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IS) NATIONAL RECONNAISSANCE OFFICE

WASHINGTON. D.C.

OFFICE OF THE DIRECTOR 25 August 1977

MEMORANDUM FOR CHARLES W. COOK 4C1000

. J D. HILL, 4C1000

MAJOR GENERAL JOHN E. KULPA, JR., PROGRAM A

MR. LESLIE C. DIRKS, PROGRAM B, CIA

REAR ADMIRAL GROVER YOWELL, PROGRAM C, U.S. NAVY

Gentlemen:

Now that I have had some preliminary orientations and

discussions of the National Reconnaissance Program I would like

to call a meeting of the Program Managers and the senior NRO

Headquarters staff members for a general discussion of the

major issues that will be facing the National Reconnaissance

Program in the coming years. Fortunately, the mission statement

of our organization is very simple so that we have a good common

starting point. The statement says: "The NRP is responsible

for the research, development, acquisition, and operation of all

United States Government reconnaissance satellites."

The major point is, of course, that the mission emphasizes

reconnaissance and space platforts and that is all that need

concern us at the moment. On the other hand, there are some

quite important and complicated questions that arise even from

a simple mission of this kind. These questions deal both with

the technology of space-based reconnaissance and with the use of

space-based systems that is compatible with the future evolution

°Cour national, foreign and military policies. We need better

definition of many of these issues and for this reason I would "awl. like to have an in-depth discussion with all of you in the

near future. '31

As I see it, there are four main issues that seem to be 7...,1

uppermost in the minds of the people who use our products:

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The vulnerability of space-based systems. There

are three separate aspects of vulnerability. One is the vulnerability that we have in case of overt Soviet action against

one of our systems. This action may either be an ASAT attack

or it could be denial by ground-based means. The second

vulnerability is a technical failure, either at launch or on

orbit, of one of our systems. The third vulnerability is the

compromise of one of our systems through espionage or leaks.

All of these vulnerabilities are important, and I would like to

have your judgments and priorities on what we should do to make

our systems less susceptible to the specific dangers that I

have outlined. There may, of course, be vulnerabilities that I

.have not included in this list.

Declassification or "open skies." During my short

tenure in this office so far I have seen a number of pressures

in this direction both from civilian and military people. I

think it is important that we develop a specific philosophy

toward the declassifidation of any of our space-based reconnaissance systems so that we can join the debate over the

declassification issue in an aggressive way. I want to emphasize

here that I believe it is not simply enough to take a negative

' position and to say nothing should be declassified. I believe

that the pressures to do something in a declassified way will

be too strong to resist. Personally, I believe it would be a

mistake to completely declassify any of our current systems

but I think we should look at contingency plans that we would

follow when, in our judgment, it becomes necessary to take such

a step.

3. The "national" versus "tactical" use of spacebased reconnaissance systems. There is a spectrum of opinion

on this particular subject which I believe we should define

and then understand. To some extent the discussions I have

heard about this problem are governed by semantics since people

tend to mean different things when they use the word "tactical."

On the other hand, it is extremely important for us to understand both the opportunities and the possible pitfalls in the

widespread "tactical" use of the space-based "national" reconnaissance systems.

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4. The emergence of new technologies. There are a

nunber of new technical developments on the horizon which I am

sure will bear very strongly on our activities. There is, for

example, the development of the space shuttle vehicle and the

opportunities and problems which it presents. If a shuttle

transportation system is actually developed to its full

potential, then the erection of large structures in space, and.

the operation of man-tended systems, becomes a very real

possibility. I would like to understand what such developments

mean in terms of the future programs that we would want to

develop. There are also technologies that are independent of

the launch vehicles. For example, there are developments in

cryogenics that have clear applications to space-based systems,

specifically, the sensors that can be used. There have also

been interesting new developments in infrared and microwave

sensors that we should consider. Finally, the development of

high energy space-based laser systems is something that should

be studied and perhaps taken into account. These are simply a

few suggestions that come to mind and I am sure there are many

others. What I would like to know is whether our research and

development programs cover the fields that seem to us to be

most promising.

This list is obviously not complete and please feel free

to add to it. As you can see, I am not interested in discussing

specific project plans. Rather, I would like to see individual

projects evolve from some general principles that we develop in

discussing the issues that I have outlined here.

office in

long discussion

be no formal

to add any

I would like to suggest that we meet in my

Washington on Saturday, September 10, for a day

of the issues that I have outlined. There will

agenda but please let me know if you would like

other major topics that should be considered.

With best personal regards.

Hans Mark

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