2 ,i 

MEMORANDM FOR DR. FLAK'. 

SUBJECT: NASA Interest in11,01,, 

Attached is the letter-I' received from 'Mr. Mathews 

earlier this week requesting information on VIOL. I have 

assured him that NASA is welcome to any and all information 

on MOL (he recognizes that NASA must accept appropriate 

security classifications), that ve would be willing to 

study in reasonable depth any NASA questions not pertinent 

to the present MOL Program, etc.,' I have repeated this 

offer of assistance to both Mr..Luskin (AAP) and 

GeAral Smart this week. 

I met with Mr. Luskin to-day with regard to the 

Mathews letter. He indicated that NASA was including NM 

options in their budget considerations for possible use 

before, after, or even in lieu of the Orbital Workshop. 

He personally, at the moment, desired information oa MOL 

potential (no DoD payload) and availability at the earliest 

possible date. Some of the highlights of our discussion 

follow: 

1. Lindicated all..stbsystams looked - reasonable,. 

as•ls,-for- 60.days or slightly' longer, with the exception 

of the fuel cells (and we:wereconsidering a change•in'that 

area). 

2. Extension of • lifetime (using the "B" model 

"wafer" in the unpressurized expendables compartment) to 

45 days was relatively straightforward, and 60 days (sans 

payload) might not be too difficult a first step. 

3: We had not given serious consideration to 

very long lifetimes (6 mos - 1 yr);- an-orbit resupply, etc. 

NRO ARPROVED FOR 

RELEASE 1 JULY 2015 
NRO APFA3OVED FOR 

RELEASE 1 JULY 2015 

-we 4. We had not seriously studied modifying MR .... 

facilities for MOL, but should be able to estimatefereasofiL 

the costnrell based on experience with the SLC-VI at VA7B. 

5. Joint use of the SLC-VI at vArB was certainly 

possible from a launch capability standpoint, since MOL 

probably would operate on 5 month or longer launch centers, 

but some additions probably would be necessary in the checkout/simulation/training area to permit NASA "open" operations 

and still properly safeguard DoD payload information. 

6. The MOL Progrmn was $30-40 million short (if 

$530 is the FY 69 MOL allocation) of maintaining a Summer, 

1971 first launch. 

7. That a NASA MOL (sans all DoD payload) probably 

could be built and provided at an early date in the program --

perhaps even before the first DoD manned launch, but that 

this depended on many factors --DAC involvement in NASA 

experiments, test flow, etc., and that I would object to any 

completely parallel FV-3 for DoD/FV-3A for NASA production 

scheme on the basis that DAC could not do both simultaneously 

and do a good job. 

Mr. Luskin and I both clearly understood that this was 

an informal exploration, and'I understood quiteclearly that 

this is a NASA budget-optionexercise (albeit, a rather , . serious one). 

We agreed to a meeting at DAC Huntington Beach next 

Tuesday, with the morning as a Government session wherein the 

MOL Systems Office would try to answer as many questions as 

possible, and identify any reasonable areas which required 

some further analysis and study on our part. During the 

afternoon, the NASA technical people would be free to query 

DAC on the basic MOL design, subsystems, and capabilities. 

Appropriate security measures 'will be taken. 

JAMES T. =WART 

Major General, USAF 

Vice Director, MOL Program