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IMPACT OF RECENT PUBLICITY ON THE 

MANNED ORBITING LABORATORY 

PROGRAM 

L)1.- Pt R.CiLLED 

Handle via BYEMAN 

Control System —Tor—SEGET-- 

Copy___Y__of-__Z__Copies 1 

Page of Pages. 

Control No.44-17.-77e-g•-%(5—. 
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SUMMARY 

On 3 December 1960 the Department of Defense placed a stop order 

on SAMOS publicity. This directive was broadened on 24 July 1961. The 

press reaction to these actions was minuscule until 1962 when a series 

of articles appeared in reputable media at a steady rate. These articles 

were technical in nature, drawing heavily on previously released data and 

speculating on the current status of the program. By 1963, the articles 

were infrequent and generally more erroneous than factual. Technical 

editors began to lose their original fascination with "spy-in-the-sky" 

stories. The public has accepted DOD silence on its satellite reconnaissance program. 

On 23 March 1962 the Department of Defense issued DOD Directive 

5200.13 which placed all military satellite programs under a special 

"look-alike" security system. This directive was opposed by the aerospace industries, the press, the services, and the Congress. Heavy 

resistance from the press peaked about May 1962 and then subsided; 

service resistance peaked in Autumn 1962 and then disappeared; 

Congressional opposition emerged in two surges -- one in May/June 1962 

and the second a year later. By the end of 1962, the 52 00.13 security 

system was solidly in effect and working well. Press speculation on 

individual programs dwindled to one or two paragraph stereotypes. 

On 25 August 1965 the President announced the Manned Orbiting 

Laboratory program. Since that date a number of articles have been 

published on the program. These are rather heterogeneous in make-up; 

some speculate on the MOL military mission; some decry the end of 

"peaceful space;" some discuss international implications; others are 

concerned over censorship, NASA, the USSR, etc. A plot of number 

of articles versus time since announcement shows a definite tapering- 

- off in the rate at which articles are being written. 

In general, one can say that the DOD's experiences with public 

reaction to security systems were most difficult in the case of 5200.13, 

less difficult in the case of SAMOS, and smoothest with MOL. Articles 

on MOL have been forceful but not abusive. Aerospace industries have 

not attacked MOL security. The Congress has been most cooperative, 

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especially as compared to its original reactions to DOD Directive 

5200.13. For the future, one would predict decreased public interest 

in MOL and a reasonably calm and tolerant journalistic environment 

until launching time, when a sudden surge of interest can be expected. 

Three analyses are attached -- one on each of the security 

situations mentioned above. Typical press stories accompany each 

analysis. 

MOL Tabs 1-29 

DOD Directive S-5200. 13 Tabs 30-37 

SAMOS Tabs 38-48 

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ANALYSIS OF PRESS ARTICLES ON THE 

MANNED ORBITING LABORATORY 

25 August - 20 September 1965 

A total of 22 daily newspapers and magazine articles covering the 

26-day period following 25 August (the date of MOL announcement) was 

sampled. Several issues stand out in the analysis: 

1. The claim of a significant change (reversal) in national "peaceful 

space" policy represented in the MOL decision. (Tabs 4, 12, 13, 20, 24, 

25, 27) 

2. Emphasis on a "peaceful effort" - U. S. wary about destroying 

the image of a peaceful U. S. manned space flight program -- play down 

military implication. (Tabs 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 13, 20, 23, 25) 

3. Super-secret (hush-hush) (veil of secrecy) treatment of MOL likely 

-- secrecy has already subtly begun. (Tabs 4, 5, 9, 11, 14, 17, 18, 20) 

4. The primary purpose of MOL will be reconnaissance -- MOL represents a giant step in satellite reconnaissance capability -- MOL will stand 

or fall on photo and electronic reconnaissance ability. (Tabs 3, 4, 7, 8, 10, 

12, 13, 15, 17, 18, 19, 20, 24, 27, 28, 29) 

5. MOL has caused disquiet across the world at a time of hope for 

progress in disarmament -- MOL likely to increase tensions between U. S. 

and USSR and directly extend arms race into outer space. (Tabs 13, 17, 18, 

24, 25, 27, 28) 
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6. Both U. S. and USSR known to be conducting military photo 

reconnaissance with unmanned satellites -- results are described as 

striking and enormous. (Tabs 7, 8, 13, 17, 18, 19, 20, 24, 27, 28) 

The "prompt application of censorship and news management by 

DOD" was treated only once in the articles reviewed. However, NASA 

was also considered a "traducer of free news flow" giving news manage- 

_ ment the "old college try" everytime a manned spacecraft goes up. 

(Tab 14) 

In several instances speculation on the delay in the MOL decision 

appeared -- charged first to State in sounding out U. S. Allies, then to 

"large and powerful segments of the Administration" brought to unanimity 

by the arms control possibility, and finally to an Air Force/CIA battle 

over mission control. (Tabs 13, 18, 29) 

SAMOS (and speculation on its results) was backgrounded in better 

than half of the sample. (Tabs7, 8, 13, 17, 18, 19, 20, 24, 27, 28, 29) 

Of interest, the first Soviet response did not appear until 10 September (16 days after announcement) -- in the form of an allegation by 

Colonel Gen. Tolubko that the "U. S. was developing a manned orbital 

space laboratory to be able to bombard the earth with nuclear bombs. " 

(Tab 23) 

The question of "why wasn't NASA, with its extensive experience in 

space, given the MOL assignment?" was raised and discussed several 

2 
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— times. Typical reasons advanced: "Top-Top-Secret" nature of the 

operation, push by Congressional allies of Air Force. (Tabs 4, 6, 17, 

18, 28) 

— One article estimated that MOL had provoked relatively little public 

discussion because its announcement was overshadowed by the "historic 

flight of GEMINI-5" and considered it "puzzling" that the President had 

— chosen to announce MOL at just the time when the Soviet Union was 

publicly attacking GEMINI-5 as a venture in military espionage. (Tab 28) 

__. 

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PRESIDENT JOHNSON'S STATEMENT ON MOL PRES3 CONFERENCE - 25 August 1965 

Good morning, ladies and gentlemen. 

At the suggestion of Vice President Ht:,rphrey and members of the 

Space Council, as well as Defense Secretary McNamara, I am today instructing 

the Department of Defense to immediately proceed with the development of a 

Manned Orbiting Laboratory. 

This program will bring us new knowle6ge about what man is able to do 

in space. It will enable us to relate that ability to the defense of 

America. It will .develop technology and ecuiPment which will help advance 

,:;nned and ,'manned space flights. And it will make it possible to perform 

their new and rewarding experiments with that technology and equipment. 

The cost of developing the Manned Orbiting Laboratory will be One Billion, 

500 Million Dollars. 

Unmanned flights to test launchingS, recovery and other basic parts of 

the system will begin late next year or early in 1967. The initial unmanned 

launch of a fully eauipped laboratory iS scheduled for 1968. This will 

be followed later that year by the first of five flights with a two-man 

crew. 

The Air Force has selected the DouglaF Aircraft Company to design and to 

build a spacecraft in which the crew of tb.c. laboratory will live and operate. 

The General Electric Company will plan and develop the space experiments. The 

Titan IIIC booster will launch the laboratc.ry into space and a modified 

version of the NASA Gemini capsule will be the vehicle in which the 

astronauts return to earth. 
IMMEDIATE.RELZAS'r!. August 25, 1965 

NO: 551-65 

OXford 75131 (Info) 

Or:ord 52528 (Copies) 

PRESIDENT APPROVES DOD DEVETOPM7NT 

OF AM?) ORSTTTNG LL10"RATORY 7

.The President announced today at the White Hcuse that he hes approved the 

Department of Defense proceeding with the developrent of a Manned Orbiting 

Laboratory (MOL) at a cost of $1.5'billion.. 

Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara recorzAnded the action to the President 

after discussions with the Vice President and members of the Space Council, 

The AirForce has selected the Douglas Aircrtft Company to deeign and build 

the spacecraft in which the men and operate. It has chosen General 

Electric Company to plan and develop the. space experiments. 

The TITAN IIIC booster will launch the labordory into space and a modified 

version of the NASA GEMINI capsule will be. the vehicle in which the astronauts 

return to earth. 

The primary objectives of theYOL program are to 

(a) learn more about what man is able to do n space and how that ability can 

be used for military purposes. 

(b) develop technology and equipment which w:.11 help advance manned and 

unmanned space flight. 

(c) experiment with this technology and equipment. 

Unmanned flights to test launching,reeovery and other basic parts of the 

system are due to begin late next year or early 1067. The initial unmanned launch 

of a fully-equipped NOL is scheduled for 1968. This will be followed later that 

year by the first of 5 flights with two-man crews. 

Astronaut candidates will be military test pelots and graduates of the 

Aerospace Research Pilot School at Edwards Air Fo:-ce Ease, California. 

On the basis of Department of Defense-NASA s'eadies, the National Aeronautics 

and Space Administration will decide which of its scientific or technological experiments are carried out in the MOL. These will not interfere with Don experiments. 

MORE 
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. 1 

' 

2. 

The MDL project was begun in December 1963 14'.en the DYNASOAR, a project dating 

from the 1950s, was cancelled. At that time it ras decided that Don's manned 

space efforts should be concentrated on finding waat man can do in space and 

getting the equipment to help him do it. 

The NOL program to date has cost $30 million, Another $150 million is in 

the FY 1966 budget. 

• • • 
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THE WASHINGTON POST 

26 August 1965 

V 

This drawing by an Air Force artist shows how the 

crew of the proposed Manned Orbiting Laboratory 

(ilt:OL) would prepare to return to earth after Complet• 

in its miss on. In the sketch the Gemini capsule, at , 

right, with astronauts inside, is separating from the 

42-fool:long MOL. The Gemini return capsule and the 

laboratory would be joined when put into, orbit by an ; 

Air Force Titan booster, with the astronauts riding in 

the return vehicle. in orbit the astronauts would move 

into the MOL for their, work. Story on rage A9. 
ele061702, 

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THE WASHINGTON POST 

L 

By John G. Norris 

Washington Post Staff Writer 

liks 'approved yesterday, the 

Air Force's long-sought 

manned orbiting laboratory 

`(MOL) project has limited immediate aims. But one significant' provision is that the 

spacecraft will be launched 

from the Nation'g space cen- 

_ 

ters in both California and 

Florida. 

Outlook for Air Force 

Until now, all National 

Aeronautics and Space Administration manned flights have 

been launched from Cape 

Kennedy, Fla., which restricts 

l

astronauts to orbits that cross 

only parts of Russia. From 

Vandenberg Air Force Base, 

Calif., satellits can be put into polar orbits without fear of 

dropping boosters on populated areas. 

This means that by 1968-69, 

the United States can launch 

manned as well as unmanned 

observation satellites that cover the entire globe, including 

Russia. 

Still more important is the 

fact that the Air Force will 

get its chance to demonstrate 

the need for a manned military aerospace force. USAF 

chiefs long have been intuitively convinced that space is 

merely an extension of the 

earth's atmosphere and that 

they must be prepared to defend it. But they have been 

like the military air pioneers 

of 50 years ago; who could not 

even predict, much less prove, 

what air power might become. 

, What can manned Air Force 

orbital flights do that instrumented unmanned military or manned NASA satellites cannot do? Lack- of hard 

answers to this question has 

heretofore blocked Air Force 

manned space proposals. 

Another argument against 

the Air Force position has 

been that the United States is 

pledged to peaceful purposes 

in space. The military's answer is that preparation of 

defenses', against armed aggression is a peaceful aim. 

Differing Opinions 

Many scientists believe that 

unmanned satellites with sensors can perform most of the 

defensive roles in space, such 

as interception and identification of hostile satellites or 

policing atomic test ban violations. But military men contend that manned observers 

can do a better and surer job. 

And men can monitor and repair faulty equipment, they 

note, as the Gemini 5 flight 

has shown. 

Men in a military satellite 

can detect the launching of 

enemy missiles better than 

other means can, it is argued. 

And they could act as "forward air controllers" for U.S. 

earth - launched missiles, re 

porting back whether they nit 

the target somewhat as pilots' 

in spotter planes do in Viet 

Nam. 

U.S. Air Force leaders agree 

with American scientists that 

satellite-borne nuclear bombs, 

such as Soviet chiefs now 

boast of, would be less accurate and efficient than 

ground-launched ICBMs. But 

there always remains the possibility of a technological 

breakthrough involving something like space-launched 

laser-type beams that could 

only be countered by defensive 

manned spaceships. 

Plans for Astronauts 

And manned satellites 

greatly intarest the Navy as a 

More promising way of 

countering the Russian submarine threat and keeping 

track of war ships and 

merchant vessels all over the 

globe. 

Manned NASA satellites 

could perform many of these 

functions as well as Air Force 

spacecraft, it is argued. But 

a high Pentagon offical noted 

yesterday that Gemini astronauts are cramped within the 

13-foot-long capsule and must 

wear pressure suits. Air Force 

astronauts must ride into orbit 

in a Gemini mounted atop the 

10-foot-diameter, 42-foot-long 

MOL. 

Within the MOL, astronauts 

would doff their pressure suits 

and work in their shirt sleeves. 

It is planned that they rema,in 

in orbit for periods of up to a 

month, and return to earth in 

the attached Gemini, leaving 

behind the MOL to continue in 

orbit or eventually burn up descending into the atmosphere. 

I

The $1.5-billion MOL program as now approved lacks 

many projects necessary to the 

development of a manned aerospace force. There is no provision for a second pair of astronauts to rendezvous in space 

with those already in orbit, and 

only limited maneuverability 

will be built into the GeminiMOL satellite. But it would be 

possible to add this later. 

In the long run, many other 

things would be needed for a 

true aerospace force, notably 

spacecraft that could return to 

earth like an airplane, land on 

an airfield and take off again 

for space. But yesterday's decision to start was a milestone 

in space. 

The Washington Post 

26 August 1965 
r: 

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. • • (r) ./ Q...." ,e,JIA1,0„ 1 

t.3 Tr 7 ,r117-3 .11—cfkiA,,ALj/ 

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THE WASHINGTON POST 

26 August 1965 

,grZillematt Pol3ey STO_V: 

O T -Inc /1-Q " -4-1\ 

JJ 

- 

v, 

By Howard Simons 

Washin:iton Post Staff Writer 

The Administration's ac-7 

tion yesterday on a manned' 

orbiting laboratory is a $1.5-

billion experiment to.answer 

a question ducked by "two 

previous Administrations. 

The decision on the 

manned orbiting laboratory : 

(MOL) represents a signifi- ' 

cant change in national poi- • 

icy. Hitherto; Presidents 

Eisenhower and Kennedy _ 

-virtually ignored Air Force 

'arguments that it had' a': 

manned role in space. 

Unsympathetic Ears 

The notion that the min--; 

tary must, occupy the high 

ground always fell on:unsympathetic ears in the Pentagon 

proper and in the White 

House. 

Rather, the Nation—as a . 

matter of policy — has concentrated its time, talent and 

money on a civilian manned 

space effort. ' 

Now the President • has"- 

sown the seed for a separate, 

but not yet quite equal, military manned space effort. • 

One-Shot Affair 

Significantly, MOL is a 

one-shot affair. The President has not committed the 

Nation to a long-term Air ' 

Force manned space flight 

effort. But what he has done 

is protect himself politically 

against potential political 

repercussions should t h e 

Russians send a six- to eightman orbiting space station 

aloft, as they now appear to 

have the wherewithal to do. 

Without some active Pentagon role in manned space 

• :,1 

Nears Analysis 

flight, the President would 

be vulnerable to the charge 

that while the Nation concentrated on the moon, the 

Russians.have brought 

about a Cuba in space. 

Now he can mitigate such 

charges by pointing to the 

Air Force MOL. Nonetheless, the MOL, per se, is a 

carefully considered effort 

to determine what, if any, 

activities have a strictly mil- 

' itary requirement in space., 

But larger decisions still 

must come. 

One .of these involves a 

national orbiting space station. This station would carry six to ten men around 

'the earth• for months and 

'perhaps 'years. The station - 

would be resupplied with 

m-en and materials by an 

earth-to-station ferry serv-- 

• ice. Cost would be $10 bil-

-lion to $20 billion. 

NASA or Air Force 

• The decision facing President Johnson or another 

President in the future •is 

who will manage and use 

such a station — the Air 

Force or NASA. 

By giving MOL to the Air 

Force, the President is giving them experience to 

compete for management of 

such a station. 

At the same time, he is 

generating' competition between the two agencies. 

NASA, it should be noted, 

ha.,.; a' preg,•.am to study the 

miter of a national orbiting 

space station, just as does 

the Defense Department. 

Another decision will have 

to come in the early 1970s. 

This one will be on whether , 

the Air Force has proved its 

long-held point that it has a 

role in manned space flight 

well enough for a President 

to extend their lease on it. 

Emphasis on Peace Effort 

Meanwhile the Administration is very wary about 

'destroying the image of a 

peaceful American manned 

space flight program, which 

it has so carefully and lov- • 

ingly constructed. Under no 

circumstances will the Air 

Force be permitted to carry 

weapons, or even remote 

parts of a weapons system, 

aloft. 'Nonetheless, the Administration will have to. , 

'walk a tightrope in the light' 

of world propaganda. 

The simple fact that orbiting astronauts Gordon 

Cooper and Charles Conrad 

are conducting Defense Department experiments with 

potential military application has created a dilemma 

for the civilian space agency. In some quarters the experiments are being labelled 

as compromises of what had 

been a peaceful program,. 

though no such hallabaloo 

surrounded NASA's use of 

modified Atlas and Titan 

ballistic missiles to launch 

its astronauts into space— 

astronauts who are also military men. 

Finally, an argftment can. 

be made that NASA's policy 

of open publicity and no 

secrets—the display of difficulties as well as successes 

on television, for example—

has helped the Nation to 

overcome the Russian space, 

lead at least in the eyes of 

some world nenoicters. 

Supersecrecy'Likely 

T h e MOL undoubtedly 

will be a secret effort unless 

President Johnson - .reverses 

-a KennedY directive making 

all military space activities 

supersecret. 

• If the MOL effort is se; 

' cret the program's activities 

will be subject to all kinds 

of innuendos and speculation and suggestions that 

the* Air Force is orbiting 

an atomic device or spying 

on Russia, China and—who 

knows—even France. 

The secrecy has already 

begun in a subtle way. The 

Pentagon, prohibited reporters from naming the Pentagon' official 'who gave a 

'doriefing• on MOL. NASA's -

officials speak for ttr° recoid and can be named,- 
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Manned Space aboraiory Approve 

I 1968 Goal Set; 

Cost Figured 

At $1.5Billion, 

By Carroll. Kilpatrick 

Washington Poet Staff Writer 

President Johnson gave 

final approval yesterday for 

the Defense Department. to 

proceed with the development of a manned orbiting 

laboratory at a cost of $1.5. 

billion. z 

The gbal is to put a fully 

equipped laboratory into orbit 

in '1968, to be followed later 

in the same year by the first 

of five • flights with 2-man 

crews. 

In making the , announcement at his news conference; 

Mr. Johnson promised to continue to seek international 'cooperation in outer-space activities. 

Soviet Aide Invited 

As a token Of his interest, 

he said he had directed that 

an invitation be sent to, the 

Soviet Academy of Science to 

send a "very high-level representative" here to observe the 

Gemini 6 flight, scheduled for 

October. The Soviet news 

agency Tass carried a brief . 

report on the invitation. 

The President renewed .his 

pledge not to orbit weapons 

of mass destruction. He prom-

' ised to "continue to hold out 

to all nations, including the 

Soviet Union, the hand of cooperation in the exciting years 

of space exploration which lie 

ahead for all of us." 

In the past, Russian correspondents have never attended 

space launchings, although the 

United. States did not bar 

t h e m. Czechoslovakia and 

some other Communist nations 

have sent correspondents. 

Own Launchings Secret 

The Soviets have avoided 

attendance, it is believed, because they do not want , a, 

similar request to.view their 

launchings, all of which have 

been held in strict-secrecy, 

• There is no di$eernible r eason, to believe that the Bussians will accept the President's invitation-.to wateh, the 

late October launching' in 

which Astronauts Walter M. 

Schirra and Thomas P. Staf-. 

ford will be the 'pilots... 

Mr. Johnson expressed the 

hope •that the Russians would 

permit one of their scientists 

to accept the invitation. 

"We will certainly rriVe•-him 

a warm welcome, in Arneri ea," 

the President declared. • 

Spheres of Cooperation • 

• -Soviet-American space cooperation has been achieved in 

some work on weather studies, 

communications, and in ..,the 

study of magnetic fields. • ," 

While the Président laid 

special emphasis on the peaceful purpOses of the manned 

orbiting laboratory, ,known as 

MOL, his decision was a• victory for the Air Force, which 

his done substantial preliminary work on the project. 

The Defense Department 

budget now being debated in 

the Senate provides $150 million for MOL in the 1966 budget. Additional funds will be 

requested over a period of several years. • The ultimate cost of the 

entire program is expected to 

be far beyond the $1.5 billion 

the President estimated, for 

development. 

The Defense Department 

said that the primary objectives of MOL are to: 

• Learn more about' what 

man is able to do in space and 

how that ability can be used 

for. military purposes. 

* Develop technology and 

equipment which will help advance manned and unmanned 

space flight. 

* Experiment with this technology and equipment. 

"Unmanned flights to test 

launchings, recovery and other 

.basic parts of the system will 

begin late next year or early• 

1967," the President said. 

The Air Force has selected 

the Douglas Aircraft Co. to 

design and build the spacecraft and the General Electric 

Co. to plan and develop the! 

space experiments. 

The Titan 3-C booster, built 

by the Martin Co. and United 

Technology Center, will be 

used to lift the laboratory inTFI 

the sky. McDonnell Aircraft 

Co. is the contractor for the 

Gemini spacecraft. 

The President paid tribute 

to the two "very gallant men," 

—Gemini 5 Astronauts L. Gordon Cooper Jr. and Charles' 

Conrad Jr., and to the hundreds of persons on the 

ground supporting their flight. 

Gemini 5 is a "dramatic reminder," Mr. Johnson said, 

that the American dream for 

outer space is "a dream of 

peace and a dream of friendly 

cooperation" among all nations. 

"We believe the heavens belong to the people of every 

country," he added. 

The Washington Post 

26 August 1965 
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• WASH,. NEWS 26 Aug 65 (2'7) 

*'s 0 IP 

; 3 1.7.LiZiL121.1/ 113 

nVERY improvement in transportation 

since man learned to walk upright — 

and thus freed his hands for using 

weapons — has brought With it a 

military advantage. Space. travel will 

be no except ion. 

And unless the United States learns 

from• practiced experience what the 

advantage is; we cannot possibly know 

how to counter it. 

That is the basic reason for President 

Johnson's warranted decision to order 

development of a manned-orbiting 

laboratory for military research in 

astronauts nad to haNe .•a commuil . 

permit to tal:e. off. • • 

Some may ask why the laboratot 

which will be a forerunner 

permanent space stations, has be 

assigned to the Defense. Departure 

rather than to NASA, the civilian spa, 

, agency. 

There are solid answers. NASA . 

committed to the task of landing a mz 

on the moon. All its efforts are direct; 

to that. While some of its experimen 

do have military value (such as ti 

Gemini 5 sightings and photograph 

tests), this is secondary to the no 

military moon shot. 

The orbiting lab and its successo 

'will permit military men to wo: 

dition 

space. 

directly, under unhamperedcon 

goes hand in hand with that pledge. 

Our own national survival — and the The United States rernah 

I peace of the world — require that we committed, as the President Sai; 

move at least as fast as they do in ,never -to • put mass weapons 

this field. Otherwise we might wake up:Idestruction into space. This ne 

some morning and find the' Soviets had program is aimed at making certa: 

:pre-empted space, and that even our that neither does anybody else. 

We are not the only nation engaged on the problems of defense in space. 

in exploring space. The Russians are Undoubtedly, there will also 1 

'up there too, and have openly boasted .objections that the project violates of 

in the. past that they would use their United Nations pledge to preser 

space knowledge for military purposes space for peaceful uses. Actually, 

it served their interest. 
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F 

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I 

i,. WASH. STAR 26 Aug 65 (27) 

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In announcing the decision to give: 

the Air Force a go-ahead in developing`' 

"a manned orbiting laboratory," President Johnson has been at pains to stress,,,,. 

that "our American dream for outer 

space is a dream of peace and a drear4 

. of friendly cooperation among all of the 

nations of the earth." And to underscore. 

his point he has invited the Soviet 

Academy' of Sciences to send "a very] 

high-level representative" to observe the 

Gemini 6 launching in October. 

iness frit failed to develop the "manned' 

lorbiting laboratory.' 

The importance of this project can 

hardly be exaggerated. In the words of 

!General Schriever, chief of our Air Force 

;Systems Command, "The prudent course 

of action today and for the years ahead 

t

is to take out insurance against the use 

of space for aggressive purposes." To 

that end, "The MOL is conceived as a 

literal laboratory in space, which .would 

!enable us to study man's adaptability 

and limitations over prolonged periods. 

_ ..... . _ .. —... ......._ . 

The results of the MOI., experinTerit 

would give us 'actual experience an 

data to determine man's usefulness i 

a military role ; in space." 

It seems• pointless to try to suga 

the fact. The MOL project, which wi 

cost a minimum of $1.5 billion, is basi 

1 tally military in its objectives. W. 

would be careless and reckless if w 

neglected to do what must be don 

in space to keep ourselves and oU 

friends in the rest of the free worl 

reasonably secure. 

At the same time, however, the 

gremlin's propaganda machine has seen 

fit to denounce the Gemini 5 flight as a 

spy-in-the-sky operation. The attack! 

I is based on the fact, openly set forth 

the press kit published by the Na.tional;• 

! Aeronautics and Space Administrationj 

that six of the Cooper-Conrad expert-

:tents are military in character, specifii 

tally requested by the Defense Depart-i 

ment. The Russians have no ground foil 

complaint. It is inevitable that orbital! 

voyages, Russia's included, involve ob-1 

servations of value to the armed forces .1 

Actually, despite the President's! 

. peaceful words, there is no point in! 

trying to argue that the projected( 

"manned orbiting laboratory" is purely 

scientific in character. It is not purely 

scientific. It has military potentials of ! 

considerable significance, and our 

country should not apologize to anybody :• 

• ; for that fact. The Russians are busy in 

this 'field. Why should we ignore it?! 

The simple reality is, as Secretary of 

State Rusk has warned, that the ocean! 

of space might become a fearsome; 

. theater of war in the not distant future. 

In the circumstances, our country would 

. be guilty of a kind of suicidal passiveL. 
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CHICAGO DAILY NEWS 26 August 1965 (27)• 

The Russians are both late and naive 

in making the charge that Gemini 5 is a 

"spy" mission. Late, because cameras in 

American and Russian "spy" satellites 

have been snapping pictures of the Earth's 

surface for a long time. Naive, because 

if there ever was a mission in which everything was open and aboveboard, it is the 

flight of Astronauts Gordon Cooper and 

Charles Conrad, If' they are spies, the 

word has lost all meaning. 

Any, venture into space may, of course, 

produce knowledge useful for military as, 

Sky -~t 

well as civilian purposes. It was the Russians' concentration on military rocketry 

that gave them an early lead in space. 

It is quite possible that some of the 

experiments undertaken by the astronauts 

in their eight-day Gemini 5 mission will 

he helpful to military planners, just as 

the Russian cosmonaut flights doubtless 

helped the Soviet planners. But the primary goal is to learn about space, not to 

"spy" on the Earth' beneath. - 

President Johnson neatly disposed of 

the Russian complaint by inviting Soviet 

CONTINUED PAGE 4—E 

Those 'spies' in 

THOSE SPIES? IN THE SKY 

Continued 

scientists to witness the next Gemini 

launching. Would the Russians he willing 

to let American scientists watch their next 

cosmonaut flight? 

In quite a different category. was the 

President's go-ahead for a manned orbiting laboratory (MOL). .This $1.5 billion 

project is admittedly military, operating 

directly under the Defense Department. 

The job of the MOL, in which crewmen 

will work in orbit for as long as a month 

at a time, will be to develop and test equipment related "to the defense of America." 

Much as we regret this overt intrusion 

'of military technology into space, it is 

necessary, indeed inevitable, following as 

it does the development of missiles and 

unmanned satellites which can observe the 

Earth for long periods of time. 

President Johnson pledged again that 

the United States would not put weapons, 

of mass destruction into orbit. The MOL 

will be one means of insuring that no 

other nation does it. either 
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AN INDEPENDENT NEWSPAPER FRIDAY; AUGUST 27, 1965 PAGE A24 

promise to serve their interest; and they will 

have to keep their promises if they want to be . 

re-elected. And this is going to mean, with absolute certainty, the end of racial discrimination in 

the South. Negroes are going to be full-fledged 

citizens and they are going to insist on their 

rights as citizens. 

If this is a revolution, it is a happy and orderly 

one. Its benefits will go not alone to the Negroes 

but to the whole region in which they have been 

for so long disfranchised and disadVantaged. As 

Negroes gain political rights, they will advance. 

economically and contribute increasingly to the • 

region. Most important of all, however, the South 

will have removed a burden from its conscience 

and will itself be liberated. "The very clear and • 

very heartening lesson of this wonderful report", 

as the President said, "is that obedience to the 

law is a fact of life to so many men and women; 

of good will throughout the South." • 

f in Space 

The President has launched the • country on 

another exciting space venture by setting aside 

:A% billion for starting work on a Manned Orbit-

; :ing Laboratory (MOL) but he has aroused some 

anxiety by assigning,the project to the Air Force. 

Apprehension that the military role would duplicate that of the civilian National Aeronautics and 

Space Administration (NASA) and involve un-

-necessary efforts and costs has been an initial 

worry but the President undoubtedly has as-

_ sured himself that this kind of waste will not 

occur in his cost-conscious administration. 

The apparent conflict between our treaty com-• 

• mitments against the use of outer space for mili-: 

tary purposes and the Air Force role was dealt 

with by the President at his press conference. 

The President made it clear that our treaty pledges 

are still in effect. He said that "the heavens 

belong to the people of every country . . . We 

intend to live up to our agreement not to orbit 

weapons of mass destruction and we will continue 

to hold out to all nations, including the Soviet 

Union, the hand of cooperation." The President 

acknowledged that the wisdom gained in this 

project will "relate that ability to the defense of 

America." There is no doubt that NASA experiments have had their defense "fall-out." More- 

• over military men form a large part of NASA's 

staff. The Soviet Union, on its part, has found 

no conflict between its treaty pledges to reserve 

outer space for peaceful uses and the total conduct of its space projects, by the military. 

. The President did not deal in his press conference statements with a third obvious anxiety 

over the new role of the Air Force and at an 

early date he ought to do so. That anxiety arises 

out of the Air Force commitment to total secrecy 

in its space operations. After a_few false starts, 

NASA put its operations in a goldfish bowl. It 

has pursued a brilliantly successful open public, 

information policy.' It has made every American a 

participant in its exciting conquests of space, 

aroused the national interest in the whole world 

of science, stirred the youth of the country to 

enthusiasm and stimulated national pride. The 

Vandenburg Air Force Ease, which will become 

a major site for MOL launchings, has operated • i 

behind a veil of secrecy: It has given its unmanned launchings 'no prior publicity. It has 

issued only laconic statements after launchings.. 

No citizen has the slightest basis for a judgment 

on Vandenburg operations-1 

The open policy of NASA won this comment 

:'recently in The General Anzeiger of Wuppertal, 

West Germany: 

The Americans make it possible for the public 

around the world to participate without reservation in all phases of their exploration of space. 

To be sure, this carries with it the risk that failures cannot be embellished or excused. But the 

advantage is that the observer feels caught up 

in the adventure to a greater degree than if he _ 

were served up a success with victory fanfares in 

an all-inclusive communique. 

'The Pentagon has not yet devised a policy for 

informing the public on the man-in-space MOL 

project. If it continues the Vandenburg policies 

of the past, the country is going to know very 

little about MOL. Such secrecy is bound to 

arouse international suspicions and alarms, particularly since the flights will be over Soviet territory. Either this is primarily a project' in the 

peaceful penetration of space that requires little 

secrecy; or it is a secret military project that 

cannot be reconciled with our previous professions. The President, we trust, will make clear 

which it is. And if it is a peaceful use of space, 

he ought to impose on the Pentagon the successful information policies of 'NASA. • 
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L 

BALTIMORE SUN 

27 AUGUST 65 P-4 

VANDENBERG 

AWAITS BOOM 

Vandenberg Air Force Base, 

Cal., Aug. 26 UPC—Presidential approval of the Air Force's Manned 

Orbiting Laboratory program 

means a new construction boom 

at this $200,000,000 West Coast 

space center. 

Industry sources say projects 

will run to hundreds of millions of 

dollars. 

Hurling manned military craft 

into space from here will call for 

duplication o' many of the launching and tracking facilities at Cape 

Kennedy, Fla., and Houston, but 

this will be necessary, the sources 

said, to establish adequate space 

surveillance., 

Polar Orbit Vital 

This 83,000-acre spread of 

brush-covered sand dunes is the 

only place in the world ,where 

satellites are launched into polar 

orbit—and only by.. circling_ the 

poles can- satellitesscan every 

square mile of the earth. ; 

—Soviet satellites and those fired 

from this country's East Coast go 

into orbits around the earth's 

middle and thus are !unable to 

keep watch, on extreme northern 

and southern areas. 

A fleet of MOL's in polar orbit 

not only would enhance the Air 

Force's espionage capability, but 

also would—provide space—platforms from which enemy spacecraft and missiles could be detected and destroyed. ' 

Unmanned 1-ton satellites carrying cameras and other surveillance gear have been launched 

from here • since 1961 under the 

code name Samos. 

Two-M-an Vehicles 

The MOL program calls for 2- 

man vehicles weighing up to ZS,- 

.000 pounds—the size of a house 

trailer, with space for much more 

elaborate equipment. ' 

They will be boosted • by 153-

foot-tall, triple-barreled Titan 3C 

rockets, much too powerful for 

any existing pads at Vandenberg. 

Construction of new pads and 

tracking 'facilities may double or 

triple Air Force investment here, 

industry sources said, but would 

be worthwhile because polar orbit 

slion—aTeirn7Mical from Cape 

Kennedy. That civilian space center cannot launch to the north or 

south without flying over populated areas. 

• Ocean To South 

One reason Vandenberg was 

chosen as 'the West Coast space 

center is that it juts out into the 

Pacific and south, of it ware thousands of miles of empty ocean 

into which spent rocket casings 

can fall without ham!, 

Defense Departzrfent officials 

have said MOlf's would be 

launched both from Cape Kennedy and Vandenberg but industry 

sources believe that' the eastern 

firings will be primarily test shot 

and that polar-orbit requirements 

mean the operational launchings 

will be at Vandenberg. 

Th6 go-ahead for the.51,590,040,- 

MOL program sparked• i-new 

boom in surrounding cities such 

as Santa Maria and Lompoc, into 

which Vandenberg already pumps 

some $7,000,000 a month in salaries and purchase of materials. . 

Depressed by cutbacka in defense spending as the nation's 

missile inventory neared its goal, 

merchants and real estate men 

are already busy planning for an', 

expected influx of. construction 

tworkers and military personnel. 
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The MOL is and always has been an 

Air Force show since it was announced 

in 1963. 

Its purpose is to establish the military usefulness of man in space. 

Its scheduled hardware is a two-man 

spacecraft powered by a Titan III-C 

booster rocket. The craft would consist of a Gemini-B capsule atop a 10- 

foot diameter, 14-foot long, canistershaped laboratory. The total weight 

would be about 18 thousand pounds; 

the orbit would be below 350 miles; 

tights of 30 days in a shirt-sleeves environment are planned, with the two 

men re-entering the capsule for a return trip to earth. 

All of the above facts about the MOL, 

together with information that the 

Aerospace Corporation has been in 

charge of systems engineering and 

technical direction and that Douglas 

Aircraft, General Electric and the Martin Company are also doing part of the 

preliminary planning, have been matters of public record for many months. 

And President Johnson's announcement that the laboratory will be built 

and that $1,500,000,000 will be asked 

to cover the cost of development test 

flights and the building of five MOLs 

was expected. A decision was to have 

been made in mid-summer, 1965, and 

Mr, Johnson is, in fact, a few weeks 

late. 

We have said before in these columns 

that if the billions expended on manned 

space research are to be justified, the 

United States must make sensible use 

of the military potential of space. 

The Soviets surely have done so froin 

the beginning of their space program, 

and the United States may well have 

lost - valuable time by pussyfooting and 

by pretending that civilian joyriding in 

space is worth the expenditure of five 

billion dollars a year. 

;,Now the fetters are off the Manned 

Orbiting Laboratory. The President 

has ordered full speed ahead. We 

think that's fine, 

OMAHA WORLD—HERALD 

27 August 1.(4)5KI.S) 

MOL at Last 

It is rather difficult in a free society 

_o soft pedal a major space program 

which is not secret and which was 

lever intended to be secret. 

But this the National Aeronautics and 

Space Agency managed to do in connection with the Manned Orbiting Labwatory. 

NASA has shown an unreasonable 

fear of admitting that space has military uses and, more specifically, that 

is Gemini program has not been whol-

-y civilian but has had the active and 

official and announced participation of 

he United States Air Force. 

NASA's reluctance to talk about this 

tact and its emphasis upon the civilian 

aspects of its program. have come close 

:o misrepresentation. NASA's attitude 

lelps to explain why the Air Force 

never has been very happy about its 

secondary role in the Gemini program 

and why there must be vast relief withn the military establishment, the space 

industry and a good many other places 

now that President Johnson has chosen 

o give the green light to the Manned 

3rbiting Laboratory. 

* * 
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CHICAGO SUN–TIMES, 29 August 1965 (LS) 

no S ace iviilitariiy 

Orbiting of weapons of mass destruction such as the atomic bomb is forbidden 

under an international agreement approved 

by the United Nations General Assembly 

in 1963. The nations already have the 

means with which to destroy each other in 

the giant missiles that can carry a nuclear 

warhead to a pinpointed target 5,000 miles 

away. 

Up until now, no nation has acknowledged putting any space vehicle into orbit 

for military reasons. The various Sputniks 

and Geminis have been sent aloft for scientific study or for peaceful purposes such 

as weather study or communications. 

Last week, President Johnson announced 

a new space-age policy. He gave the U.S. 

Air Force permission it has long been 

seeking to send into space a manned orbiting laboratory (MOL). Five are to be sent 

up in 1968. They will not violate the UN 

agreement on orbiting nuclear weapons. 

They are described as defensive weapons, 

intended particularly for surveillance. They 

could be used as another line of defense 

against enemy satellites. And, of course, 

like any military machine, the MOL could 

be useful for offense as well as defense: 

It was inevitable that space would become another military theater. But as the 

world is now constituted, the United States 

would be risking its own future if it did 

not look to its defenses in space as well as

. 

on Earth. 

In this new venture, the United States 

continues its policy of operating in the open 

with candid disclosure. The machines are 

described and the timetable diSclosed. Obviously, details of military secrets will not 

be revealed but the Communist world is 

forewarned that America intends to be 

prepared militarily in space. 

This may be inveighed against by the 

Reds as a warlike step, but reasonable 

persons throughout the world must be 

moved to consider this question: What is 

more warlike, the open society of the United States or the closed society of the Communists, who for all the free world knows, 

may already be under way militarily in 

space? 

The Communists protest "spying" on 

them from space. What have they to hide? 

The United States would not object to Soviet satellites looking us over. President 

Johnson has invited the Russians to watch 

the next Gemini lift-off In October, the 

third such invitation the United States has 

made to them. The invitation does not even 

require a similar return invitation from the 

Russians to watch one of their secret 

launchings. 

The American decision to put a branch 

of the Pentagon in space must be viewed 

against this background. Such decisions 

will be unnecessary when the day comes 

—as it must for mankind's survival—when 

all the world will be a society as open as 

America's. 

( 1. 
1 ecturity: Public • InfP -

STIC: MOL 

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w. 

SUNDAY, AUGUST 29, 1965. y. J . • . 

• J- • 

• . 

1. ." 4,1 

••• Across, the scrubby sands and 

calm lagoons of Cape Kennedyi 

there have been taking shape two 

.of• the more astonishing installalions of the astonishing U. S. 

• space program. One is the vast 

launch complex from which the 

National Aeronautics and Space 

Administration hopes to send men 

to the moon in the Apollo space-.. 

• craft by, the end of the decade.'I 

The other,. a couple of miles away, 

is the smaller but scarcely less im-" 

posing •complex from which the 

'Air Force expects in a year or two 

to send • men aloft to study a grim 

question: What military use can 

be" made of space? .' 

Last week both enterprises 

moved measurably 'closer \„to realiminimum and gradually nursed1,' 

the 'system back to the: •point.. 

where ,,it was supplying norma1;. ' 

power. ' They then received per-1, 

r• mission from the Mission Control 

t• Center at the Manned Space.. 

1 .• Flight Center in Houston to ccin, 

<it tinue on a day-to-day basis. ' 1 •■ ; 

'V • _For the next few days the astro- -., 

nauts conducted a full schedule of • 

experiments, always mindful that 

new trouble might cut the flight 

• short. At one point • the heavy';:; ' 

- • work load raised Colonel Cooper's:,•: 

fur. Referring to the experiments 

I . he said over the intercom to earth: I:, 

" "Yeah, well, ' some of these, like 

on our time, they were just bang, 

bang, bang, right together. We '•J 

• just can't do them that close to-Yi 

gether. That's rather poor plan- -1 

, I 

Most-of the time, however,thel 

, spacemen retained their sense of ' 

humor under difficult ' circum.:1, 

stances, and carried on a steady:'.1 

banter with their colleagues on'-'1 

the ground. They, even exchanged:11 

, bits of, original' poetry when they 

. • Were forced into another lull byl 

•.313'3r. this tirrie; lioviever,lhe astro-; 

nauts had ; set. the following 

•records:' ' 

1; (1) Longest flight. Colonel Coop-.:1 

er and Commander Conrad on 

Thursday passed the Soviet mark • 

• 'of 81 orbits' in 119 hours, 6 minutes'} 

Set' by Valery. Bykovsky in 1963, ,.; 

and .headed 'for 'their planned tar-,'.! 

get' of 121. ..orbita in more :.than' . 

192 hours. 

(2) Longest total hours in space. 

=With the Gemini 5 flight, Ameriycan spacemen surpassed the 507. 

hours, 16 minutes compiled by So- 

.:.viet cosnionadts. The full eight-: 

'slay run, by Gemini 5 would boost 

,the U.S. to nearly 644 hours. 

.• •• (3) Most, hours in space per in 

%.indioidual. Colonel Coopei, 

logged 34 hours, 20 minutes on his 

-solo • flight in .May, 1963, took the 

;lead away from. Mr. Bykovsky..! 

.,-- But the main idea was not to .. 

play oneupmanship with the Rus--.. 

. tear's; it was' to determine what 

.1-- : 

II:: • While definite' conclusions must .1 

.b...await extensive studies on the. 

u: ' mates of. what was learned from . 

•.■ Gemini 5 on four major questions:","i 

., ground, here are preliminary esti- ) 1 

(eight days in space and what skills -• 

, i•• 

ploration. -' ' ' , 

and docking techniques—approach- ',•; 

ing and contacting another vehicle -•: 

in space—needed for lunar ex- :,4 

are necessary for the rendezvous ''., i

happens to a human being during: , 

Endurance. One of the most-! 

techniques—approach- ... 

. heartening disclosures - of the ' 

1 . flight 'is the new light it has pro. .1 

11. 'vided on the limitless resiliency of :.; 

i ' the*human spirit. The two astro- . .! 

nauts, under constant strain and .•! 

, .., anxieties, displayed an ability' to i 

.•solve problems which, many spec^ 1 

r experts contend, could not . often '.i 

.. . .ba achieved by machines alone. .. . 

• . The spacemen maintained their ' 

, '.' high spirits even .though. restless ''; ' 

i' sleep, confinement, chilly nights, 

.1 . itching beards and minor problems 

, `with :equipment compounded the..E 

-"-'stresses of living for so long in an. : 

,com- '

i 

.'"area as small as the seating • r: 

:P41'404.0;a: sports 

. ._ 'Far- ... :. , , ,• . ,i . • • 

zation. • 

• The Gemini 5 spacecraft, recovering from power trouble that 

threatened to short-circuit its 

flight, completed its full eight-day 

mission for a scheduled splashdown in the Atlantic this 'Morning 

to prove that man can stand a 

period of weightlessness considered necessary for a round trip to 

the moon. In the process, the two 

astronauts aboard so three world 

records and pushed the U.S. ahead 

of Russia in space endurance. 

And at his news conference 

Wednesday, President Johnson 

gave the green light for construe- 

• tion of a 31.5 billion Manned Orbiting Laboratory (M.O.L.)-to explore space for military purPoSes. 

The announcement raised the Specter . of the battlefield one day being extended . into the infinity .of 

outer space. • • 

GEMINI'S SUCCESS 

. From its blast-off at Cape Kennedy a week ago yesterday, 

Gemini 5 was a source of anxiety 

and suspense. Three 'hours after 

launching, the 7,000-pound space-

. r ship developed problems in the 

electrical 'System and there •.were 

' fears that the mission'would have 

to be • ended in 'the' Sixth'. of the ' 

seheduled 121. 'orbits.. 1 ,111- •

But the two pilots=Lieut 'Col 

'Space Goal. 14‘ Gor

don Cooper Jr.,' 38, ate... Lieut. Comdr. Charles Conrad 

35—cut use' of electricity to a• 

...President Defines Thenii . . 

power difficulties late in the" 

flight. , • ' . . • ""11 

The late, power problems forced, 

the astrounauts to curtail their. 

Space chores sharply and spend4 

theist' of their time 'n drifting. 

flight in hopes of completing the 

mission. As .the capsule tumbled 

thrMigh space, 1,tlission 4Control !,1 

t. asked, "You think we could sell 

that 'thing as a • ride at a carni-.y. 

val?" Colonel Cooper answered, •, 

"I don't think you could sell this..! 

day-to-day of drifting flight as 

ride anywhere." 

-- A: major problem was boredom,: 

and-to help the astronauts kill,' 

time, the ground controllers 

over the intercom what they called i! 

"music to drift by." Another prob-. 

.tem was the lack of exercise. When::* 

, Mission Control asked if Colonei; .; 

Cooper was keeping active, Corn-,:, 

minder Coniad,; chuckling, re 

plied; "I hope to shout. He's up-.; 

side down in the.food box. We're 

th 

matter: of7tacte'we're,..,up'; tot'our 

,oatryringx. torarerbp.aageck„, 
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'Thus; cespite difficulties that 

1 ous state by heating and fed into,' 

j the fuel cells. There, electrical en-' 

1 ergy is generated through a' con- • 

tinous chemical reaction. ,•raj, ,' 

Gemini 5 had trouble three times 

!

, with the fuel cell system: first, be...,',. 

_ fore the flight, when difficulty de-' . 

veloped in filling the hydrogen' 

tank to the capacity needed; sec-, 

ond, early in the flight, when pres.'. 

sure in the oxygen line dropped' 

far below normal; and third, on. 

the sixth day, when the system 

seemed to produce water too fast," 

1 raising fears that the cells might 

"drown" because there was no , 

way of ejecting the water overboard. 

1

4 • - Experts at Houston pointed out 

1 that the fuel cells themselves beL. hayed all right, and they expressed 

confidence that the allied problems 

, , could be ironed out. for • future 

flights. • • 

, a Observations' and photography.,' 

Experiments performed by the astronauts showed that man can effectively photograph and track 

. things on the ground and missiles 

: launched from the ;ground;' take 

measurements that should lay the 

basis for a system of identifying 

man-made objects in . orbit; and 

-...... _-__, • scan the weather of half a contiaa 

nent at once. 0 : , '.; ; ' a.... 

rendezvous exercise with a. ,Radar f 

Evaluation' Pod (REP), 

was carried into space on the capsule and, then ejected, .had. to .be 

abandoned unfinished early in the 

• mission because , of 0 the power 

trouble. • 

Nevertheless, many of the •objectives of that exercise were ac- 

• complished later through a highly ..I 

successful rendezvous exercise f• with a "phantom" rocket whose , 

orbit and flight characteristics., 

,-- • were generated by a computer on • 

• the ground. The spacecraft wasable to maneuver 'to change its kl 

orbit in the desired way and 'camel 

within a few tenths óf 'a mile of, 

achieving the exact orbit characa 

teristics the astronauts sought.r 

Fuel cells. Gemini 5 was the'. 

first in-flight test of fuel cells as' 

a source of electrical power. Previa. 

, ous missions used heavier and'. 

' bulkier storage batteries, which- 

, are considered unfeasible for flights. 

{ of more than four days because of 

' their. weight and size. The fuel. 

• cells operate on oxygen and hydro.... 

gen which are converted into gase-' 

Frequent measurement of thel - - 1, ■ • 

astronauts' heartbeats, their tem-. 

peratures and blood pressures during the flight indicated the pilots 

will come through the experience 

in good 'shape. They ate and .1• 

drank water as well as could be I 

• expected and there was no appar-1 

ent danger of dehydration—a fre- , 

• 

i 

quent occurrence in a weightless' 

Readezvons . and docking. A. • 

• 

plagued the flight from time to 

time, space experts considered ' 

Gemini 5 a success that set the 

stage for-Gemini 6 in October and 

represented a significant step 

toward fulfillment of the Apollo 

project. As to whether the flight 

put the U.S. ahead of Russia in the 

'space race, George E. Mueller, :: 

NASA associate administrator, 

said, "I don't think any one flight 

or achievement is going to deter- . 

f mine leadership in space. The ' 

; flights over, the long term .will 

provide us with a sound 'basis, for' 

ileadership." . . . ., • f 

if- AND NOW M.O.L. 

. 

l• As Gemini 5 whirled about the 

earth, President Johnson issued', 

I 'the order that added a crucial mg.,' 

i itary dimension to the space rage. , 

his news conference, he said e 

,'had.instructed the Defense — 

/ .partment to proceed immediat 

• :with • construction of the fir 

-Manned' Orbiting, Laboratory. 

'said: 

...., "this program will bring us" a •• 

new knowledge' about what man 'll 

..is able ;to do in space. It will en-.'! 

• able us to relate that ability to 

r: the defense of America.;It will, 

develop 'technology and . equip-, 

• , •. anent which ,will help advance ;i 

manned and unmanned space"' ' . ' ,.; 

flight and it will make it possi-, t. 

to perform very new, and re- If, 

a warding experiments with that ..." • 

technology and equipment." .11 

Mr., Johnson said unmanned 

,.flights to, test launching, recovery 

and other basic parts of the sys-v. 

tern will begin late next year , or 

. 'early in 1967. The initial unmanned 

launch of a fully equipped labor' 

r. atory is scheduled for 1968. This' 

.1 will be followed later that year by.. 

the first of five flights with tWej; • 

man crews. ' ' - I ..` 

the two-man ivr.o.L:, is the larg-1,.) 

• est manned spacecraft yet planned 

• l• by. the, U.S.. It, will, consist of a; 

Gemini capsule attached to a 42-, ,.3 

; foot-long, 15,000-pound .cannister. 

• '; that will serve as the laboratory:: 

One-half ,of the canister will con.; 

tam instruments; the Other, relaatively , roomy living quarters in 1 

which the astronauts can work'

• 

!. 

and sleep "in their. shirtsleeves," I 

that is, without cumbersome space 

'suits. ' The astronauts will return 

earth in the capsule, leaving the, 

canister in .orbit. The space sta-; 

1 tion will be launched into orbit 'by: t• 

the Air Force's.Titan 3-C, the most 

',powerful rocket yet, developed by 

;'• the U.S.., • ; . 

••"The decision 'to proceed with the,' 

I M.O.L.; long . urged 'by. the, •Air 

is. Force and long delayed by the.Adaa 7 ' 

mnIStratlon represented aav; 

• 

• 

o portant modification of American, 

, policy and goals in space. Ever '• 

since the space age dawned nearly • 

eight years ago, it has been the 

• policy, incorporated in the 1958 

. space law, that U.S.' ,activities 

• should be devoted to peaceful purposes. , Now the U.S. has made a 

major and, open comMitmentato

• 

•. • 

explore and' possibly exploit spaca. 

.for military purposes. 

Actually; in recent years the 

' U.S. has been increasingly active 

in launching military • satellites 

'that .have, been photographing 

'Russia and 'Communist China in 

• remarkable detail..' The 'M.O.L. . 

program has been delayed, in part, 

by the Government's desire' to 

\

present 'a peaceful image to the. 

world, and in part by the civilian-/ t 

'Mary division in the space prcid"

 

, 

..' gratta....Hasically, the argutrientns 

• one 'of. arrian-f-verstis;--nraChine, of ' • 

;whether .man can perform any , 

military function 'in space 'more 

effectively than an unmanned sat-" -

elite. 

• There is general agreement that • 

. 

• tman probably does not have an; 

1 aggressive military role- in space. - 

;But there remains the• question of 

whether man, with a flexibility 

and power of decision that still 

surpasses servea.dfensive rymachine, could1t .observerr:in 

,spade. 

M.O.L. will lhelp answer iles 

a ' question. The experimental' pro-

' ' gram will seek , to determine the • 

feasibility of using manned satel- ! , 

• lites as command: posts for milltary operations on earth, to in- i 

' ' spect and destroy hostile satellites, • 

•,, .. to conduct photographic reconnais-% 

sance of the earth, and to monitor 

enemy ra1dio and radar • trans- ! 

missions. . . 1 

• ' President Johnson sought to play 

down the military implications of

• his announcement on M.O.L. He, 

said, "We intend to live up to 

our agreement not to orbit weapa 

ens of mass destruction" and' will 

• continue to cooperate with every 

,one, "including the Soviet Union," 

• in future space exploration. To 

:accent' this stand,: Mr. Johnson invited ,'the Soviet. , Academy of 

Sciences to send .observers to the ' 

next Gemini launching, in October. 

•• Nevertheless, the' M.O.L. development caused disquiet across the.' 

world at a time when there was 

hope that current disarmament 

, talks might produce some progress. M.O.L. -seemed to raise all': 

sorts of new questions on disarma- , 

, ment. Assuming that Russia has 

;a similar technical capacity to 

produce orbiting, laboratories, 

, outer space from 1968 onward ; 

' ! could he full of manned space !: --.' • 

ship, with ' awesome- military, - • ■ 

potential. , , . • , 

' 

• 
NRO APPROVED FOR 

RELEASE 1 JULY 2015 

WASHINGTON STAR 2 SEPTETBER 1965 (3) 

A .f7 1 a `I " 

V V V gLifJ 

P— ?6 

17 15 

• 

The Pentagon has surprised 

almost everyone with its 

promptness in • applying the 

first squeeze of censorship 

and news management to its 

new Manned Orbiting Laboratory (MOL) program. 

Most people assumed that 

soon after the military got a 

manned role in space, it 

would start classifying it, but 

few could have foreseen the 

rapidity with which restrictions came. The elapsed time 

from President Johnson's 

announcement of the start of 

MOL at his press conference 

last week to the Pentagon's 

first fumbling bit of news 

management was exactly two 

hours. 

The restriction was picayune and worse than pointless: 

It was unenforceable. It was 

characteristic of federal relations with the press in that it 

had no other effect than to 

antagonize. 

Reporters trooping to an 

MOL briefing at the Pentagon 

were instructed that they 

would not be allowed to make 

tape recordings or to mention 

the name of the of:Li:dal - (Dr. 

Albert C. Hall, deputy director of research end engineering), who was briefing them. 

This exchange then occUrred: 

"Why not?" 

"Because that's the way wa 

prefer to do it." 

The briding was highly 

technical and contained many 

points that could be misunderstood by reporters and thus 

misinterpreted for readers 

who, in the final analysis, will 

be paying the expensive tab 

for MOL. A tape would have 

been helpful. 

The briefing was later 

transmuted by telephone to 

the National Aeronautics and 

Space Administration's Houston center, where a large contingent of reporters was covering the flight of Gemini 5. • 

The same "no tape, no 

attribution" rule was invoked 

at Houatore but was ignored 

by many reporters who -reEly WILLIAM HINES 

fused to be bound by secrecy 

they knew could not be enforced. Tape recordings were 

made and freely circulated in 

Hoeston. 

Only one apparent purpose 

can be served by limiting the 

news-gathering tools of a 

reporter to pen and paper. 

Simply and bluntly stated, 

that purpose is: It is easier to 

disavow a newsman's notes 

than an official's own voice. 

This is a craven device, and 

when one searches for the 

author of the unworthy policy 

behind it, one invariably runs 

into a stone wall 

The late Prizident Kennedy 

said, in respect cif the Bay of 

Pigs fiasco, that success has a 

thousarid fathers. but defeat is 

an orphan. The same is true 

as well of any untenable 

policy, and the current, longstanding news gag en Russian 

space accomplishments is an 

excellent exan-iple. 

Soon after the Kennedy 

administration came in, the 

government ceased reporting 

Soviet space launchings, 

including attempts that failed. 

Manifestly the Russians knew 

when they • launched; they 

also knew we knew. The 

people left in the dark were_.. 

and are—those here in the 

United States Wi:o are paying 

for the nation's elaborate and 

presumably efficient spacecraft detection system. Nobody 

in the government defends this 

policy, yet it persists. 

The DefenseDeTartment is 

not the only traducer of a free 

news flow. The space agency 

gives news management the 

old college try every time a 

manned spacecraft goes up. 

Of thesignificant news 

locations in a Gemini flight, 

the only one not covered by 

the combined news media 

(meaning ?rays, radio and 

TV) is the most important one 

of all the missian control 

center at Houston.. 

It is not a sec:et place,' nor 

one in wlaick, unne.cca'cary 

traffic is discouraged. Flight 

director Christopher C. Kraft 

already has stated publicly 

that he would rather have a 

Soviet observer in his control 

center than an American 

journalist. Further, every 

clerk and secretary among 

the 4,6e0 NASA civil servants 

who could spare five or ten 

minutes from work was 

encouraged to look in. 

On one flight the motion 

picture actor Jimmy Stewart 

was an interested observer. 

Even newspaper publishers 

have been admitted, possibly 

on the theory that they are 

not really "working press," 

and hence harmless. 

But neither camera nor tape 

recorder nor pen-and-paper 

reporter is allowed in the nonsecret room at any time 

during a flight. This is a 

measure of how far we have 

come toward government 

control of news in 20 short 

years. Even in the supersecret atom bomb project, the 

national , press had a "pool" 

representative, William L. 

Laurence of the New York 

Times. This is not to suggest 

that there has been any 

"cover-up" to date. In the 

course of missions, Kraft 

gives regular, full and apparently frank accounts of flight 

activities, and opens himself 

to detailed questioning. So 

do his associates. A mission 

commentary of less consistent 

accuracy and authenticity is 

broadcast. 

But whether or not there 

has been suppression to date 

is not the point. All flights so 

far have ended happily, and 

nothing succeeds like success. 

There has been no reason for 

a cover-up. 

The point is that the oppor-

(amity for news management 

definitely exists in mils :don 

control—and it is an axiom of 

political science that where 

cpreertunity exists, there are 

always people waiting to 

seize it. 
0 APPROVED FOR 

RE ASE 1 JULY 2015 

fe 1-1 • k .114- g'4./r 

irr o IT C,' 

STIC;-'A/104." ' • - 

Security:. Pub Info.Clippings ' 

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' • ;.; ,"1!, j1./.''.'/"."%i,!1/..7e;„,.. 

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Page 4 -E:orroatAL RAGE Friday, Sept. 3, 1963 

-7••(") • 

• 

, .•, t 

• 

• 

• 

0 

c77-s, -77 7 0 

!:1111 

.(L 

the oceans, thus increase the warn- 

- ing time for defense against both 

Soviet ICBIVIs and submarine-fired, . 

Polaris-type missiles.• - 

Such a manned-satellite, early- 

• warning system could be. opera- • 

tional before 1975, now that it's • 

known man can operate in space 

for extended periods.., • , 

SOVIET. MILITARY men have 

the same problem of early detection. They aim at quicker knowledge of any U.S. Polaris missile . 

firings. • 

It may 'be too risky..to let the 

perfected, decoy loaded, zigzagging Russian ICBMs of the 1970s 

get close enough to .vital U.S. targets to be knocked out by Nike X. 

t may well be safer to develop 

a defensive antimissile - missile, 

based on a space platform, that 

would blast cut Russian missiles 

before they crossed the Atlantic or 

Pacific. 

Some missile men believe it 

will be essential eventually to put 

attack missiles similar to Polaris 

or Minuteman on manned. -space 

• platforms. They believe that, properly 

.• 

. constructed and fired, such -.- 

missiles would have a better 

chance than ground-based Minutemen of getting through the -Soviet 

antimissile defenses of the mid1g705. . . 

Some • competent space scien- • 

-Lists privately say it Would be wise 

to explore the possibility of some . 

:lay establishing missile baseS on • 

the moon_.: • • 

THE • EIGHT-DAY Gemini. V 

frieht proved-that space has a 

strong military capability-. 

The- uncertain factor-after' Gem- • 

ini IV was whether man could operate efficiently in. a: satellite for 

.extended periods.. . 

MediCaI reports. on astronauts 

• Gordon CooPer• -and Pete Conrad -• 

have proved that man can. 

This makes possible. the hurry- . 

up program on the Manned Orbiting Laboratory announced.by Defense Secretary Robert laNamara. 

• The stor behind that. hurry-Up -. 

Is simple. There's new evidence. -

the Russians. are. bearing. down 

hare on building a. manned Chili 

terry satellite laboratory. of , their 

own. • ' 

Why this race?..- 

AS SOVIET intercontinental 

ballistic. missiles get better, some 

way must be found to get an earlier warning' of Russian ICBM at7 

• tack.. 'T 

Practical warning time. at best 

now is considerably less than 15 

minutes. - • • 

, As the Soviet. Union builds a 

fleet of Polaris-type missile submarines, there will be less warning time.; Any ,rnissile fired a few 

hundred. miles off ••the U.S. coastline may well get to target before 

defenses an be alerted and operating. 

Manned satellites high enough 

in space. and armed, with infrared 

sensors should be able to continuously scan the Soviet Union and 
STIC: MOL V 

FUNCTIONS: MOL 

NRO APPR9VED FOR 

RELEASE 1 JULY 2015 

DEPARTMENT OF THE AIR FORCE 

OFFICE OF THE SECRETARY 

MEMORANDUM 

3 September 1965 

Col Carter, 

I have reviewed the attached document 

and informed Colonel Sanders that it looks OK 

‘fOt• •my viewpoint. My contact with him indicated 

that he had not provided you a copy, so one is 

attached. 

General Evans 

1 Atch 

a/s 

cr-. WIPE Ctr'— 

FiLtz. 
4pG- 2 

• (0 t .t.10 

. .•;•!,t, 

. • 

NF$0 APPROVED FOR 

rr RELEASE JULY' 2015 

• 

UMLASSIFIED 

• DPAITT 

O: Al I Dip-1==Jc sr: ons 

LajEcT: . • Ntaned Orbitinz, Laboratory Space =Jett 

On August 25 President Johnson announced that. he was. . . . 

• instruetins the Department of Defence to with tho:'' 

development' of a N'anned V.Liyii.S.nz Laboratory (L'10L). 

22:c:side:tea- statement on NOL is annered..-: 

Various questions as to the nature and aims of NOL 

have cone up in the V.S. tad abroad. - Any presentation or 

• - •.. • 

or:planation of the 1:O1 project 'will of course have to bp:so 

ovzcbcd. 'as'. to Suitable ia terns of the. local situation. an 

. -,• 

but the general stance. that should be: taken', 

is thls: 

„Lac., A uL p.oeet will doubtless produce b,-e4its 

• t-erns o•I'•scient-rfic •kao-v71e1:1,-,-.• the 6nt of space 

•• . • • 

•41=ploration geaerally;-1 It has not been and should not be 

juotifiedo erplained for that reaso n.- It is a slilitary r. 

•.. . 

.project, to be undertaken for reasons of.eatienal security, 

rccairing no apolortes, camoufla,e or more justification 

a= zz3r other projects undertaken for this reasoa.--It has. 

tie "r‘eapons in space" or "bombs in orbit" aspect whatever, 

. ,... 

. . • ..` .',' ...- 

,.., 

. ....--: 

-,131'.1tLASSTrtIts 

... 

•■••••.•••• 

cixeumstanoos 
NRO APPROVED FOR 

RLEA§ 1 JULY 2015 

DFCTASSIFTED ' 

- 2 

• and is neither illegal nor unique. 7t does mot represent 

new policy. daparture by the U.S. Government, 

logical nomt step la the overall U.S. space programa-which 

has hc.d.both mllitary:and non-military Componeato'frem the 

beginaing, Z=.%is an erparimantal,-rescarch project,. 

. . • ' 

gas -con planned'end taikod about gor nearly the years 

which is citned solely at finding DLit. MO :7a ZOCAIt 1-.47.17; rzan 

do ia space cad how that abilit7 might 

defense and security tha U.S. aad the freavarld.\ 

Tho "ol 

•". • 

M. related to:the: 4

more datalled ingormation,.set up-in 

quastion =.ansver'fomn for conveniene may be useful to.. 

in answering press or other coacria.) -or'yoluatecrad, 

appropriatew-:, 

What i tho project?-. 

v,rled sp-reo f143 ht pro;;act, of research 

expe:.Imental nature., which will pu3r two a...e.a into 

space for periods of u2 to SD days, ia 

alcoves environment, with the object of 

out Ez0110 about Vhat man is able Co do ia snaec and 

how that ability.can be related to dcgcase purposes. 

Yive such. manned launches arc presently plannad,=_ 

starting in 1963. 14.0/. experimentation will rua -* 

into the 1D70'a. 

,.: What is meant by a "shirt-slcavesn•caviromment?. 

• ' 

• cmvironment spacious onouz;h and saga enough to 

enable mem to live, movc,,and work in it withaut 

having'to usa,s73ece suite.The =was once 

• 

'KM 
NRO APPROVEp•FOR 

RELEApE 1 Ain' 201.5 

• ' 

InT2ASS=D 

. 3.. 

cdescribed by Secretary' McNamara as to ba'about tha 

—.4ze of a small house trailer, what is now envisage ,.., 

is a laboratory "canistc.rr." about. 40 feet long and 

oft4 

j.L.A LO ,, capzulea - 

the whole thina to be launched by'a Titan Ill-C 

booster.. Bach man vill have about 400 cubic feet 

of space n_which to live-and wor4.r 

e. Who will carry out the pro:Act? 

. z•ao U.S. Air D'orcee, ur,do- the C,7 7octio-, of t:e. 

Departmont of Defsase. The L'ot.71as Aircraa: 

Company and the General Eleatria Com:any will 

build the spacecraft and plan c. dhvelop the 

c2:parizento respectively. L3L flichto 

directed by tho Yorco Satellite Centrel 

2acility2 Sunny Vale Califoraia. We anticipate 

that XO/. la(inchca be carriad out from both 

tao East and Vest Coast°. 

10hat air'd o<= c=orimonts will ba conductad? 

ry-.oject directors till 'L'c considering for some 

time --,et that defense-related 0..c”e- - -:--nts would 

rseem to offer the most promace, but there is 

interest by the Force in buildinz and assemblinc, 

large antennae for com:zunloa t. —c_Is purposes, ana by 

the Yavy in el-.7:eriments of notc.ntial usefni=co 

in antisubmarine warfare. The /..r.my has not as yct' 

recom=nded any cv:periments. Oth-,r re.7.cresen . -at;v" n. , 

erazples of dofenso enporiments that Ina.3at be 

carried would dea/ with space structures teohnolov, 

guidance and navisatien, and oxtra-vallicular aativity 

c.nd equipment. In addition to defenso-rolate 

cmperiment4 scientific ozperiments devised by 

=ay be incIttdod. 

.- Mat iLt the relationship bet:weer:1M and nuclear. 

weapons in space? - 

.• • 

:Mere isno relationship whateverThe 7.4.01. is 

mi/itary'progra= which is peaCeful non. 

aggressive -- im_charact=w: ML will not • be. 4. 

wawa carrier. 

1,•• • ve • 

• 

''••1• • • • • ••• • • • ••• • 

• ' 
NRO APPROVED FOR ' 

RELEASE'l JUW2015 

UNCLASSIFIED': 

..4 .. 

t the same time that he announced the decision to 

proceed with the XOL, President Johnson reaffirmed 

' the U.S. intention not to place weapons of mass ., 

destruction (WED) in orbit. The President said 

"We continue to live up to our agreement not to' 

orbit weapons of mass destruction and we will 

continue to hold out to all nations, 'including • 

the Soviet Union, the hand of cooperation in the 

exciting years of exploration which lie ahead for 

all of Us." 

By way of background, two years ago the U.S. and 

USSR each stated it would refrain from orbiting 

WND in outer space or stationing WMD on celestrial, 

bodies. The U.S. and Soviet statements were 

expressly welcomed by the UNGA ,in resolution 1884 

(WIIZ) adopted unanimously October 17, 1963, as 

an important step in preventing the spread of an 

arms race to outer space. The resolution calls frz: 

on all states to refrain from conducting or encouraging 

such activitLes. 

Doesn't the MOL approval nevertheless mean that 

the U.S. has embarked on a new policy with respect 

to military activity in space? " 

No, it does not. The XOL fits into and is a logical 

next step in a continuing U.S. military program 

•spate which derives from cur Space Aet. The Adt 

itself makes clear that the U.S., while seeking t 

help develop space for peaceful purposes for the. 

benefit of all mankind, intends to utilize its 

space activities in maximizing its defensive . 

- capability. 

The MOL was first announced in December, 1963, at. 

the time when DUASOAR, a manned-flight project 

dating from the 1950's, was cancelled. DYNASOAR 

was cancelled because it was aimed solely toward 

the development of advanced reentry techniques.' 

NUL began to be studied at that time because it' 

seemed to give promise of being a broader and more 

useful research and experimental program; focussing 

Oil man himself "in space rather than machinery, 

tt-cui43,:leni74 At,Id techniqu'is as s'!n'n; 
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NRO APPROVED FOR 

RELEASE 1 JULY 2015 

ql-T POS 3 Sop 65. -12 

IL OP kj 4: 

AN -7 ".." (1) • 

FRIDAY ''.Z `C 3 5.; cjP 

out not just in space geogrsphy. It is 

the application of techniques of communication and obae:rvation matching 

the wildest science fiction. 

MOL is a step forward—and a giant 

step—in the capacity to know instantly 

and to communicate with the same speed 

what is happening on the earth, in the 

waters around the earth or in the air 

above. The first step was the U-2 spy 

plane which, as the boast went, could 

photograph ants on the sidewalk from 

60,000 feet. 

But compared to the second step, the 

Samos satellite, the U-2 was a comparatively crude instrument. Also under 

a classified label so that no official can 

discuss it, Samos has from outer space 

made detailed photographs of much of 

the earth's surface and transmitted 

them back to receiving stations. Thus 

a vast mosaic of the globe, showing 

natural and man-made phenomena, is 

assembled under a secret label. 

MOL carries this a big jump forward, 

since the instruments the laboratory 

will contain can do far more than photograph the surface. Radio frequencies, 

radiation, heat, sound—all are believed 

to be within the scope of the laboratory. 

i'doreover, men working in their shirt 

sleeves — not in space suits—will be 

using instruments hitherto undreamed 

of. Both the President and Defense 

officials stress that MOL will not in any 

way violate the United Nations resolution sponsored by the United States to 

keep weapons of destruction out of 

space. The emphasis at a Defense Department briefing was on military programs which do not involve destruction 

and yet, in the words of the briefer, sup: 

port the safety of the country. 

co..a 

BUT THE disturbing question around 

the world, despite these disclaimers, is 

whether MOL will not now touch off a 

military race with the Soviets in space.. 

A Defense Department spokesman was 

asked if the assessment had been made 

on how the Russians might react to a 

manned military laboratory overflying 

the Soviet Union. He replied that he 

assumed that they do not object, since 

they overfly the United States. 

Former Premier Nikita Khrushchev 

once boasted that Soviet satellites were 

constantly photographing military installations in this country. This was his 

answer to the achievements of Samos. 

Presumably in what might be called a 

spy-in-the-sky race the Soviets could 

build their own orbiting laboratory. 

Another question is why NASA with 

its extensive experience in space was 

not given the laboratory assignment. 

One answer from those responsible for 

the decision is the top-top-secret nature 

of the whole operation. It can best be 

done in a partitioned-off section of the 

Air Force where top-secret clearances 

are taken for granted. Put into NASA's 

big organization it would mean elaborate new security procedures and the 

possibility of the kind of unhappy conflicts that arose in the early days of 

the Atomic Energy Commission. 

There was, of course, a more immediate and pressing reason. For years 

the Air Force has been demanding a 

role in space. And congressional allies 

of the Air Force pushed for the same 

goal. 

NASA's reaction might best be described as one of dignified silence. The 

decision, NASA officials say, is in accord with the national interest and 

yond this they say little other than to 

add that later NASA may purchase an 

added "vehicle" for its own scientific 

purposes. The future is here and MOL 

is one of its shapes. 

By R:arqui5 

THE HUSH-HUSH curtain around the 

Manned Orbiting Laboratory is so thick 

that the atmosphere Is a little like the 

wartime Manhattan Project that produced the atomic bomb. As one official 

with great responsibility for national 

security put it: "I wish nothing at all 

'could be said about it but I suppose 

that's impossible." 

This first entry of the military into 

space would undoubtedly, if wartime 

censorship were applied, be off limits 

for comment. Official discussion thus 

far has been phrased in general hints 

and cautious intimations of what MOL 

can and cannot do. 

But those closest to the lengthy review of the project and its final authorization swear that its thrust will be for 

peace and not for war. Before President Johnson announced that the Air 

Force was authorized to develop the $1.5-

billion laboratory in outer space the 

proposal had been surveyed from every 

angle by the space council of which 

Vice President Hubert Humphrey is 

chairman. Director James E. Webb of 

the National Aeronautics and Space 

Administration, hitherto with exclusive 

jurisdiction in space, is, a member of 

the council. 

PIECING TOGETHER what has been 

said so far about MOL and with a bit 

of conjecture, the picture that emerges 

is one of a far-out operation and far 
NRO APPROVED FOR 

RELE4SE 1 JULY 2015 

cmv6ii TUESDAYMORNING 7 SEPTEMBER 1965 

k1 X111 1111 iill .1111t) 4..._4

' 

C 61. 

Ity Howard Simons and Chalmeri Al 1:oliert:: 

an American intelligence program that would be a violation of Soviet airspace. 

But spy satellites now circle 

both the United States and 

Johnson declared that the the Soviet Union without ofNor will 'MOL be a weapons 

carrier. In announcing the goaltead'on Aug. 25 for the $1.5-

billion proj e c t, President 

America's newest and biggest spy-in-the-sky opens the 

possibility for a major new mov ein the Licht of global 

arms control, They can use • 'their judg 

Large and. powerful seg• ment on what to photograph. 

rnents of the Johnson Admin. They can be selective on when 

istration Wert' SUM on the Air and where to aim not only one 

Force's Manned Orbiting Lab- camera but a series of cameras 

oratory (M01.) simply as an including new and expefi- ''7 

1PielikNiCe tool. Rut it was mental photographic equipau• adai:;c possibility in the ment. They can shoot ace& 

arms-control field that brought rately through a hole 

unanimity. clouds. And they can main- 

.\s one key official put it: thin and repair equipment 

"If this dues what we think that may have become Moon will do, MOL will be the erative. 

:_ovatest boon to arms control Dramatic reinforcement of 

et these notions came during the 

I 11 iti It; the kind of reason- recent eight-day Gemini 5 

ing that overcame the con- flight of L. Gordon Cooper .1i. 

cern of those who worried and Charles Conrad Jr. The 

lest tic thrust of military man: astronauts made repairs on 

into (whit around the earth equipment, most notably on a 

would (......ode the carefully! sighting device for enabling 

iniage of the United' them to pinpoint targets in 

Stat,"s as totally devoted to space and on the earth. 

the poi,eclul uses of man in Moreover, in a conversaspace. lion with Ground Control-, 

primary mission of Conrad spoke enthusiastically 

NIOL, a canvass of Washington about his use of a commercial 

offteials makes clear, is with- camera lens known as a Ques. 

out doubt to have man sup- tar, • modified to lit into a 

plemcnt the machine as a tntt altering 

shut:crhug spy in the sky. it s capability 

ni;:.n will advance the Conrad: 

amatintly successful cam-.•1•lieQuestar lens the 

era woil 9000-toot. runway up here fills 

barn , :ifs" of jllfot0 recur naissL,Iice-.st irrin. now pro:1 the whole lens up and the 

dtieiniCthOttsanOTiir pictures '')I.P haiiiiitY (11. havingit pass 

tlie_*•si,..071...isiii - --iral-Curn; "11.""-'11 

Questar field of 

view is virtually impossible 

niuni China. 

1-Tdin;7a . itidgment is the 

we ve col plenty of pie' 

tures fur them out of the 

Questal. anyhow. Over 70" 

Although MOL will carry 

other kinds of electronic 

eavesdropping equipment, as 

well as sonic basic scientific 

and engineering experiments. 

Administration officials are 

emphatic in declaring that it 

will not be a research "junk 

shop," as one highly interested 

Senator expressed a fear it 

might become. 

critical new factor being 

added by use of the MOL, a 

house trailer-sized space veL, hick' in which two men will 

he able: to live and work for 

30 days in their "shirtsleeves." 

it is scheduled to be operational in 1968. 

Here is what the Air Por,:e 

believes these men will ■ )e 

able to do; 

rnensely add to that American 

capability in relation not only 

to the Soviet Union but to 

China and, indeed, the whole 

world. 

In short, MOL could lead to 

a space-age version of former 

President asenliower's "open 

sktes'! airplane inspection proposal, put forward at the 1255 

Summit Conference in Geneva 

and rejected by the Soviet 

Union as being no more than 

from the ground to a target 

halfway around the world is 

a far more effective weapon 

than any foreseeable orbiting 

system. 

By the same -token the idea 

of dog fights between space 

vehicles is, generally considered 'science fiction-„ at least 

for the immediate future. 

" How, then, will MOL contribute to arms control? 

The thesis is that the two 

major nuclear powers are deterred not only by the nuclear ; that the MOL concept was for 

weapons they possess but by mally proposed, largely as a 

what each knows — and how i sugar-coated pill to counter the 

fast it knows -- about what bad reaction the Air Force was 

goes on, in a military sense, expected to — and did — have 

in the other's country. It is when it learned that Defense 

hoped that • MOL will im- Secretary Robert S. McNamara 

was going to kill its manned 

DynaSoar orbital glider program. 

A month later, on Dec. 10, 

1963, McNamara announced 

publicly the cancellation of 

DynaSoar and the intention of . 

developing MOL. 

United States intends "to live' ficial protest from either 

up to our agreement not to Washington or Moscow. And 

lust as the United States is orbit weapons of mass destruc- j 

• emoarking on the MOL projtion." He was referring to the cct, so the Soviets are. exAmerican - sponsored United petted to embark on a simiNations resolution, accepted Jar effort. 

by the Russians, to ban nu- Indeed, it is not inconceiva-• 

clear weapons in outer space. ble that these developments 

It is the Pentagon's continu- could lead to manned sychroning and unanimous position ous satellites, able to hover 

at the top level — and it is over Russia and the United 

also felt this is the Soviet States ready to flash instant 

position — that an intercon- word on missile firings, rocktinental ballistic missile fired et tests, nuclear explosions, 

mass troop movements or 

other important military activities. 

The logic of this, from the • 

arms controllers' viewpoint, is 

that all this could lead to a 

formal worldwide inspection 

a g r e e m en t— peacekeeping 

from space. But short of such 

agreement, such space surveillance would vastly add to the 

deterrence on which today's 

nuclear peace is founded. 

It was at a Budget Bureau 

meeting in November, 1963, 
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• For roughly a year thereafter, the Air Force paraded 

a series of MOL objectives 

before hard-nosed, cost-conscious Defense Department 

officials. Each time, the Air 

Force schemes were rejected 

on the grounds that they did 

not demonstrate a real need 

for Air Force men in space. 

Then the Air Force, with 

the help of Defense Department scientists, turned the 

corner and came up with the 

need for more intelligence—a 

• need that neither unmanned 

satellites or the civilian National Aeronautics and Space 

Administration could fill. 

In the fall of 1964, 5150 million was included in the Pentagon budget for 3,10L. 

Still, there were skeptics. 

Would MOL be secret, and if 

so, what effect might this have 

on the world's image of 

America's hitherto peaceful 

manned space effort? 

Yes, it will be secret, as are 

all military space activities, 

including the launching thus 

far of twice as many un-. 

manned American satellites by 

the Defense Department as by 

NASA. Yes, too, MOL probably will detract in part from - 

the gain that the civilian space 

effort has accumulated in dra-

-matically • demonstrating the 

difference -between the American open society end the Russian closed society. But on the 

decision scales, the need to, 

know whether the military has 

a role in space, the need to 

know more about potential 

enemies and the possibility of 

a new thrust toward meaningful arms control outweighed 

the propaganda loss. 

What would MOL's effect be 

on NASA? asked some questioners. Doesn't MOL really 

mean the military camel is getting his proverbial nose under 

the manned space flight tent? 

Not at all, said the officials, at 

least not for the immediate 

future„ 

That 'question was resolved, 

in large. part, at the National 

Aeronautics and Space Council. table, with Vice President 

Hubert Humphrey in the 

chair. The Vice President, 

long active in promoting disarmament, sought the answers 

to some 25 questions before 

he was convinced that MOI,'s 

peacekeeping potential outweighed possible serious international repercussions from 

putting the military into 

'manned space flight. 

Furthermore, NASA's ton 

officials were enthusiastic 

about MOL. It would employ 

NASA know-how, technology 

and equipment such as a modified Gemini capsule. And they 

were satisfied that MOL is a 

limited and nonduplicating 

program. 

MOL, as now approved, represents an opportunity for the 

Air Force to learn whether it 

has a meaningful role for 

itself in manned space flight 

in addition to just that in the 

intelligence field. A decision 

to give the Air Force a followon manned space role will 

come only after MOL demonstrates what it can or cannot 

do. 

Would MOL be a "junkshop 

or a workshop?" asked other 

interested parties, mindful 

that in the past Air Force 

officers had offered long 

shopping lists of what they 

would like to put in MOL. 

The lists included experimental communications and 

navigational devices; basic 

scientific experiments such as 

those to study solar radiation. 

infra-red or heat-sensing devices for registering the radiation signatures of missiles in 

flight and on the ground: material such as fluids and lubricants and metals that someday may have to withstand 

the harsh environment of 

space for more than 30 clays 

as the building blocks of permanent manned orbiting space 

stations. 

Pentagon officials also have 

.talked about satellite inspec. 

tion, that is, the ability to 

rendezvous in space with another nation's vehicle to determine what it is doing and 

what it is carrying. 
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hille51,E= 6 S ept crab e r 1965 (2) 

A heavyweight platoon of generals 

and congressmen, firmly convinced that 

the U.S. should control the high ground 

of space, has long argued that the Air 

Force should be given a major role in 

manned orbital flight. But some, most 

• notably Secretary of Defense Robert S. 

McNamara, have questioned whether 

earthbound military tactics apply directly enough to space to justify the 

tremendous expense of two mannedspace programs. 

The Secretary is still not wholly convinced, but last week the Air Force 

got the chance to prove its case. Acting 

on McNamara's recommendation, President Johnson announced that the General Electric Co. and Douglas Aircraft 

Co. had won the long competition to begin development of MOL—the Manned 

Orbiting Laboratory. The cost: a hefty 

$1.5 billion. 

The vehicle chosen for this first military mission is palatial by Gemini stand- ' 

ards. A cylinder 41 feet long and 10 feet 

in diameter, MOL will provide nearly 

all the comforts of home: roomy working 

and living compartments, ample stores 

of food, water and air, a "shirt-sleeve" 

environment that will permit its occupants to go about without bulky space-

- suits—and an unsurpassed panorama of 

space and earth below. 

Round Trip: MOL itself will be unoccupied during its flight into orbit. 

Instead, the two passengers will ride in 

a modified Gemini spacecraft, fastened 

to one end of the cylinder. Then, once 

in orbit, the crew will crawl through a 

lock and into MOL. As planned now, 

they will circle the earth for about 30 

days before crawling out of MOL; and 

returning to earth via Gemini, leaving 

the space station behind. ( Whether 

MOL can be reoccupied will depend 

on the ability to rendezvous and dock 

with it, and also on its supply capacity.) 

MOL is no orbital bomber. The U.S. 

has committed itself to the United Nations to use space only for peaceful 

purposes, and President . Johnson took 

pains last week to reiterate that pledge. 

"We intend to live up to our agreement 

not to orbit weapons of mass destruction," he said. But the U.S. evidently 

makes a distinction between an aggressive satellite and simply a military one, 

for the main purpose of MOL is obviously to gather intelligence. 

- r7v 

a ds !.121 .4■.• y 

• 

Since Aug. 11, 1930, when the Air 

Force successfully recovered a - filmcarrying,capsule ejected from orbit, the 

U.S. has been actively engaged in military surveillance of the Communist bloc. 

It is a two-stage operation. First, camera-carrying satellites, launched from 

California by Thor-Agena boosters, conduct a broad photographic survey. After 

the film package is recovered it is analyzed by photo interpreters. If they spot 

anything of particular significance, a 

larger satellite is sent up for a sharper 

look with higher resolution cameras. 

These satellites, formerly called Samos 

but now not even acknowledged—much 

less publicly named—are launched by 

Atlas-Agena rockets and stay in orbit for 

only a day or so before jettisoning their 

precious film for recovery. 

Since 1960, as far as can be determined from the meager launch information, at least 58 Thor-Agena payloads 

have been sent up over the Soviet Union 

and recovered; another 26 Atlas-Agena 

payloads have been recovered. In turn, 

the Soviet Union has launched 34 Cosmos satellites at an angle that would 

cover all the U.S.; most of these are believed to be photo satellites. 

Rich Reward: Clearly, judging by the 

effort and the money expended, the 

program has been paying off for both 

sides. Indeed, many analysts believe 

that surveillance satellites gave President Kennedy the confidence to confront the Soviet Union over Cuba in 

1962.. The satellites revealed that the 

Soviet force of intercontinental missiles 

was much smaller than imagined and 

vulnerable- to attack. It is likely that 

President Kennedy-' even let the Soviet 

Union know that he knew, by means of 

a newspaper "leak." 

The question now is, can the presence 

of man in orbit produce enough additional information to justify the cost of 

getting him up there? To use Secretary 

McNamara's phrase, would a manned 

surveillance satellite be cost-effective? 

- Many believe the 'answer is yes. Man's 

judgment and serendipity cannot be duplicated by machines, proponents argue. 

He can pick and choose his targets and 

his camera system, study photographic 

results on the spot, photograph suspicious areas again and again to measure 

activity and report what he sees instantly to the ground. 

The MOL crew, of • course, will be 

able to conduct much valuable research 

of an entirely benign character, such as 

weather study, astronomy and a host of 

biological experiments into the effects of 

weightlessness, radiation and high vacuums on life. But MOL will stand or 411 

on its ability to 'study the Soviet Union's 

land defenses, count its aircraft and 

missiles, spot its submarines, and eavesdrop on its radio communications. In addition, it will probably be required to 

keep track of Soviet agricultural production, to record activity at every sort of 

industrial undertaking from steel factories to plutonium-production plants and 

generally to monitor the entire Soviet 

and Chinese economies. 

High Price: At perhaps $70 million 

per launching, only a rich harvest of 

such intelligence would justify carrying 

MOL beyond the experimental stage. 

"MOL is really an Air Force toy," one 

high Pentagon planner said recently. 

"It's fascinated with the idea of putting 

men in space, but there are still many 

unanswered questions as to whether we 

really have to put men there." 

One unanswered, question involves_an 

entirely different surveillance system 

the Air Force has also been studying. It 

is a 10-ton unmanned vehicle, stuffed 

with cameras, sensors and detectors, and 

possibly capable of maneuvering in orbit. It will also be equipped with a half 

dozen maneuverable re-entry vehicles, 

which could literally deliver the film 

packages on the front doorstep of a 

photo-interpretation lab. Such a surveil- , 

lance system could conceivably give 

MOL stiff competition. 

All these doubts and objections notwithstanding, everything is now "go" for 

MOL. There is $150 million in the current budget to get the program rolling, 

and the first manned launching is scheduled for late in 1968—probably a realistic date, since the launch vehicle, the 

huge Titan 3-C, has already had its 

first successful firing, and will be ready 

in plenty of time. 
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AVIATION WEEK, 6 September 1965 . 

Manning;the Space mar parts 

0 

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MOL 

• 

President Lyndon Johnson's decision to proceed with -

the development of a military manned orbiting laboratory. combined with the record-breaking endurance flight 

of Gemini 5, marks a significant milestone in the progress 

of manned space flight: The last twn Gemini missions 

have shown clearly that the U. S. manned .spacd 

program has come of age technically. They also demonstrated the operational flexibility that can be achieved in 

long-duration manned missions. 

With each new manned mission, the Gemini program 

is forging a record that insures its place in space history 

as the great leap forward in space flight that transformed 

the role of man himself from that of a surviving passenger 

to a useful performer of vital functions in the space environment. 

The Gemini program is making a great technical contribution to both the Apollo lunar landing mission and 

to the•development of a military manned orbiting laboratory (NIOL). Final decision by the President to proceed 

with hardware development of MOL represents the end.' 

of a 10-year struggle by the Air Force to gain a role in 

manned space flight. It also is a reversal of policy on this 

point by the two previous presidents. For too long, the 

military role was blocked by the "peaceful uses of outcr 

space' motto so hastily and ill-advisedly concocted by the 

Eisenhower Administration to conceal its own sterile 

space policy that gave the Soviets an early lead in space 

exploration. Unfortunately, this same policy was continued by the Kennedy Administration, which also interpreted "peace" to mean "non-military." The Kennedy 

; Administration proclaimed this policy publicly while 

actually utilizing a satellite reconnaissance system to spy 

on the rest of the world, including Communist China 

and the Soviet Union. 

It was really the conclusive demonstration that adding-. 

a long-term manned capability would improve satellite 

reconnaissance by orders of magnitude that finally forced 

the decision to proceed with MOL after nearly two years 

of delay under the guise of "further study." 

The Air Force has been given primary management 

responsibility for the MOL program, although it has 

important naval aspects as well. USAF has selected a 

strong industrial team to develop and build the required' 

hardware, with McDonnell for the Gemini re-entry vehicle: Douglas for the laboratory can; 'General Electric's. 

fissile and Space Div. for instrumentation and experiment integration; Martin for the Titan 3 booster core, 

and United Technology Center for the solid-propellant 

strap-on boosters. • 

NInch of the Air Force's future rides on the outcome 

of VIOL. It behooves this service to organize a management for this effort composed of its very best available 

talent. The VIOL management team also will require' the 

consistent support of the top-level USAF command • 

against the inevitable pressure both from within the • 

'• Pentagon and from other government agencies that will' 

seek to slow its progress and blunt its effectiveness% The.ti 

primary purpose of MOL will be reconnaissance. If it is 

successful in this mission, it will, in fact, acid a tremend-• 

ous force to the capability of this country to keep the I 

peace. We can think of no more "peaceful" purpose in 

space than to provide a capability that further diminishes, • 

an enemy's ability to prepare and mount a surprise nu-.. • 

clear attack—the only type that could possibly 'offer 

even the remotest chance of ,success. 

Reconnaissance is a necessary and effective weaptm in 

the Cold War. Its extension into space by both the 

U. S. and USSR took place several years ago, despite the 

pious pretentious of the diplomats that it hasn't.. The 

U. S. was first to develop a successful system in this field -, 

with its.Samos satellite launched into polar orbits from 

Vandenberg AFB, Calif. The data obtained from,this 

system has been of tremendous value to the defense of 

this nation and the rest of the free world. Its operations 

are no secret to the Soviets, who have countered with 

,•• their own reconnaissance satellite system, which is 

launched. from Tyuratam under cover of their Cosmos 

• series. Soviet manned space launches also have traversed: 

the United States several dozen times and undoubtedly ; 

will continue to do so. When he was Soviet Premier, 

Nikita Khrushchev several times pointedly offered to exchange satellite reconnaissance pictures with the West 

to demonstrate Soviet capability in this area. ..! 

The United States would be well advised to consider • 

its public relations policy on \IOL. It would do well to 

avoid the type of obvious phony "cover," originated bv. 

the Central Intelligence Agency, that has embarrassed 

this country so badly in the case of the U-2 and other 

reconnaissance efforts. The reconnaissance techniques 

and results produced by MOL arc certainly legitimate 

military secrets, although there may be times when their 

publication to the world may prove conclusively the 

perfidy of an aggressor, as in the Cuban missile. crisis. But 

to adopt an ostrich head-in-the-sand policy and attempt 

to preserve the fiction that the U.S. does not indulge 

in space reconnaissance would only make us look foolish. 

The fact that this nation is improving its capability to 

defend itself and the rest of the world by means of .j 

manned space vehicles is news that can only reassure our , 

friends and dismay our enemies. The MOL program is 

one of the most important efforts this nation has made 

to improve its defenses in the nuclear era. It is technically 

feasible and nationally necessary.' • 

—Robert Hotz 
1 

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r 

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STIC: 1VIOL 

NEW YORK TIMES 

10 SEPTEMBER 65 P-12 

Soviet Says U.S. 

Plans Orbital Lab 

As A-Bomb Base 

MOSCOW, Sept. 9 (Reuters) 

-- A Soviet general said today.:.. 

that the United States was developing a manned orbital space 

laboratory to he able to bombard the earth with nuclear ..'' 

bombs. 

The allegation was the fIrst.,!■ 

Soviet response to President 

• Johnson's announcement of -; 

Aug. 25 that the United States 

would develop a $J. billion space 

• workshop devoted to defense re-.••• 

• search. 

• 'Now the Pentagon wants to•:.' 

use space laboratories not only 

. . for espionage but also to 

• complish direct combat tasks," 

Col. Gen. Vladimir Tolubko, 

Deputy Commander in Chief of

• 

••• 

the Soviet Union's strategic. 

rocket troops, wrote in a mag-.1 

• azine article. 

He reiterated a West German 

. , newspaper's view that space 

; laboratories could be used as 

platforms for dropping bombs 

in outer space, and added: 

'The question suggests itself:. 

What bombs? Is it possible 

that. the Pentagon generals intend to drop conventional aerial 

. bombs from outer space? Of 

course not. Surely, nothing but' 

nuclear bombs are implied. 

"All this does not tally with 

(President) Johnson's hypocritical announcement about extending the rule of law to outer r; 

• space,' he added. • 

. . . The general's views appeared ,. 

in a news and opinion • magazine, Za Rubezhom (Life 

Abroad), published by the Sovlet Union of Journalists. 

General Tolubko said President Johnson had tried "to allay 

the suspicions of world public 

, opinion" while the United 

• States designed and tested' 

space carriers for weapons of 

• mass destruction "under the..-: 

signboard of peaceful and 

I strictly scientific research." •7. • 

r 

L 
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STIC: MOL 

THE NEW REPUBLIC 11. September 1965 (9) 

The Military Mayes .intoSpace 

• 

President Johnson's decision to allOW the Air Force to 

build and launch five manned orbital laboratories 

(MOL), at a cost of $1.5 billion or more, is likely to ' 

increase tensions between the US and the USSR and 

to spark a similar military space program by the Rus-, 

sians. If so, the Air Force will certainly urge further 

escalation of its own military space program, raising 

the specter that space will become a fantastically expensive battlefield of the future. 

Even before the Russians launched the spice age in 

OctOber 2957 with Sputnik I, some US Air Force officers were predicting., almost hopefully, that military 

operations would move out into space as a logical extension of aerial combat. In their ignorance of the 

rigors and the immutable laws of orbital physics, they 

envisioned space bombers that would drop their weap,• 

ons from space and spacecraft interceptors that would 

shoot down enemy orbital bombers and engage in space 

dog-fights. The scenarios were drawn largely from the 

Buck Rogers comic strip of the late 1.920'5. 

These ambitions were frustrated in 1958 when the 

Eisenhower Administration and Congress decided to 

emphasize peaceful exploration and established a 'civilian space agency - the National Aeronautics and 

Space Administration (NASA). One major reason for 

giving the MOL program to the USAF rather than to 

NASA is that the space agency has avoided military ; 

space activities partly in deference to neutral African 

nations which provide sites for critically needed tracking stations. The USAF had to content itself with developing unmanned Samos reconnaissance satellites 

and unmanned Midas'satellites, the latter designed to 

warn of enemy missile attack. For several years the, 

USAF sat on the sidelines of manned space operations, 

providing the rocket boosters, many of the astronauts 

and much of the know-how for NASA whose resulting 

Mercury shots served to boost the space agency's prestige and its budget. 

Then, in the spring of 1961, President Kennedy proposed that NASA launch its Apollo lunar landing program, a project which would swell its budget and pres- • 

tige dramatically. The USAF counter-attacked with a • . 

propaganda campaign to convince the public and Congress that space posed a grave military threat and that 

the Kennedy Administration was derelict in not allowing the Air Force to develop manned military spacecraft. Gen. Bernard A. Schriever, commander of the 

Air Force Systems Command and who, last week, was 

named to direct the MOL program, said in October, 

1961: "We cannot permit space to be dominated by 

those who have shown themselves to be the enemies of 

freedom. For the nation that dominates space might - if ' i. 

it chose - dominate the world." Gen. Schriever went on 

to recommend the development of manned Military . 

spacecraft; calling them "vital" for the "ultimate sur- • 

vival of this nation and the rest of the Free World." • 

For the next x8 months the nation's press was filled 

with articles,' inspired by the Air Force, telling of the 

dire threat to national survival unless the Kennedy Administration changed its views. (See "That Attack From 

Space," NR, May 4, 1963, p. 17.) The Air Force view 

was echoed by its champions in Congress and was later 

raised, weakly, by the Republicans in the last Presidential campaign. 

When Defense Secretary McNamara asked the Air 

Force for details on the military operations it proposed 

to conduct in space, the answer boiled down to this: 

"We really don't know, but if we can have a few billion dollars to go up and look around, perhaps we can 

find a mission in space for man." At a time when the 

US had increased its defense spending by 20 percent in 

a crash effort to overtake the Soviet lead in ICBM missiles, it is not surprising that the USAF requests were 

turned down. Nearly two years ago, McNamara finally 

told the Air Force to come up with specific proposals. 

Despite the years of public complaint that it was being 

blocked from performing vital military space missions, 

the Air Force had to turn to industry and civilian scientists to suggest useful military tasks in space and 

.experiments to demonstrate their feasibility. Meanwhile, the experience gained with the Samos and 

. Midas unmanned satellites had begun to suggest that 

military observers in space might'prove useful. Samos 

had to make thousands of reconnaissance photos which 

must later be painstakingly analyzed on earth by 

photo-interpreters to locate those containing objects of 

military interest; perhaps a trained photo-interpreter 

in space could be much more selective and photograph 

only those areas of-potential interest. 

The Midas satellite, designed to detect enemy missiles from their infrared (heat) radiation did not prove 

too successful, because it frequently mistook sunlight 

reflected from clouds for• enemy missile radiation. A 

human observer might not make the same mistake. 

Granting this potential superiority of manned observers for such operations, we don't yet know how 

long man can live in orbit without deleterious effects 

on body or mind. There has been reason to fear that 

the isolation of space might produce hallucinations 

which could be disastrous for a mission intended to 

warn of enemy attack. Until the very recent. Gemini 

space shots, no US astronaut hadremained in orbit for 

more than a couple of days and Soviet cosmonauts who 

had stayed longer often experienced difficulties. 
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i 

Unless military observers can retain their efficiency 

and rationality in orbit for periods of at least several 

weeks, the cost of maintaining a continuous manned 

space watch would probably be prohibitive, compared 

I 1 to other techniques for accomplishing the same objective . One of the primary purposes of the MOL experiments selected for 1968-70, will be to determine the 1 

effect of long space missions, up to 3o days, on man's 

i

i body and spirit. MOL astronauts will live and work 

in a can io ft in diameter and 41 ft long. Air Force i 

• astronauts will conduct experiments to determine man's I 

. i perception as a reconnaissance observer, his ability as 1 

. : a repairman of equipment and as an assembler of large 1 

objects in space, such as a telescope. I 

c This is the extent of the program now authorized by : 

. ; the President. As such, it poses no direct military 

i

t I threat to the Soviets. But in view of previous USAF 

: F statements about the need to "control space," it would I 

be surprising if the Russians don't conclude that there 

4 is more behind the project. The Air Force sees MOL 

as an opening wedge for an expanded military space 

I mission and a means of counteracting its declining i 

1 share of the defense budget. If MOL prompts the ; 

1 ! Soviets to expand their own military space effort, the 1 

1 . I USAF can cite this as reason to expand MOL, to give I 

, 1 it the ability to maneuver in space and rendezvous with 1 

Soviet satellites to inspect them for possible "hostile 1, 

1 I intent." 

)— 

The 1 Military REPUBLIC 11 September 1965 (9) • 

Moves into Space 

Then will come. the question of destroying or disabling such Soviet satellites. Four years ago Gen. I 

Schriever put it this way: "Should a satellite be determined (bY inspection) to be hostile, we must have a 

capability to neutralize it If we cannot deal with such 

satellites, it is doubtful that our nation can continue 

to preserve its essential values." If the Soviets should . 

follow suit, attempting to inspect and disable our military unmanned reconnaissance satellites, the Air Force 

will certainly seek approval to send up armed manned t 

spacecraft to protect our satellites. This will set the 

1 stage for occasional space skirmishes. 

It is, however, possible that MOL will demonstrate I '. . . 

the feasibility of a few American and Soviet spacemen 

in their respective spacecraft operating a continuous F 

space watch. If it does, and if both nations exercise 

i restraint, it could have a stabilizing effect, as have our I 

mutual unmanned reconnaissance satellites. If man 

can be an efficient observer in orbit for extended pe- 1 riods, the time may come when.the US should invite - ' 

; the United Nations to maintain a continuous space patrol, with a multi-national crew, to warn of any irnI pending or surprise attack. • ' • , 

RAYMOND D. SENTER 
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SATIJ. AY F EW. 11 Sent M (10) 

hat oes n in the Sky? 

tonce of continuity in United States ; The continuityof this policy has-now t 

foreign policy. One aspect of that con- I been broken. On August 25, 1965, Presitinuity is now in question. We refer to dent Johnson announced he had authorthe policy of President Dwight D. Eisen-1 ized the Air Force to proceed with its 

bower and President John F. Kennedy .; plans for a Manned Orbiting Laboratory. 

on the need to avoid a nightmarish dim-'' While it was emphasized that the MOL 

would not be armed with nuclear firepower, the MOL nevertheless represents; 

a specific military use of space vehicles. 

As such, it is a step toward the direct 

extension of the arms race into outer 

space. 

What makes the matter all the more r 

inexplicable is that no one has stated 

(2\N VARIOUS occasions during the 

' past year, President Lyndon B. 

Johnson has stressed the impor-; 

. . 

ger of colossal dimensions to the American people and the world's peoples in!: 

general. This danger arose the moment:; 

man discovered he was able to liberate;; 

himself from earths gravity and go cruis- h 

ing in space. For this development meant 

that space stations could become the 

orbiting carriers of atomic weapons, putting the entire planet under the nuclear the case against military activity 

President Eisenhower was the first to I space more cogently than President 

gun. 

warn of this Orwellian horror. He spoke Johnson himself—in the very

.act of mak-1 

of the very real possibility of accident or, ing the announcement about MOL. He I 

miscalculation that could trigger an un- I did not make clear beyond a reasonable 

speakable holocaust. And even without 

in

, doubt, however, why the MOL and also 

accident or miscalculation, weapons the involvement of the Air Force do not

, 

orbit would convert the sky into a grim 

canopy. Prime Minister .Harold Macmillan fully supported President Eisenhower's declaration against nuclear weapons Kennedy, or his own statement about! in space. the importance of preventing the exten-I On coming to office, President Ken- sion of military technology into space. ; nedy gave high priority to the need for 

effective agreements aimed at preven the principal opposing arguments 

ing military spacecraft from occupying hereis that the lvIOL will be unarmed, outer space. Both through the United this may meet a technicality, but it does 

Nations and through direct negotiations not meet the problem created by the 

with Premier Nikita Khrushchev, Presi- fact that the door is now open to a long; 

dent Kennedy persisted with his effort line of new developments in the field of 

insure that space would be reservedrbiting laboratories. In past negotia orbiting laboratories. 

for peaceful purposes. As a result, both tions for arms limitation and control, the • 

- 

issued declarations of intent against milt- the need for adequate inspection. Yet we have now taken the initiative in a tory operations in space. The United . field where inspection is most improbNations, on October 17, 1963, endorsed able and virtually impossible. For the; this action and called upon all other up nations to be bound by it. Though the Russians, inevitably, will now send 

no way of knowing whether these space-I 

be; 

potential military use of rockets was in- MOLs of their own, -and there will 

herent in the development of space tech- craft will be secretly armed with nuclear i 

gun mounts. The very existence of such 

a possibility is certain to produce a 

clamor in the United States for armed' 

space vehicles of our own. And the stage' 

-will be set-for other nations to join the I. 

successfully fought to keep atomic ener- horror, cluttering up the sky with death-I 

gy development in nonmilitary hands. disseminating vehicles and blocking out(. 

. To be sure, the U.S. Air Force had been man's vision of a rational world in which I pressing for a prominent role in space 

development, but Presidents Eisenhower . . 

! and Kennedy held to their contention . 

that outer space should be out of bounds 

to the military. 

...,....._ 

run counter to the United Nations resolution signed by the !United States, or 

the policy of Presidents Eisenhower and 

the United States and the Soviet Union United States has properly emphasized: 

nology, neither country crossed the line 

into military ventures. In fact, the space 

program in the United States had been 

deliberately put under civilian control, 

just as President Truman years earlier 

to live out his life with reasonable faith 

in the sanity and decency of his fellowman. 

We pride ourselves on being an 

educated nation. But we have not yet 

learned the most fundamental lesson of 

the atomic age. This is the lesson that 

our safety and security no longer depend 

on the accumulation, multiplication, or 

refinement of force, but on the control I 

of force. For the force cannot be used 

without destroying security, shattering 

freedom, and making a weird farce of 

claims for human uniqueness, human intelligence, human nobility., What will it 

profit us in the last instant of recorded 

time to know that we stood supreme 

among all the nations of the world in 

the variety, multiplicity, efficiency, and 

sophistication of the force that figured I 

in .the final holocaust? Inherent in our 

history are higher distinctions. The time t

in which to put those 'distinctions fully 

to work grows short. —N.C. 
. • Those facts were assessed in this coun---; 

. . 

Military astronauts were put under try, with these results: . ! 

the new agency, military programs were of State Dean Rusk, long put in mothballs or scrapped, and ex- , Secretary , i concerned over Soviet military activihis 

perts like Dr. Wernher von Braun and es in space, convinced others at the I Saturn-rocket program were.removed ; I ti 

from Pentagon control. State Department that the time had 

President Kennedy went a step fur- I come to abandon opposition to a purely

I ther. In 1961 he chose the moon, rather U. S. military program, despite possible I 

than strategically important areas closer ; propaganda setbacks around the world. McNamara, with the same to earth, as the nation's main space Secretary 

goal. He set up a moon-landing program . evidence in hand, qualified his own opat a cost of more than 20 billion dollars. l'• -I position. President Johnson had been re- : 

In this period, civilian space spend- luctant to go ahead with MOL without 

- ing rose to 5 billion dollars a year while Mr. McNamara's support. On August 

spending on military programs was . 25, the decision was announced to put ti 

held to 1.5 billions, largely for un- military men in space. I 

manned systems. Robert S. McNamara, The praCtical results of that decision, 1 

Secretary of Defense, made clear he 1 as seen by space authorities: I 

was willing to invest in productive un- I America's civilian race to the moon I 

manned satellites, but not in a manned will continue, consuming 5 billions a ( 

military program. The manned Dyna- I year until accomplished in 1969. Bute 

Soar space-plane program was canceled ambitious civilian plans to go beyond 

—...., the moon are being reconsidered. 

I and, according to his critics, Mr. Mc- I A landing on Mars—estimated to cost 

1 Namara inhibited development of other I up to 100 billion dollars—has been 

new man-in-space projects. I- scrapped for the present. That was to 

Then, two things happened: ■ I have been the big goal after the moon. ' 

1 1. Exciting progress was made in the I Instead, military spending will start 

1 Gemini civilian program. Man proved I going up. Later in this decade, experts 

I he could endure the physical hazards ; believe, the two programs will even out. 

I of space and function efficiently. He it What's at stake in space for the millalso showed he could maneuver his tary? To get an answer, you first must I 

spacecraft and thus paved the way for ' investigate what is now being done, and 

I rendezvous of vehicles in space. This con- I then consider the plans for the future. 

I

vinced many skeptics that military opera- I Behind a wall of semisecrecy, a half 

1 dons could be carried out in space if a dozen major military-satellite programs 

' country wanted to invest the time, money ! are now under way in the U. S. The 

, ! and resources. I.Air Force has launched 150 satellites 

I I 2. It became clear that Soviet Russia i from Vandenberg Air Force Base in 

1 I was less interested in racing to the. i California. In the past two years, 80 

I I moon than it was in first developing i per cent of all U. S. payloads have been 

I spacecraft for operations 100 to 600 !. military in nature. Among them: 

miles above earth. The entire Russian i SAMOS. These photo-intelligence sat- 

; space program, run by Soviet generals, • ; ellites have exceeded all expectations, 

showed itself to be military in nature— ; keeping the U. S. informed of Soviet 

I its boosters, communications, tracking I missile sites, nuclear progress in Red ! 

-I stations,' telemetry, radar, launch sites, I China and Communist troop movements 

:I*I pilots and strategy. - . • I I in both countries. They parachute back 

On top of that, results described as ! f pictures with 1,000 times the resolution 

I nothing short of amazing started flowing iof standard TV images. 

I

from the unmanned satellites. Scientists I MIDAS. After an uncertain start, Mi- 

; concluded that manned satellites could I.,.--' "--:=-••=--------;-- - - — • - 

' do an even better job. Russia gave indi- Ii das infrared detectors are . now age-. 6- , . 

I detect Soviet rocket launchings by pick1 cations that it was moving quickly into 

the field of manned platforms to take I 1 ing up telltale exhaust gases and trans- 

...,-,-,----- 

11latio it hem into electronic signals. 

I advantage of a lead in that area. 

fs 

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• S TIC: MOL 

U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT 13 SEP'TEMBER 1965 (10) 

SPACE P. AV": AS 

DLE:ENSE PROBLEM 

President Johnson has now committed 

this country to a vital and far-reaching 

I race against Russia for military supremacy in space. 

It is a strategic decision regarded as 

important as any since World War IL 

The race actually has started. At this 

point it is largely silent and secret. But 

both powers are known to be conducting military missions with unmanned 

satellites, and results are described as 

I striking and enormous. • 

Next, both countries will make major 

strategic moves by putting up space 

stations with military crews. Beyond 

that, plans' are being readied for armadas of :orbiting platforms and fleets of 

space planes—and, in case of hostilities, 

possible confrontation in space. 

1 The U. S. goal: to make certain Russia is denied control of space that might 

enable it to tip the balance of power 

here on earth. 

A year or so ago, the whole idea was 

considered "fantastic" by some of the 

President's closest advisers. Some skepticism and opposition still remain. 

But by midsummer of this year, Mr. 

Johnson became so convinced of a growing Soviet space threat that he ordered 

the Air Force to build a series of 

manned orbiting laboratories — each is 

called an MOL—as "insurance." It was 

a big step in moving space defenses from 

:he realm of fantasy to actual operations. 

Suddenly, it became recognized that 

space is a defense problem. 

The inside story. What follows is 

he story behind the President's key decision, the reasons it was made—and 

what is to come of it. 

First off, the MOL decision was a 

victory for military men who, since the 

start of the space age in 1957, have 

insisted that the value of space power 

vill inevitably transcend that of air 

Dower today. They argued that Russia, 

recognizing this, was devoting its main 

resources to military mastery of space. 

Arrayed against the Pentagon from the 

;tart were White House advisers who 

felt U. S. space efforts should project a 

peaceful image. President Eisenhower 

vas convinced they were right. The 

;pace Act of 1958 stressed that point 

and created a civilian space agency to 

handle roan-in-space projects. 
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SPACE RACE .0. Contld 

FERRET. This is a version of Samos, 

equipped for electronic intelligence and 

communications eavesdropping. It is 

said, to be useful for monitoring radar 

and radio traffic near Russia's major 

rocket-testing sites, tracking clown 

coded or scrambled transmissions and 

relaying them to.U. S. listening posts. 

Other satellite systems are proving 

equally useful. The Pentagon has "borrowed" the civilian-developed Syncom • 

to speed military traffic to Vietnam. 

Transit satellites are furnishing missile- 

: carrying Polaris submarines with precise 

navigation. Four Vela satellites—equipped 

with radiation detectors—are in orbit to 

i ; make certain that Russia cannot, unclected, break the nuclear-test ban in space. 

Russia's faster pace. Russia is gaining 

ground on the U. S. in unmanned satellites, may even be ahead where "spy-inthe-sky" satellites are concerned. The Soviets are expected to launch more than 

60 Cosmos satellites this year—twice the 

rate of a year ago. 

According to U. S. authorities, the 

Russians are making heavy use of their 

Cosmos camera-satellites to chart the 

exact co-ordinates of every U. S. missile 

site in the U. S.—the kind of information 

they are finding it difficult to get from 

spies on the ground. 

Mr. Johnson's decision on MOL means 

that in 1968 the U. S. will be putting two 

men into space aboard a trailer-size station for 30 days at a time. It is a 1.5-

billion-dollar project to find out just how 

well man can carry out military missions 

in orbit. 

No nuclear weapons will be aboard. 

Using space as a launching area for Hbombs has never carried much weight 

with U. S. military men. They believe 

that job can be done much more effectively with missiles on the ground. 

What the Pentagon has in mind is a 

number of other missions. Some are listed in the chart on the preceding pages. 

Others include the feasibility of putting 

communications and navigation systems 

in space, under direct control of man, to 

survive nuclear attack on earth. One 

project will be for astronauts to leave 

their ship and assemble radar antennas 

perhaps 100 feet across. 

Soviet head start. Russia is expected 

to be putting up manned space stations 

before the U. S., with even more ambit tious missions in mind. If the signs are 

being read correctly, the Soviets have 

I the means to orbit, not two men at a 

time, but six to eight. That superiority 

!is based on a long-established lead in 

rocket power. Soviet cosmonauts, in 

flights to date, have passed over the 

U. S. almost 100 times. And experts 

point out that the Russians, who have 

been boasting about orbiting supermegaton bombs over the same routes, will 

soon have the rockets to do it. 

Ten years from now—. 'U. S. milttart' men whose job it is to plan ahead 

are already looking beyond MOL, lay- I 

ing out requirements for any possible 

space battlefield of a decade or two 

hence. 

What is now envisioned are 'giant 

"national space platforms" at the center 

of military operations, directing fleets 

of interceptors and destroyers, rescue 

and • logistic vehicles. Each platform 

would carry 10 to 20 men, stay up for 

!months and possibly years. 

While Russia may proceed with Hbomb platforms, U. S. planners are con- ! 

sidering a more advanced retaliatory ' 

counterthreat—using futuristic lethal en- ; • 

ergy and light-wave weapons to create 

destruction over enemy targets below. 

Those are "far out" plans. Air Force 

planners make that point themselves. 

Many of the technical problems have', 

not been solved and some may prove 

7 

insoluble. But this is the main point military men make: One-sided control of 

space could destroy the balance of power on earth and prove catastrophic if it •' 

;'is the Russians who make all the big ! 

strategic breakthroughs. 

It is that deep-rooted concern that 

lies behind the planning and scrapping' 

'by the Air Force to overcome lingering 

skepticism in this country over the need 

to put military men in space:. ; won 
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STIC: MOL. 

N.Y .TIMES 13 Sep 65 MONDAY MORNING 13 SEPTLNBEll. 1965 

M.O.L.: The New Arms Race in Space 

nArare SCHWARTZ 

President Johnson's order to 

the Air Force to develop 

a manned orbiting laboratory 

(M.0.1..,) has provoked relatively little public discussion, in 

part because its announcement 

was overshadowed by the historic flight of Gemini 5. But 

historians may yet conclude 

that politically and militarily 

this Presidential decision was 

even more important than the 

Cooper-Conrad feat. 

The President's M.O.L. announcement came at ' a time 

when the Soviet Union was 

publicly attacking Gemini 5 as 

primarily a venture in military 

espionage. Just why the President chose' precisely that time 

to supply the Russian propagandists with supporting ammunition is still a puzzle. 

Joint Effort Dim 

Moreover, by underlining the 

potential military significance 

of space, - the President may 

have finally ended any last 

lingering hope that there might 

be a joint Soviet-American program for sending a man to the 

moon or to some more distant 

objective in the solar system. 

Most serious is the indication that the Soviet Union and 

its allies have interpreted the 

M.O.L. decision as the American signal for an arms race 

in space. 

1—ediately after the Presidential announcement, several 

Eastern European newspapers 

warned that the Soviet Union 

could hardly fail to try to get 

similar military capability in 

space. Then last week the deputy commander of the Soviet 

Union's rocket troops denounced the M.O.L. as a means 

of bringing American atom 

bombs into space. 

Arms Race Inevitable 

One school of thought argues . 

In effect that an arms race in 

space was inevitable from the 

beginning. It holds that the Soviet program has always aimed 

at maximum military space 

capability, and that the United 

States has been delinquent in delaying its own response so long. 

The tight secrecy surrounding 

the Soviet space effort lends 

some credence to this argument, 

but in the public domain at 

least it is the United States that 

has now become the first to declare it wishes to develop an 

extraterrestrial military capability. Those who would have 

preferred a longer effort to keep 

space as a zone of peace can 

question whether the arms race 

now starting may not detract 

from American security, rather 

than increasing it. 

Now the United States and 

the Soviet Union regularly have 

camera-equipped satellites in 

orbit. These supply Moscow and 

Washington with enormous 

amounts of information . about 

what is going on aboveground 

all over this planet. This is the 

practical realization of President Eisenhower's old "open 

skies" proposal. The United 

States in the net gainer in this 

exchange. 

Air Force proponents of the 

M.O.L. have argued that this 

• line of research will ultimately 

permit this country to inspect 

and destroy hostile satellites 

such as the Soviet spy' sputniks. But by the same token 

similar Soviet development will 

permit Soviet spacemen to destroy the American automatic 

cameras in the sky. Then when 

all unmanned espionage satellites have been made inoperative, the question will arise of 

. trying to force the other side's 

manned craft out of space, since 

these vessels will also be 

equipped or both automatic ' 

and hand cameras. 

. In the face of such dangerous 

possibilities, it is arguable that 

the United States should have 

tried to freeze the present situation. 

The same problem arises in 

respect to other proposed military uses of manned spaceships. Thus some Air Force 

sources speak of using such 

craft as space command posts 

to direct military operations on 

earth. But will not such com- 

, mand pent), ho prime ti■ rget.A . 

.of enemy space vessels in the i 

event of terrestrial conflict? 

Alternative Suggested 

These reflections suggest an 

alternative path. There are 

many non-military uses for a 

manned orbiting laboratory that 

could serve the needs of astronomers; meteorologists and other, 

scientists. Would it not have 

been better for the National 

Aeronautics and Space Administration to have been giver; 

'the M.O.L. assignment and thus 

avoid the provocation and prop:. 

aganda setback represented by 

. the decision the President ac.: 

Wally;took ? And once a NASA 

M.O.L. were developed, it could 

be used by the military if the 

need arose. That need would 

presumably be evidence that the 

Russians or others were actively exploiting space for military 

purposes other than intelligence 

collection. Such a course might 

have kept Washington from 

bearing the onus of seeming to 

start , an arms race in space, 

while giving more time to exert 

pressure on Moscow for cooperation rather than rivalry 

in the new dimension of human . 

activity.. 

. . 

HARRY:SCHWARTZ is 0 nein 

bcr of the editorial board of The 

Times. 
- 4.rk,1(014,60";., 

ibitlakkh 

" • Z, ArtIrl • 

igiateat4 

CH 0 0 

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CIA Control Bid Slowed ecision on -VIOL 

Battle with USAF over responsibility seen main delay 

cause; science experiments may be shifted to NASA. 

By Donald E. Fink 

Washington—Long delay in the decision to proceed with the development 

of the military manned orbiting laboratory (MOL) was caused by a fight between Air Force and the Central Intelligence Agency over which would exercise system mission control. 

MOL now is conceived primarily as It had been believed that the MOL 

a reconnaissance/surveillance payload decision delay had been sought by the 

(AW&ST Sept. 6, pp. 17, 22), and the State Dept., which wanted to sound out 

battle apparently centered around the effect on U.S. allies of a manned 

whether the vehicle would be a succes- reconnaissance system (AW&ST July 

sor to the U-2 and under CIA control, 26, p. 15). 

or to the Samos reconnaissance satellite' This State Dept. survey was relatively 

and under Air Force management. brief, however, and the, delay of several 

USAF MANNED ORBITING laboratory system in its launch configuration shows the five 

grime contractors and areas of responsibility. Negotiations with these contractors A.. ,.!, iitkcOk;ii tbst is estiniAk1i at $1.5 billion. 

months was caused instead by the mission control argument. 

..,The White House appeared to rule 

In favor of the Air Force by announcing 

the program late last month after -key 

USAF leaders, headed by Under Secretary 'Brockway McMillan, interceded. 

With Air Force apparently in control, 

and with MOL rapidly being viewed as 

a Defense Dept. intelligence-gathering 

satellite, a move has begun within the 

Air Force to offer all scientific experiments previously proposed for MOT. to 

the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. The proposal is that NASA 

fly these experiments in its Apollo extension system (AES) program. 

To obtain the best operational results, 

extremely high inclination orbits are being planned for MOL, with some missions set for 85 to 92 deg. angles. Circular 300 mi. orbits had been considered, and may be flown on some missions. But for the best ground resolutions, the orbits will be held to 150-160 

mi. 

The transtage will have to be used 

regularly to compensate for natural orbital degradation. Orbital periods will be 

about 90 min. 

Preliminary studies show the maximum laboratory payload will be 5,600 

lb. Electronic and photographic sensors 

will be used, and the data will be relayed to the ground by digital data 

transmission or 6-me. bandwidth television—comparable to commercial television. 

Two ground receiving stations will be 

used. 

The problem of keeping the television channels secure still is being studied, but it is felt that since the transmissions will be line-of-sight, there 

should be no major difficulty in guarding against interception antennas. 

Mission planners do not consider it 

necessary to include use of ejected 

photographic capsules, since the television will permit transmission of fairly 

high-resolution pictures. 

Sensors being considered for use on 

MOL include low-light level television, 

zoom lens attachments for the television system, L-band high-resolution radar, long-lens photographic systems and 

also a variety of electronic ferret devices. 

Power requirements for a 30-day mission have not been fully determined. It 

is felt, however, that fuel cell systems 

drawing on the technology developed 

for Projects Gemini and Apollo will suffice for all MOL missions. 

The number of reconnaissance tasks 

developing for the two MOL crewmen 

is prompting supporters of a strong op-A-\,; 

vT4tkir4rially oriented program to play170 
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ciown the scientific aspects. Thus the 

approximately 26 scientific experiments 

proposed for the MOL flights, may be 

offered to NASA for its AES program 

missions. 

There will be a considerable amount 

of experimentation in early missions to 

further MOL technology and evaluate 

man's performance in space. In addition, the two crewmen will be kept 

quite busy operating the sensor systems 

and classifying targets and are not expected to have much time for scientific 

experiments. 

MOL planners think one man can 

seek out and locate at least 1,000 targets per orbit with the sensors, but the 

classification by the second crewman is 

expected to be quite time consuming. 

Air Force plans to conduct numerous 

mission profile studies in an attempt to 

develop the. technique through which 

a MOL reconnaissance system would 

function. 

The Navy, which is participating in 

MOL through the P-13 ocean surveillance experiment, has done some mission simulation studies to determine 

what workloads would face a two-man 

crew attempting to locate and classify 

ocean traffic on a global basis. - The ocean surveillance mission may 

be extended to include anti-submarine 

warfare (ASW) applications. For ASW 

work, the crewmen would operate 

sensors that are compatible with the 

anti-submarine network of sonobuoys, 

surface ships and aircraft. 

The Navy is reported to be somewhat 

apathetic about its role in the MOL 

program,' which raises the possibility 

that Air Force may take over the ocean 

surveillance mission: Air Force • has 

argued that surveillance over ocean and 

land are essentially the same, and that 

the P-13 experiment can be handled as 

an integral part of the Air Force mission. 

The first MOL spacecraft are scheduled to be discarded after use and allowed to burn up upon re-entry. Mission planners feel, however, that if the 

program is to be truly open-ended, they 

must be able to re-supply the vehicles 

for extended flights beyond the currently-planned 30 days. 

For this reason, all laboratory design 

considerations cue including Gem i 

docking ports leading into the unprcssurized section of the canister. These 

would.be used by ferry vehicles bringing 

re-generation units for the life support 

system and perhaps eventually new 

crews. 

Several rendezvous schemes are being 

considered. Based on the experience 

with Gemini rendezvous simulations, 

the approach to the MOL vehicle probably can be made visually. A variety of 

distance measuring devices, including 

Doppler radars and Mossbaucr radiation 

counters, are being considered for the 

final portion of the docking maneuver 

When the crew's visibility will be obseured. 

• Air Force contract negotiation 

-currently are working with Douglas Aircraft.' Co. and General Electric Co. to 

define their respective areas of activity 

and shares of the $1.5 billion contract. 

One industry official described the situation as "chaotic" and said it would 

be some time before the relationships 

between the five associate prime MOL 

contractors are defined fully. 

Douglas.is expected to be primarily 

involved in the construction of the 

oratory and monitoring installation of 

equipment and experiments. General 

Electric's area of responsibility may include development and integration of 

experiments, pre-launch and post-launch 

mission support and final data analysis. • 

Numerous spacecraft design details 

have yet to be worked out for MOL. 

These include: the type of cabin atmosphere that is to be used—Douglas appears to favor a helium-oxygen mixture 

that could permit cabin pressures up to 

7 psi.; what environmental control system will be used, and whether or not a 

new fuel cell system will be required. 

Economizing Blamed for Army Shortages 

Washington—Only three of the Army's entire force of 16 active divisions 

considered themselves capable of going into combat within 30 days as of the 

close of last year, and the low state of readiness is blamed on Pentagon economizing, the Senate Preparedness Investigating Subcommittee charged in a report sent to the Defense Dept. for comment. 

Defense Secretary Robert S. McNamara and Army leaders in official testimony have belittled the shortages alleged by the subcommittee. However, 

these are among the subcommittee findings which lie behind the alarm of 

committee members about the Army's state of readiness: 

• European forces. The 7th Army" in 

Europe rated all its five divisions in the fantry Divs. and the 24th Infantry Div. 

lowest category of readiness as of Dec. (mechanized). McNamara and Army 

31, 1964—Category C-4. This C-4 leaders have been trying to improve the 

category is defined by the Army as "not.7th Army's state of readiness since the 

capable of conducting combat opera- subcommittee survey. Some improvetions—requires more than 30 days to ment has been made, but not enough 

attain C-1." The C-1 category set as the to calm subcommittee fears. Comobjective for the 16 active Army divi- manders told the subcommittee the 

sions is defined as "fully prepared for high priority for Vietnam needs is 

and capable of undertaking sustained causing many of their equipment shortcombat operations within 24 hr." ages because the Pentagon "robs Peter 

A major reason for this lowest cate- to pay Paul." 

gory of readiness was not shortages of • U.S.-based divisions. All but .two of 

minor items like rulers and manuals— the eight active divisions based in the 

Pentagon inferences to this effect not- U. S. were rated C-4 at the end of 

withstanding—but the lack of aircraft, calendar 1964. Army leaders—when 

vital spare parts and assemblies, like asked about this by the subcommittee 

transmissions. The commanders in the —claimed that the readiness ratings 

field told subcommittee investigators were artificial in some situations. Althat these shortages were critical. though the 82nd Airborne Div. at Ft. 

The 7th Army comprises the 3rd and Bragg, N. C., and the 101st Airborne 

4th Armored Divs., 3rd and 8th In- Div. at Ft. Campbell, Kr.: were rated 

C-4, the Army leaders said this was 

because their table of organization and 

equipment (TOE) was changed. The 

Army said this was done to lighten the 

divisions so they were easier to airlift 

and would have equipment tailored for 

an enemy like the Viet Cong rather 

than a modern force like Russia's. The 

Army said the quick response of the 

82nd Airborne to the Dominican Republic crisis showed its actual readiness. 

The two U. S.-based divisions which 

were above the C-4 rating were only 

C-3, defined as "limited capability to 

perform combat operations and only for 

a short period. Can attain C-1 in 30 

days." The Army has been improving 

the state of readiness of the seven U. S.-

based divisions since the subcommittee's Dec. 31, 1964, survey—but the 

desired C-1 rating still is far from being 

achieved. 

In addition to the 82nd and 101st 

Airborne Divs., the continental U. S. , 

Army divisions as of last Dec. 31 are: 

1st and 2nd Armored, Ft. Hood, Tex.; 

1st Infantry Div., Ft. Riley, Kan.; 2nd 

Infantry Div., Ft. Benning, Ga.; 4th 

Infantry Div., Ft. Lewis, Wash., and • 

the 5th Infantry Div. (mechanized), Ft. 

Carson, Colo., and Ft. Devens, Mass. 

• Pacific readiness. Among the Army's 

Pacific forces, comprising the 25th Infantry Div. in I Lilvaii and thk, 10-