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8. CONTROL NUMBER i I (26-37)

9. SECURITY CLASSIFICATION RF

(38-39)

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RETURN RED STAR COPY TO: 
-CONFIDOMAL--

REPORTS: (Katz) The Open Mouth, et

• ••

„ 0D,07„.....

Noted by the

Under Secretary

of the Air Boras

1 70 0 MAIN ST. • SANTA MONICA CALIFORNIA

21 March 1961

Brigadier General R. D. Curtin, Director

°Liao. of Missile and Satellite Oyster

Since of the Secretary of the Air Force

Washington 25, D. C.

Dear Dick:

Inclosed are ems notes I prepared several years ago. Became

they bear on item and activities of antuat interest I think

and hope you and Er. Clan* vL11 find then of Interest.

iiincersky,

ARK:dle

In=

Reclosure: One copy of "lhe Open Mouth Policy Versus the Open

*1.s Policy (U) classified 0020.40Uttla.

seriesewn orININfrayse Ny NONNINI

Idessalkabou 4DI Ntss esneemoONNO webs

eassmose.
U.S. AIR PORC•

PPt SleetIan

Mb NOWA origin idairebe elholue the grind define et dr WOW ern •ilib

Ole goso el el .Ni Inn Aft IS VAC. Sea MS ad ISA •grobilse

ibe el S II en mar to ea ggegilgoind porn Is bg

THIS IS A PREUMINARY WORKING NOTE AND SHOULD NOT BE

CITED. QUOTED. 011 ABSTRACTED WITHOUT APPROVAL IT I S KING

MADE AVAILABLE TO SPECIFIC INDIVIDUALS FOR THEIR INKIRMA -

TION AND IMMEDIATE USE, PRIOR TO BEING CONSIDERED FOR

MORE FORMAL PUPUCATION. THE VIEWS. CONCWSIONS. AND

- RECOMMENDATIONS EXPRESSED HEREIN DO NOT NECESSARILY

REFLECT THE OFFICIAL VIEWS OR POLICIES OF THE UNITED STATES

AIR FORCE.

SANTA MONICA • CALIPOINIA
U.S. AIR FORCE

Pite •

THE OPEN MOUTH POLICY VERSUS THE OPEN

SKIES POLICY (D)

A. H. Katz

May 1, 1959

COP! N.O. 11,1,1

NI D

This aosoriol amminm lolommom ongoing mho mason dawn. of she *famed Sales within Ilop

umpoohmo el oho ompilmoor iw.. Tao IS U.S.C.. Ina. 71,3 oon she Minonieli1141 Sr she orrolosion

of said in IOW NOON OD ea sommohorismil pomo it amphibian by low.

THIS IS A PRELIMINARY WORKING NOTE AND SHOULD NOT BE

CITED. QUOTED. OR ABSTRACTED WITHOUT APPROVAL. IT IS BEING

MADE AVAILABLE TO SPECIFIC INDIVIDUALS FOR THEIR INFORMATION AND IMMEDIATE USE, PRIOR TO BEING CONSIDERED FOR

MORE FORMAL PUBLICATION. THE VIEWS, CONCLUSIONS, AND

RECOMMENDATIONS EXPRESSED HEREIN DO NOT NECESSARILY

REFLECT THE OFFICIAL VIEWS OR POLICIES OF THE UNITED STATES

AIR FORCE.

'74 R41f1D..

1700 MAIN ST • SANTA MONICA • CAIIIOSNIA
•

must be using to get important information about us, our works, our activities,

and our plans would truly be an impressively long list, I choose to make ammo

comments only on that material which vs give to them gratis, openly, and in

large volume.

The lesson which I have drown from observations like those which follow

below is an extremely simple one: ve cannot keep most things secret; I •

•

will not go so far as to elate that we keep no secrets, but I feel strongly

that if anyone here at aim attempts to devise • system, an operational concept,

or a procedure in which secrecy about the procedure, the equipment, its

location, is an important (but not crucial) part of his strategy, be out

to plainly and simply give it up. The benefits of secrecy cannot be

counted on to remain plugged in direct series with the rest of the syst016.

.

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The possible exceptions may lie among those operations which completely

•

fail if secrecy 1* lost. • " '"•

%.94.

It was not very long ago when a coupling of WDD with the Reno-Wooldridge

organization in correspondence required that the correspondence be classified,

when even a sketch of the Atlas was classified, when pictures which I have

in my office showing the Atlas being dragged across the country were marked

confidential; when the words 'reconnaissance satellite' were themselves

classified. The half•life of secrets of this type seems to be somewhat

For same years now I have been watching various projects, ideas, facts• • ,.••

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and data move directly from the top secret and secret levels into unclassified

newspapers, Congressional Mariam*, and other open sources, with nary a •

•

pause or a wait at any intermediate level. The projects aren't declassified, • •

;'• but remain in a schizoid suspension.

a.

Although a catalogue of the ways and systems which the Soviet Union

..•

less than a year.
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?'he project I have the most information on, as far as history of releases,

news leaks, etc. are concerned is the 117L recce satellite. Under date of

November 26, 1956 I wrote a memorandus, number to Joe Madsen.

In it I discussed sane brief history of public releases on recce satellites

up to that time(actually, there has been so much released on this in the

last couple of years that I have stepped collecting clippings--I collected

them when they were rare, but despite the feet that I have several filing

cases, I haven't any room for any more.)

In that memo to Joe, I recounted the fact that some little while before

this that Fairchild Camera Instrument Corporation sent me an unclassified

teletype requesting visit approval to come in and discuss photo reconnaissance

from satellites. Dick lest and I caught this security violation simultaneously,

and despite the fact that the Fairchild people are good friends, ve thought

they should have the word, and called them on the security matter. Their

response was to ship us a clipping from the Los Angeles Times dated

Feoruary 6, 1956 in which a story from Washington under date of February k

describes a statement by (the then Air Secretary) Donald queries on the

possibility of launching a 'reconnaissance satellite' and the fact that

the Air Force has long range research interests in this project. The

questioning of Quarles by reporters, which brought out the material on the

satellite, followed a column by the Alsops which was headlined 'Big Brother.'

This appeared in their Sew York Harald Tribune column on February 3, 1956.

The Alsops had a column on the recce satellite under date of August 15, 1950 %-

in the Washington Post, and Time Magazine carried articles January 10, 19149

and February 26, 19k9. Sure enough, by April, 1958, Lockheed saw fit to

publish a full page classified ad trying to hire engineers to work on what t
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is described in extremely large type as the U. B. Air Force Reconnaissance

Satellite. (Bee this ad on my bulletin board. It should have read •

Wanted: 5000 Engineers 5000.)

Nov in this discussion, I an not necessarily advocating that all this

material should have been kept secret. I as only illuminating the fact

that with an obvious and stated intent and some matching action by the Air

Force to classify this project even higher than secret, it has come pretty

yell un-glued in the public press.

If we try to establish a line-up of reasons for keeping anything secret,

we have only one: presumed national good as reflected in secrecy. But

now let's look at the big hitters on the other side. The forces which slake

for disclosure have been operative now for a number of years, and it I read

the tea leaves correctly, will continue to be so operative. First, we have

tnternationa/ rivalry, and the fact that a weapon is no good as • deterrent

if the other fellow knows nothing about it. Ot course, the reader will

notice I used the word 'weapon' in the proceeding sentence whereas the

previous discussion was on R mad D projects. However, I have noticed that

despite increasing experience, knowledge, and power, our military leaders

as well as many of our civilian leaders completely tail to distinguish

between ideas, conjectures, R and D projects, prototype weapons and

weapons in t:rce. These words go around in one big intellectual mish-mash

and are used interchangeably. The net result is that it becomes necessary

to add a new tense to the R and D language: Hitherto vs have been able to

describe project status by use of eitner past tense, present tense or future

tense. To this set we must nov add pretense.

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Perhaps an even more profound reason for disclosure by high military

figures of projects and ideas has to do with inter-service rivalry. In my

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view, it is likely that most of the time the major enemy of the Air Force

is not the Russians (they are a potential enemy) but rather the Army, the

Navy and the civilian economy who are real and here. The terrific competition for lines in the press, for dollars, and activity, undoubtedly force,

or at least put pressure on, top officials to take aside a key reporter and

plant a leak.

Commercial reasons are extremely powerful. It was obvious to me long

before Lockheed published these ads that they would have to publish them to

attract engineers,to promote stock, to keep the people they have, etc.

I'm fact, Gene Root, head of the Lockheed Missiles Systems Division,

said this in almost exactly the same words in his Congressional testimony before

the Committee on Armed Services of the United States Senate on January 15,

1958 (for those readers who are pack rats, like the writer, this is the hearing

entitled 'Inquiry into Satellite and Missile Programs' Part 2, pages 1855-18574'

: quote hers from Root's testimony:

'...and we would like to indicate Lockheed's role in the Air Force

Satellite program in the sane manner as others publicize their roles

in the ICBM and !FIRM programs, and we have such a program underway.'

I now quote again from the referenced memo to Goldsen of November 26, 1956:*

'...now for the project itself. The 117L people at WDD are tightening

security on the project and are attempting to raise its classification.

My wn view is that this will be difficult and will fall afoul of good

old American business practices. What I mean is that as soon as Lockheed -

;eta sizeable funds, they viii want to advertise (you knot these beauti- • .,.,

ful, institutional advertisements which are becoming a Madison Avenue •

art form.)

The pressure to advertise will come about because they will want to

hire people, beep people, promote stock, etc. Further, everybody else

bdvertises. From a condition a fear or so ago, when the magic initials

•
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WDD couldn't be coupled with RW in an unclassified context, we vent to

the era'when scarcely a month passes without the appearance of an a

article describing (or decrying) the organisation of WDD and RW. So,

I conclude the satellite will be disclosed, advertised, bragged about,

discussed and analyzed--all before we build onellet alone launch it

and get pictures out of it.'

• ; 4

'RECONNAISSANCE SATELLITES --- Swinging over every spot or. Earth, the

snooper satellites of tomorrov will look down with photographic, TV,

infrared and radar eyes. As they flash over the U.S., they will

transmit data collected during their sweep around the globe--or film

from optical cameras viii be elected for recovery.

They were first described in an exclusive AVIATION WEEK article

October 14, 1957. Latest technical developments were reported in the

June 16 and i5, 195e issues of AVIATION WEE. These reconnaissance

systems are nearer than you think. The satellites are in the development stage and will use missiles for launching which are already in

existence.

. • •

A striking illustration of the argument advanced in this note is to

be found in a remarkable double page spread in Aviation Week (November 10,

1955), where Aviation Week itself advertises RECONNAISSANCE SATELLTTIOS in

large headline type. The message is:

Even now, they affect hundreds of policy decisions and procurement

awards. .

Space Technology developments -- the markets of tomorrow —

are shaped by today's decisions in the Aviation industry. That's why

your message, your advertisements -- your product, your company, your

facility -- belong in AVIATION WEEK. It's the one publication qualified

to speak to these decision makers.

Sell Today the Market of Tomorrov. SPACE =NEOLOGY'

An interesting example of the tendency of military people to do their

oraq.iics.: before they have accomplished what they are bragging about is

furnished by consideration of the testimony of a very sober citizen, then

Mayor General Sernard Schriever, who, oack in January, 1958, in the same

hearings which Root appeared, talked about the recoverable photographic

satellite, said that the Air Force intended to use a TROR -based system to

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do this, and promised the assembled senators that this system would be

operational in early 1959. Another interesting aspect about this unnecessary

testimony (which the reader will note did not discuss the theory of recoverability, but the fact of the existence of a program to which the Air

Force was giving high priority) is that this testimony was released unilaterally by the Air Force, which release got the Senate more or less teed

off at the Air Force. A new disease seems to be abroad in the land: oralgitis.

It is derived :rim ors.: and the latter being a common travelling

zan'E efl!-tize.

It is quite clear that testimony, releases, newspaper publicity, are

designed not only to inform the public and the Congress, but are designed

to show one service's superiority in planning over another service's,

are designed to nail down funds, * to secure approval for larger programs, and

for other purposes, the listing of which could be extended almost indefinitely

by ani of the readers of this note. Again, I am not saying this is bad,

just that it exists, and we'd better not ignore it.

')!;•..

. .

Of course not. It simply means that operations and projects in which

secrecy itself is not an integral part of the project or an integral purpose of the project, are likely to have secrecy removed. It may or may not

be true that the success of the recce satellite project depends on secrecy.

It is, at ae.t, arguable, and one could construct an argument that it

should be done openly as soon as possible and that the pictures shoUld be

putlished. Again, this is arguaole, but I could schest up other projects

in which securit7 and secrecy are fest=es of the projects, and in which

it would ze cLvtou. a priori that failure would result were secrecy

violated or lost.

'

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Does this necesearily mean that no operations can be conducted secretly?

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The careful, reader vho also attends selected briefing* around RAND

(especially those vho attended a-recent one on security) viii veil, realise

that we do a lot of talking other than to nevmpapers and Congressmen. I

suggest that all of the foregoing be kept in mind vhen any of us around here

attempt to recommend the hiding of bases, the hiding of missiles,

and the building of fully secret installations.

We give away so such information that except for some very special and

important problems (discussed, elsewhere) the Soviets have little need for

participation in an 'open skies' operation over the V.S.

We need 'open skies' over there because among other reasons, the

Soviets seem to have found either a preventative or a cure for oralgitis.

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