In Memoriam

Alexander H. Flax

Director, National Reconnaissance Office

(18 January 1921–30 June 2014)

By Patrick Widlake and Courtney Homer

JUNE 2014
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Editorial Staff

Editor Robert A. McDonald, Ph.D.

Managing Editor Patrick D. Widlake

Design and layout Charles P. Glover

The Center for the Study of National Reconnaissance (CSNR) publishes National Reconnaissance—

Journal of the Discipline and Practice for the information, education, and use of the broader national 

security community, especially those government and contractor personnel who are involved with national 

reconnaissance. Our objective is to promote dialogue among these professionals and to identify lessons for 

them by facilitating a synthesis of the technical, operational, and policy components that define and shape the 

enterprise of national reconnaissance.

Disclaimer: The information in National Reconnaissance may not necessarily reflect the official views of 

the National Reconnaissance Office, the Intelligence Community, the Department of Defense, or any other 

U.S. Government entity. Nothing in the content should be construed as asserting or implying U.S. Government 

endorsement of the factual statements or interpretation.

Contributions: We on the editorial staff invite authors from the NRO and the extended Intelligence 

Community—both current government and contractor employees, as well as alums—to submit scholarly articles, 

commentaries, and book reviews for publication consideration. Your articles for National Reconnaissance may 

address any doctrinal, theoretical, operational, or historical aspect of the discipline and practice of national 

reconnaissance. 

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body that reports to the NRO Deputy Director, Business Plans and Operations. Our primary objective is to 

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Center for the Study of National Reconnaissance 

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Internet: csnr@nro.mil
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In Memoriam

Alexander H. Flax

In Memoriam

Alexander H. Flax

Director, National Reconnaissance Office

(18 January 1921 – 30 June 2014)

Dr. Alexander H. Flax was a brilliant 

engineer, scientist, and innovator, who 

as the fourth Director of the National 

Reconnaissance Office (DNRO) from 1 

October 1965 to 17 March 1969, approved 

the United States’ last film-return system 

for development and deployment and laid 

the groundwork for the country’s late Cold 

War-era satellite architectures. His leadership 

put the NRO on a path toward greater 

integration and collaboration and helped 

establish a lasting organizational foundation 

from which the NRO could evolve to meet 

the most difficult intelligence challenges. 

Flax was instrumental in bringing the NRO’s 

second generation of reconnaissance satellite 

imaging systems into operation: the Hexagon 

(KH-9) and Gambit-3 (KH-8) film-return 

satellites. Both played pivotal roles in U.S. 

intelligence collection during the Cold War. He advocated significant growth in National 

Reconnaissance Program (NRP) funding and personnel. Under Flax’s direction, the NRO 

developed a signals intelligence (Sigint) satellite architecture that increased dwell time and 

persistence over collection targets and initiated preliminary research and development 

on near-real-time imagery systems, paving the way for the NRO’s electro-optical satellite 

capability that remained unmatched by U.S. adversaries for years. With all this, Flax’s 

most important accomplishment as director in the NRO’s early years was arguably his 

leadership in building consensus, collaboration, and trust among sometimes antagonistic, 

competing organizations in the Department of Defense (DoD) and Central Intelligence 

Agency (CIA), both of whom sought increased control over the direction of and funding 

for satellite reconnaissance programs. Dr. Flax died 30 June 2014 at the age of 93.

When Flax became the DNRO on 1 October 1965, concurrent with his tenure as 

the Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Research and Development (1963 – 1969), 

he inherited an organization still grappling with how best to develop and manage the 

new national reconnaissance capability. The NRO had been established on a covert basis 

on 6 September 1961—its existence would remain classified until 1992—with a “hybrid” 

organizational structure bridging DoD and CIA organizational elements. Finding optimal 

management policies governing this unique arrangement proved elusive, as evidenced by 

Alexander H. Flax
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the three different NRO charters produced in the first 18 months of the organization’s 

existence. Flax assumed directorship amidst the backdrop of a contentious relationship 

that had developed between the constituent programs and organizations. To ameliorate 

this situation, then Deputy Secretary of Defense (SecDef) Cyrus Vance and Director of 

Central Intelligence (DCI) William F. Raborn had signed a memorandum of agreement on 

11 August 1965—the fourth NRO Charter—that created a three-member NRP Executive 

Committee (ExCom) to allocate resources more effectively. Comprised of the Deputy 

SecDef, the DCI, and the President’s Special Assistant for Science and Technology, 

the ExCom provided ready access to key decision-makers that facilitated streamlined 

program approval and oversight, and swift, definitive resolution of problems. The 1965 

agreement proved satisfactory enough to all parties that it remained largely in effect until 

the first decade of the 21st century. With that structure in place, Flax set about fostering 

more constructive communication among the program offices, parent organizations, 

and mission partners, in an effort to exploit emerging technologies and produce vastly 

improved national reconnaissance collection systems. 

One of the first major system proposals Flax had to review upon arriving at the NRO 

was for a new, improved general search and surveillance satellite system to replace the 

reliable, but aging Corona (KH-4) photoreconnaissance satellite system. What became 

the Hexagon (KH-9) satellite system was in the system definition phase, with three 

competing camera designs and disagreement over operational requirements between the 

CIA and U.S. Air Force program offices vying to oversee the program. Flax eventually 

redirected the competition between the program offices and their respective contractors 

through a compromise on the management structure that assigned CIA responsibility 

for the sensor subsystem and the Air Force responsibility for the rest of the satellite basic 

assembly and overall system integration. The NRO went on to launch and operate 19 

successful Hexagon missions, providing incalculable national security benefit. 

Flax’s technical expertise influenced NRO program development, and during his 

tenure, the organization established satellite architectures and system configurations 

that guided NRO satellite constellation planning and production for years afterward. 

He cancelled less-effective, low-earth-orbit Sigint systems in favor of higher-orbit systems 

with longer dwell times, in the process expanding the NRO’s Sigint program from 5% 

to 30% of the overall NRP budget. Flax also recognized the value in pursuing near-realtime imagery and the potential for a revolutionary technological breakthrough. Under his 

direction, the NRO developed coherent architectures for multiple Sigint programs and 

began preliminary studies for the next-generation imagery satellites. Whenever asked to 

list his greatest accomplishments, Flax always included the growth in the Sigint program 

portfolio and the progress toward conceptualizing a near-real-time imaging capability. 

Perhaps the highest national security priority during Flax’s time as DNRO was obtaining 

intelligence on the Soviet Union’s weapons systems and reconnaissance capabilities. 

President Lyndon Johnson demanded 24-hour-a-day coverage of Sary Shagan, a Soviet 

anti-ballistic missile test range in Kazakhstan. Although somewhat skeptical of Soviet 

advancements and capabilities, Flax evaluated several options to fill the Sary Shagan 
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Alexander H. Flax

requirement, eventually deciding to collaborate with the National Security Agency (NSA), 

an organization looking to stake its own claim within the emerging field of national 

reconnaissance. The NSA sought greater control over this critical mission, asserting its 

authority as the organization with responsibility for Sigint operations, while the NRO 

maintained it had responsibility for satellite systems and operations, whether Sigint or 

otherwise. Through Flax’s determined efforts, the NRO and NSA forged a partnership, 

in which, in his view, both organizations were responsible for the function that they were 

best suited to perform. 

Flax’s career prior to and concurrent with his NRO experience included two Air Force 

positions that broadened his introduction to space and national reconnaissance programs 

and paved the way for a lifetime of championing cutting-edge technology. Flax served as 

the Chief Scientist of the Air Force from 1959 to 1961, a position in which he succeeded 

his friend and colleague, Joseph Charyk, who, along with Richard Bissell of the CIA, 

became the first co-director of the NRO. Flax and Charyk had met years earlier and 

worked closely together in 1958 on a six-week Air Force summer study of space, part 

of which involved the groundbreaking Weapons System-117L (WS-117L) program, the 

forerunner of Corona and other future satellite programs. When Charyk accepted the 

position of Assistant Secretary of the Air Force for Research and Development in 1959, he 

recommended Flax to be his replacement. While chief scientist, Flax first became aware 

of the Corona mission, though further, more substantive involvement with U.S. national 

reconnaissance came after Flax served as Vice President and Technical Director for the 

Cornell Aeronautical Laboratory from 1961 to 1963, and in another Air Force position.

Flax’s second high-level Air Force appointment was to Assistant Secretary for the Air 

Force for Research and Development, to which he was sworn in on 8 July 1963. He would 

serve in that position until 1969, for more than three years concurrently with his DNRO 

role. As assistant secretary, Flax advocated for advanced aircraft engine development that 

he argued was essential for military and civilian aeronautics. He backed the Lightweight 

Engine Gas Generator Program and Advanced Turbine Engine Gas Generator Program, 

with both reaching fruition the following decade. Supported by his experience in the 

development of fiberglass helicopter blades, Flax became a champion in the new field 

of fiber composite materials. Flax also supported programs developing precision-guided 

weapons and designing the necessary corresponding aircraft targeting systems and sensors. 

Still only mid-way through his career in 1969, Flax left the NRO and became President 

of the Institute for Defense Analyses (IDA). He remained in that capacity for 14 years, 

among other things overseeing development of analytical and computer models to evaluate 

strategic nuclear and conventional forces as well as innovating and improving operational 

test methodology and instrumentation for air-ground combat. In 1967, Flax’s peers 

elected him a member of the National Academy of Engineering (NAE). When Flax retired 

from IDA in 1982, he remained active in the NAE, working part time as home secretary 

until 1992. Flax also served on a variety of boards, most notably as a member and senior 

consultant on the Defense Science Board from 1970 to 1994 and on the advisory board 
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of the Defense Intelligence Agency from 1970 to 1995. He later joined the Washington 

Advisory Group as a partner and retired in 2002.

Alexander Henry Flax was born in Brooklyn, New York on January 18, 1921. He was 

a bright, industrious child, who knew by age 11 that he wanted to be an engineer. At 

age 16, Flax graduated from high school and began studying Aeronautical Engineering at 

New York University (NYU). He graduated with his Bachelor’s degree in 1940 and secured 

a position as a Structural and Vibration engineer with the Curtiss-Wright Corporation. 

In 1944, Flax joined the Piasecki Helicopter Corporation as the Chief of Aerodynamics 

and Structure, and in 1946, at the age of 25, Flax left Piasecki and transitioned to the 

new Cornell Aeronautical Lab for his first assignment there as Assistant head of the 

Aeromechanics Department. The lab promoted him to head of the Aerodynamics 

Research department in 1949, the same year Flax received the Lawrence Sperry Award of 

the Institute of Aerospace Sciences for his contribution to the advancement of aeronautics. 

Further promotion to Assistant Director for technical affairs followed in 1955. From 1956 

to 1958, Flax pursued a Ph.D. in physics, attending classes at night and on weekends at the 

nearby University of Buffalo, writing his thesis in 1957, and graduating in 1958.

Flax’s numerous awards and honors included the Air Force Exceptional Civilian 

Service Award in 1961 and 1969, the NASA Distinguished Service Medal in 1968, the 

Civilian Service Medal from the Defense Intelligence Agency in 1974, and the Elder 

Statesmen Award from the National Aeronautics Association in 1992. Remaining active 

through retirement, Flax continued to be involved in intelligence events and retained his 

sharp wit and memory to the end of his life. Although his presence in the intelligence and 

aerospace worlds will be missed, his legacy will not be forgotten. Leading the NRO at a 

turbulent and pivotal time, Flax proved to have a near-optimal combination of technical 

expertise, managerial acumen, and easy-going personality to mitigate the challenges and 

be successful. In addition to being remembered as a brilliant and dedicated engineer, 

Alexander Flax will forever be known as a leader who helped forge a new level of cooperation 

and integration at the NRO that allowed it to evolve technically and organizationally to 

meet the national security challenges of the Cold War and beyond.

 Patrick Widlake and Courtney Homer

 Center for the Study of National Reconnaissance