of American educators that 

these satellites "justified spending ten times what the nation 

had already spent on space." "Because of this reconnaissance," 

the President confided to the group, "I know how many missiles 

the enemy has." President Johnson also knew, because of GAMBIT, 

the approximate capabilities and state of readiness of Soviet 

ICBMs. 

HEXAGON, like GAMBIT, was a daring technological challenge. 

An NRO/CIA/ industry program, HEXAGON became the ultimate filmreturn photo-reconnaissance satellite system. It, like GAMBIT, 

suffered hard times during its development stages. Not only were 

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there technological problems to overcome, camera and film design, 

reflective and refractive mirror construction, and film movement, 

but HEXAGON also suffered from constant bureaucratic struggles 

over who would control the program. The often bitter debates 

between the NRO and the CIA caused major delays in design and 

development time. This resulted in serious launch slippages and 

major cost overruns. Originally proposed as a cost-saving system 

to replace CORONA and GAMBIT, HEXAGON became the most expensive 

system yet build. Nevertheless, HEXAGON proved to be an 

extraordinary success. It had the capability of providing 

stereoscopic, cloud-free photography over 80 to 90 percent of the 

Sino-soviet landmass on each mission. In addition, HEXAGON had 

the unique ability to satisfy surveillance and mapping, charting, 

and geodetic data requirements. HEXAGON imagery, by providing 

continuous direct evidence of Soviet activities, helped eliminate 

the surprise element for US officials and increased the 

Intelligence Community's and US policymakers confidence in the 

overall intelligence product. It provided the hard data for 

analysis. It also provided assurance to US leaders negotiating 

arms limitation agreements with the Soviets. 

GAMBIT and HEXAGON proved to be of paramount importance to 

US policymakers. with these systems, US officials had detailed 

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information on Soviet strategic weapons development and 

deployment. Any new Soviet ICBM complex or development, such as 

mobile missile deployment, was quickly detected. Soviet 

construction of antiballistic (ABM) sites, nuclear submarines, 

aircraft, and naval vessels, and Soviet ballistic missile 

launchings were all carefully monitored by GAMBIT and HEXAGON. 

Conceived and built under a crisis situation, these systems 

stretched space technologies and ultimately performed well beyond 

their initial expectations. They were truly, "Critical to US 

Security. " 

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CORONA 

GAMBIT 

GRAND SLAM 

HEXAGON. 

imagery. 

intelligence 

intelligence collection 

Intelligence Community 

us. 

National Reconnaissance Office 

photo-reconnaissance 

policymakers . 

private industry 

satellite 

security 

US. 

Soviet Union 

nuclear program 

order-of-battle 

weapons development 

INDEX 

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4, 7, 

. 1, 

1, 

12 

7 

· 9 

7 

.4 

.4 

.4 

· 4 

.4 

.4 

.4 

· 4 

· 1 

.4 

.4 

.4 

.4 

.4