NRO APPROVED FOR 

RELEASE 1 JULY 2015 HANDLE via BYEMAN 1-`4- 

CONTROL SYSTEM ONLY 

OFFICE OF THE ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF DEFENSE 

WASHINGTON, D. C. 20301 

2 4 1969 

SYSTEMS ANALYSIS 

(Strategic Programs) 

MEMORANDUM, FOR DIRECTOR, DEFENSE RESEARCH AND ENGINEERING 

DIRECTOR, NATIONAL RECONNAISSANCE OFFICE 

DIRECTOR, DEFENSE INTELLIGENCE AGENCY. 

VICE DIRECTOR, MANNED ORBITING LABORATORY, PROGRAM OFFICE 

SUWECT: The Manned Orbiting Laboratory (MOL) Development Change Paper 

The enclosed memorandum and supporting papers were reviewed with 

Mr. Nitze, who discussed them with Mr. Packard. They asked that I 

work with your staff to prepare a memo summarizing the issues on MOL 

and the views of the interested parties on these issues. 

My me orandum, enclosed, identifies and discusses what I believe 

are these ssues--the value of very high resolution (VHR) -imagery, 

the urgency with which we need it, and alternative ways of obtaining 

such imagery. I would like you to review my memorandum and its en 

closures more thoroughly than you had an opportunity to do before, 

and provide me directly your comments on these by February 3, 1969. 

I will then prepare the memorandum requetted by the Deputy Secretary 

of Defense. This memorandum will be made available to each of you 

for review and comment prior to its being sent forward. 

Ivan. Selin 

Deputy Assistant Secretary 

Enclosures 

BYE-7782769 M 

{ 1,1 ON 

f9 )1

S 

02. // G.Z. 

WANDL-E VIA BYEMAN 

'CON'T'ROL SYSTEM. ONLY 

BYE - 7 827_6 

EXCLUDED FROM AUTOMATIC 

RECRADIG; DOD DIR 5200.10 

DOES NOT APPLY TOP SECRET 
r't r D OTY' 

ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF DEFENSE 

fit•?41.1.1 WASHINGTON, D. C. 20301 

:71 R e„ppr 

etAAA,tok-tim:4 

koz,47 

cre, weistataFregbit VTN BYEMAN 

CONTROL SYSTEM ONLY 

Kamte wit 13yEMAN 

CONTROL SYSTEM ONLY 

r423.74.9,52/1110•1KaSk. 

EXCLUDED FROM AUTOMATIC 

REGRADING; DOD DIR 5200.10 

DOES NOT APPLY 

NRO APPROVED FOR 

RELEASE 1-JULY 2015 

SYSTEMS ANALYSIS 

MEMORANDUM FOR FOR DEPUTY SECRETARY OF DEFENSE 

SUBJECT: Comments on the Manned. Orbiting Laboratory (MOL) Development 

Paper (DCP) and the DDR&E Study of Very High Resolution :(VHR 

Imagery 

The MOL DCP (Tab A) was transmitted to you on December 5, 1968, for 

signature. Supporting this DCP is an ODDR&E study entitled, 'The Need 

for Very High Resolution Imagery and Its Contribution to DoD Operations 

and Decisions". At Tab B are our detailed comments on this study which 

I promised you in my letter of January 7, 1969, 

The MOL DCP concludes that the need for VHR .imagery great enough', 

and urgent enough to spend more than $1.5 billion on MOL in FY 69 through 

FY 71. I do not believe available evidence and analysis support this 

conclusion. 

The Value of VHR Imagery 

The MOL DCP and the ODDR&E study argue that VHR imagery will be 

valuable in two general ways. First,_ such imagery might, improve our 

estimates of the capabilities of Soviet and Chinese forces, permitting 

us to plan less conservative, and therefore less expensive, forces. 

Second, VHR imagery might provide enough detail about the military char 

acteristics of Soviet and Chinese weapons to permit better design of our 

weapons, either to reduce their vulnerabilities or to- enhance other 

aspects of their effectiveness. 

The most important example of the first argument is that if the 

Soviets were to deploy an extensive anti-ballistic missile system (A3) 

which could be penetrated by means less costly than exhaustion of, the 

ABM interceptors, VHR imagery might reveal these, defects. We could then 

deploy a smaller offensive force than would otherwise be needed, saving 

the cost of weapons required to exhaust the ABM interceptors. This argument has several serious weaknesses. 

First, if such forces were deployed by the two sides, the situation 

resulting would likely be unstable and possibly very dangerous. The 

Soviets might not recognize that their ABM is -vulnerable. In other words 

they might not be deterred. This could lead to Soviet attempts to 
Air Defense 

The ODDR&E study argues, for example, that VHR imagery would have 

allayed earlier improved estimates of FOXBAT characteristics-such as 

maximum speed and range. The difficulty here is that our penetration 

capabilities are not very sensitive to such characteristics over rather 

wide ranges. On the other hand, our penetration probabilities are 

strongly influenced by Soviet air defense capabilities at low altitude. 

These are, in turn, determined mainly by internal electronic characteristics of Soviet airborne radars- Overhead VHR imagery will have little 

or no capability against such radars. 

Armored Vehicles 

The ODDR&E study argues essentially that our armored vehicle design 

is sensitive, for example, to the largest gun on Soviet tanks. VHR 

imagery would permit a better estimate of the caliber of these guns.- 

4AN0LE MENEM: 

OONTROL SYSTEM ONO' 

On 

NRO APPROVED FOR 

RELEASE 1 JULY 2015 TOP SECRET HANDtg viwBYEIVIAN 

obNTRoc SYSTEM ONLY 

2 

exploit what they perceive to be some sort of superiority. Obviously 

such a course of events is highly undesirable. Alternatively, the 

Soviets might accept the fact that our penetration tactics will work 

and proceed to correct the vulnerabilities in their ABM. This eventuality could lead to larger U.S. forces to exhaust the improved ABM or 

to an interaction between the opposing forces involving cycles of improved U.S. penetration tactics and Soviet counteractions to these. 

Second, even if the difficulties just described did not exist, significant savings could be realized through mnaller offensive deployments 

only if a number of conditions are met. First, a very large A3 deployment is necessary for the cost savings to be realized, since programmed 

U.S. offensive forces can tolerate much larger ABM forces than projected in NIPP-69. Second, the ATM must, in fact, be vulnerable to 

penetration tactics other than exhaustion. In short, the ABM system 

must be both extensive and defective. Third, we must discover the ABM 

vulnerabilities at least one lead time before additional offensive forces 

would otherwise be needed. Fourth, the AM vulnerabilities must be such 

that the time between our discovery of a program to correct the vulnerabilities and their correction is longer than the time required for us 

to deploy enough additional payload to exhaust the. ABM, or to develop 

new penetration tactics. Fifth, estimates of the ABM vulnerabilities and 

the time to correct such ABM defects must be made with very high confidence since a faulty estimate could lead to compromise or loss of our 

Assured Destruction capabilities. There is little reason to believe that 

any of these conditions are likely to be met. Certainly the DCP and the 

ODDR&E study do not make convincing arguments on these points. 

The second way VHR imagery might be valuable is exemplified by 

arguments on air defenses and armored vehicles. 
for it a program which would: 

DOR!AN 

GAMBIT lEUGOti 

malricz: nt-ZIETyLukT 

SYSTEM c.,NLY 

NRO APPROVED FOR 

RELEASE 1 JULY 2015 

HANDLE liefi BYEMAN 

tONTRoi.: SYSTEM 0- Ni.1' 

3 

This is no doubt true; however, our armored vehicles are vulnerable 

to many other weapons such as rocket launchers and recoilless riflea, 

many of which are very unlikely to be photographed by overhead VHR. 

Further, Soviet general purpose weapons are not threats to us until 

they are deployed in large numbers, an inherently very slow procesa_ 

(for instance, they replace less than 10% of their tank-inventoryper 

year). This gives us time to gather needed information:fromdirect 

observation, COMINT and other sources for. any response that might be 

.required. In short, VHR imagery in this case would give us only_fragmentary information earlier than it is really needed for.an effective 

U.S. response. 

The Urgency of VHR Imagery 

VHR imagery is not required to determine such things of immediate 

importance as numbers of Soviet strategic offensive and defensive weapons and numbers of Soviet, Bloc, and Chinese general purpose forces 

units, where these are deployed, and the equipment they possess. Rather, 

VHR imagery can contribute to more refined estimates of some of the 

performance parameters of weapons, both before and after their deployment. The resulting estimates even with VHR imagery will be of 

modest confidence because of a large number of- factors. We have not 

found examples of such estimates to which VHR can contribute, which 

have a strong influence on major resource allocation decisions. 

We have some relatively urgent intelligence needs for general purpose forces, for example, intelligence on Soviet and Bloc force dispositions in real time during crises, but VHR imagery will not contribute much to these. In short, a case has not been made that the need 

for VHR imagery is urgent. On the contrary, there are good reasons to 

believe that it is not. 

On balance, I believe that VHR imagery may provide some useful in 

formation we cannot now obtain and that it will be_a worthwhile if 

marginal addition to our collection program. However, I do not believe 

large savings will result from VHR imagery, nor do .I believe such 

imagery will make major changes in the confidence with which we estimate Soviet and Chinese threats. I do not believe that our need for 

VHR imagery is great enough or urgent enough to warrant the high costs 

of MOL. 

Alternatives to MOL 

ODDR&E has indicated that they have not found alternative ways to 

obtain VHR imagery that are- cheaper-thanMOL (abclat- $1.8- billion dollars 

still to be spent) even if more time were used for development of such, 

alternatives. ODDR&E is still studying such alternatives,„however. If 

unmanned cheaper alternatives are not available, I`believe serious Consideration should be given to terminating the MOL program and substituting 
NRO APPROVED FOR 

RELEASE 1 JULY 2015 

KW= VOZ BYEN1 

etNTRQL SYSTEM ONLY 

1. Exploit an existing system such as GAMBIT-3 or HEXAGON to 

obtain photography of resolution between that of GAMBIT-3 and MOL. 

2. Do advanced development of the optical and other systems for 

an unmanned VHR satellite to be operational at some time in the future 

when technology might permit a substantially less costly,system than 

MOL. 

Recommendations 

I would like you to: 

1. Withdraw your endorsement of the MOL DCP. 

2. Direct the preparation of a revised MOL DCP which would present the MOL option and either (a) unmanned alternatives to MOL; or 

CO a program to exploit existing systens coupled, vdth advanced development of the critical components of a VHR satellite. This revision 

should be completed in time to support FY 70 apportionment. 

3. Direct the Air Force to limit commitments on MOL to the minimum required to maintain the current program pending completion of 

the revised MOL DCP. 

At Tab C are letters to the Director, Defense Research and 

Engineering, and to the Secretary of the Air Force to effect these 

recommendations, 

____paclosures 

ilEXMON 

BORIP11. 

GRIAIT HANOLIE 

CONTRO 

BYEMAN 

L SYSTEM etklt...y 
• TOP SECflET 

EXCLUDED FROM AUTOMATIC 

REGRADING; DOD DIR 520030 

DOES NOT APPLY 

NRO APPROVED FOR 

RELEASE 1 JULY 2015 

Frwmg v BATA AN 

ttitriROC.; SYSTEM OWIr 

COMMENTS ON THE STUDY 

"THE NEED FOR VERY HIGH RESOLUTION (VHR) IMAGERY 

AND ITS CONTRIBUTION TO DOD OPERATIONS AND DECISIONS". 

' AND THE 

MANNED ORBITING LABORATORY (AOL) DEVELOPMENT CONCEPT PAPXR_(DCP) 

VHR imagery, if provided by DORIAN, is very expensive: DORIAN 

start-up costs are estimated to be about $3.0 billion, of which about 

$1.2 billion is already spent. Additional launches will cost more than 

'$100 million each. Because of these high costs, we need to be convinced 

that VHR imagery will be of a high value, that the need is urgent, and 

that DORIAN is the best way to obtain such imagery. 

Conclusions 

The VHR imagery study argues that photography of about 

resolution will reveal many things that photography of about 

resolution will not. The study is persuasive on this point; however, it 

does not make a convincing argument that these things will result in significant savings or effectiveness gains in our strategic and general purpose forces 

The analysis of strategic forces is inadequate and is not consistent 

with the way these forces are designed. The analysis of tactical forces 

does not show that VHR photography would change the way we design these 

forces, nor does it show that such imagery would have in the past contributed to avoiding situations that were either very costly to us or that 

materially reduced the capabilities of our forces.. 

Serious consideration should be given to an option which develops 

the VHR optical and image motion compensation systems on a schedule designed to achieve a high degree of economy in their development. This 

development is not urgent enough to justify the present levels of expenditures on DORIAN. 

Value of VHR Imagery in Strategic Force Decisions and Operations. 

Our strategic forces are sized to meet Assured Destruction (AD) criteria. 

These criteria require that under very pessimistic'assumptions (or estimates) about Soviet forces and tactics we can with high confidenCe kill 

20% to 25% of the Soviet population after a surprise first strike on our 

strategic offensive forces by the Soviets. The Soviet forces which influence these calculations are ballistic missiles (sea-based and landbased), ASW, air defenses, and anti-ballistic missile defenses CAW)! : 

: woo= yrg ByEMAN 

:,CotrrnoL SYSTEM cp!...y 
NRO APPROVED FOR 

RELEASE 1 JULY 2015 

HANDLE VIA BYBIAN 

CONTRO.: SYSTEM ONLY TOP SECRET ,utatirt 

HANDLE VIA BYEMAN 2 

CONTROL SYSTEM ONLY 

VHR Imagery and Assured Destruction 

Soviet Anti-Ballistic Missile Defenses. The analysis of VHR 

photography in support of strategic force decisions is one of the weakest 

parts of the VHR study and is also the most crucial argument in support 

of rapid development of VHR capability. This study says on pp. 44-453. 

Volume I, and pp 86-109, Volume II, that the U.S. might deploy, strategic . 

Offenses for AD which would be substantially inadequate to - exhaust Soviet. 

As with warheads only. In making this point, the StudYfails to account 

for likely consequences of such a strategic balance. Also, the study does 

not- make clear all the Conditions that would have to be met to make this a 

permissible course of action, even if the consequences were otherwise. 

acceptable. 

Deterrence and Strategic Deployments 

Our deterrent forces are designed primarily to convince the Soviets 

that we have the capability to destroy their society after a surprise first 

strike on U.S. forces. Our forces must be unmistakably capable of so des-. 

troying the USSR. For the Soviets to be so convinced about a U.S. offensive force, substantially incapable of exhausting a large Soviet ABM, they 

must accept an estimate that their ABM will not serve its intended purpose 

(or alternatively, that our penetration tactics will work).. This would 

entail the exposure of our penetration tactics and consequently the vulnerability of the Soviet ABM. Such a balance between U.S. and Soviet forces 

would seem to be highly unstable. There are only-about three ways such a 

situation could proceed: 

1. The Soviets might believe their ABM works. This could lead to 

Soviet attempts to exploit their perceived strategic advantage. Such 

actions could lead to very dangerous crises. 

2. The Soviets could accept the faults of their ABM, but set about 

fixing them; in this event, we would have to respond by deploying more 

payload or developing other penetration tactics. 

3. The Soviets could accept the faults of their ABM and do nothing 

or phase out the A. This appears to be the assumption of the VHR study. 

Even if the U.S. could discount the foregoing argument, all of the 

following conditions must be satisfied for us to realize real savings as 

suggested in the VHR study. 

1. Very large Soviet ABM deployments must be projected in our intelligence estimates. We are already committed to deploying POSEIDON and 

MINUTEMAN III. These, with other programmed missiles and bomber forces 

provide the capabilities shown in Table I. 

P;"- irlam 

HANDLE WA BYEMAN 

CONTROL SYSTEM ONLY 
NRO APPROVED FOR 

RELEASE 1 JULY 2015 40P-SEGRETVIT5152tg_ tirEAUS. 

TRol. SYSTEM ONI4 

3 

Table I 

Capabilities of U.S. Programmed Forces for Pen9tration 

of High NIPP-69 Soviet ABM Defenses2i 

Missile Warheads 

FY72,FY73 FY74 2Y(5 FY76 FY77 

Reliable, Surviving, Penetrating Area 

Defenses 1904. 2668 2752, 2729 2608 2596 

Reliable, Surviving, Penetrating 

Terminal Defenses 1876 2641 2723 2686 2570 2533 

Area Aim Points 

Reliable, Surviving, Penetrating Area 

Defenses 2631 2681 6524 6226 5834 5748 

Terminal Aim Points 

Reliable, Surviving, Penetrating 

Terminal Defenses - 2020 2771 2828 3030 3169 3289- 

U.S. Assured Destruction Capabilities 

Percent Soviet Fatalities 

Without Penetration Aids 45 45 44 43 42 4o 

With Penetration Aids 45 45 45 14 44 43 

Reliable Effective Soviet As (NIPP-69) 

Area Interceptors 0 100 280 550 820 950 

Terminal Interceptors 64 64 64 124 184 364 

/ Strategic Force and Effectiveness Tables, January 1969. 

This table shows that very large increases can be tolerated in projected 

Soviet forces, especially their ABMS, before major new outlays, on U.S. 

strategic offensive forces would be required. Further, the most recent 

changes in projections of Soviet AB MS have been downward by about onehalf. 

2. The Soviet ABM must, in fact, have defects which willerMit it 

to be penetrated using tactics other than exhaustion (direct penetration). 

Even if VHR imagery would permit a high-confidence analysis of_Soviet ABM, 

the ABM must have features which will permit high confidence penetration 

using direct penetration tactics. There clearly is some probability that 

this will not be so. In this case VHR -imaaery would not permit leaser 

U.S. offensive forces. 

3. The high confidence estimate of Soviet ABM characteristics must 

be obtained at least one U.S. strategic force`-deployment- lead-time before 

such U.S. forces would be required; otherwise the information will be too 

late to avoid many of the costs of such U.S. offensive forces.:. The lead 

time to make significant changes in our strategic offen6ive force posture 

40P-SEGREF DOW trAN'ocz Vrg C<K4TROL' SYSTSM 
NRO APPROVED FOR 

RELEASE 1 JULY 2015 TOP SECRET 

HANDLE BYEMAN 

CONTROL SYSTEM OW' 

is at least three years, and probably closer to five. It could even be 

longer if an entire new system must be developed. For example, MINUTEMAN. 

development.began in earnest about July, 1958. Three hundred MINUTEMAN 

missiles were not deployed until about the Fall of 1963, fiye years later; 

hence, we must be able to predict three to five years in the future that 

a Soviet ARM will be such that we can penetrate it without interceptor 

exhaustion. Otherwise we cannot avoid committing to larger offensive 

forces. 

• 

4. The time between U.S. discovery of &program to correct the Soviet 

ABM defects which permit direct U.S. penetration and their correction must 

be loner than the lead time for the U.S. to de 10 enough •a load to ex 

haust the'ATM. Consider the situation in which the Soviets deploy a very 

large ATM—say 6,000 interceptors. If the defect- in the ABM is in the 

radars, say, the Soviets might be able to correct the defect quickly, 

creating an ATM that must be exhausted. If we have failed to deploy 

enough payload to exhaust the Soviet ABM, our Assured Destruction (AD) 

capabilities could be compromised for an extended. period. 

5. Finally, our confidence in our estimate that a Soviet ARM is Vulnerable to direct penetration must be very, very high.... At.present our most -

important national defense objective is to: deter nuclear war. We believe: 

that to do this we must maintain an Assured Destruction capability—the 

capability under extremely pessimistic estimates of Soviet fordes and 

tactics to kill 20% to 25% of the Soviet people after a surprise'Soviet 

first strike. Though no one has assigned an acceptable .probability to the 

event "we lose our AD capabilities", there is general agreement that this 

probability must be kept vanishingly low. This probability can be thought 

of as our lack of confidence that we havebeen sufficiently pessimistic 

about the many uncertainties that enter the AD calculations. Our estimate 

of Soviet ARM performance is only one of these; hence,: ourconfidence in 

this estimate must be even higher than our cOnfidence that we will` not.lose 

our AD capability. 

The VHR study fails to make convincing arguments that any of these 

conditions will be met. 

At present there is little evidence that the Soviets are now or will 

in the next few years embark upon a major ATM deployment. The Mbscow system deployment has been cut back substantially; there is asjet no evidence 

of a terminal defense system development; there are some indications of 

the initiation of a new test program for a modified Moscow ABM. This new 

program is consistent with NIPP-69 which has reduced estimates of Soviet 

ARM deployments as noted earlier. 

Not much can be said about the: probabilityaBoviet ARM will have 

serious defects. If NIKE-X were to be deployed, it is unlikely:that it 

could be penetrated without exhaustion. Soviet ABM technology appears to. 

'HANDEE VOZ BYENIAN 

sNTROL:, SYSTEM ONLY 
NRO APPROVED FOR 

RELEASE 1 JULY 2015 --TOMEORE-TpuNnctinn BYEMA 

CONTROL, SYSTEM ONLY 

5 

be behind ours and they appear to have been sensitive to shortcomings in 

their ABMs in the past. Such sensitivity might explain the sporadic, 

nature of Soviet ABM deployments since the early 1960s. One can only 

speculate, but reasonable estimates would seem to 'be: (1) that Soviet 

technology will permit a NIKE-X like system in the 1970-1980 period, and 

(2) because of the great expense of a large ABM deployment and apparent 

past Soviet sensitivity to their ABM technical shortcomings, it is not 

likely that a large Soviet ABM would contain serious flaws.' 

The question of timing raised in paragraphs 3 and 4, above, are not 

discussed beyond estimates of the increase in lead time VHR would give. 

Cases are not made that either of these two conditions will be satisfied. 

Finally, the issue of confidence in the estimates of ABM performance 

is raised in the study; however, the confidences used in the study are 

vague in their meaning, they have been determined subjectively, i.e., 

someone has guessed them'and they are rather low-in an AD context, e.g., 

50% to 90% on individual ABM performance parameters (several of which 

might be needed to estimate that an ARM is vulnerable to direct penetration). In short, the study fails to make a case that any combination of 

intelligence systems will provide estimates of high enough confidence to 

permit founding our AD capabilities on direct penetration. 

In sum, the arguments made in the-VHR study that large savings might 

result from VHR imagery are, highly speculative, would require, literally, 

a change in national policy, and at best are based on situations which 

have a very low probability of occurrence. 

Soviet Ballistic Missiles.. We need to know the number of independent 

ballistic missile reentry vehicles that can be delivered, their reliability, 

delivery accuracy, and yield. Of these, by far the most important are 

numbers and accuracy. Since Sentinel presents a negligible defense to the 

Soviets, if the Soviets take even simple steps to exhaust it, Soviet penetration capabilities beyond use of chaff are now of little importance. 

Soviet silo hardness does not even enter our estimates of cur JUD capabilities. We cannot, therefore, agree with the statement on Page 48 of Volume 

I of the report that states that accuracy,,, penetration capability, and 

silo hardness are the most important features of. Soviet missiles which' 

influence U.S. (strategic) programs and that numbers, reliability, and payload are of secondary importance. 

VHR imagery can be expected to make little or no additional contribution to determining either numbers or accuracy of Soviet- ballistic missiles 

It is conceiveable that such imagery,could help determine the payload 

(through better measurements) and hence the yield of a missile such as 

the SS-13; but because our ICBM vulnerability is not very sensitive to 

yield, the value of every refined yield information is low. 

DOW 
NRO APPROVED FOR 

RELEASE 1 JULY 2015 

hrOr.-.,c5 yt-'! aiEr7Ifli 

Cournov, SYSTEM 

6 • 

Soviet Area Air Defenses. The effectiveness of Soviet air defenses,. 

given known Soviet aircraft, are almost completely determined by the capabilities of Soviet airborne warning and control (AWACs) aircraft; interceptors, and air-to-air missiles to find and shoot, at low altitude targets. 

Because these capabilities depend almost entirely on Soviet airborne'radar 

design features aimed at dealing with ground clutter, especially in the 

radar signals and in the radar receivers, it is very unlikely that photography of any resolution can contribute much to reducing the uncertainties 

about these capabilities. 

Soviet terminal air defense capabilities are determined by surfaceto-air missile (SAM) system low altitude capabilities, basically an electronic capability, SAM fire power and SAM reaction time, both electronic 

and data handling capabilities. None of these are very susceptible to 

analysis by VHR imagery. 

With the recent decision to include subsonic cruise armed decoys 

(SCADS) in our bomber forces, our sensitivity will be low even to very 

good Soviet area defenses, e.g., several hundred FOXBATs with shoot-down 

missiles and AWACS. 

Soviet Anti-Submarine Warfare (Asw). The problems the Soviet have 

with ASW against our SSBNs are exceedingly difficult. Our SSBNs are unlikely to be seriously threatened by any foreseeable Soviet ASW options. 

The kinds of things we might see with VHR imagery such as deck mounted 

ASW weapons, sonar domes, and antennas are not,the critical elements in 

a system with capabilities against our SSBNs. The fundamental problems 

of detecting and tracking these submarines are not likely to be solved with 

equipment subject to VHR imagery. The VHR study does not identify the 

critical problems the Soviets must solve to have effective ASW against our 

SSBNs. It does not make a case that VHR can contribute much in this area. 

In summary„.the analysis of the VHR imagery contribution to U.S. 

strategic offensive force structure decisions is naive and misleading. 

There is very little likelihood that any intelligence collector like 

DORIAN, or any realistic combination of collectors, will ever be good 

enough to give us the confidence required to base our AD capability on an 

offensive force substantially inadequate to exhaust a Soviet ABM. Further, the report has identified the wrong features of Soviet systems as 

the important ones. It has also ignored the substantial hedges already 

built into U.S. forces against gxeater-than-expected Soviet ABM. For ex 

ample, we could add 4 MK 3 RVs to each of the 496 programmed POSEIDON 

and about 300 MK 12s to the MINUTEMAN force for little more than just the 

cost of the warheads. These would yield between about 1,000 and 1,500 

more surviving reliable RVs, depending on MINUTEMAN survivability. About 

another 1,000 reliable MK 12s could be added to the MINUTEMAN force by 

converting all to MINUTEMAN Ins. If MINUTEMAN III survivability were 

only .5, these steps would add 1,800 surviving reliable RVs. These steps 

would cost nowhere near the $5.0 million per warhead suggested in the VHR 

study. 

cZNTPOL SYSTEM TOP SECRET frlim‘ ONLY 

,. PrANI5L-E vrx"MAN 
NRO APPROVED FOR 

RELEASE 1 JULY 2015 -49P-SEC-RET-- 

HANDLE yiA BYEMAN 

CONTROL SYSTEM ONLY 

7 

VHR Imagery and Damage Limiting 

We do not I* substantial increments to our strategic forces for 

Damage Limiting (DL); however, because we expect to over-design our 

forces using the AD criteria, we spend modest sums to enhance the DL 

capabilities of our forces so that those excess to our AD needs can be 

used to limit damage if deterrence fails. 

• 

The primary DL contributions suggested by the report'for- DORIAN are 

improving our estimates of Soviet ICBM silo hardness and determining more 

about Soviet capabilities to penetrate our antiSOyiet ABM (which we have 

not yet decided to buy). 

It is undoubtedly true that VHR imagery could improve our estimates 

of ICBM silo lid thickness. Unfortunately, the lid is unlikely to determine silo hardness. As is pointed out in the study, and as our experience. 

with MINUTEMAN indicates, other factors :-dominate. Even with Complete 

drawings, exhaustive soil tests, and, finally,- ,full scale high explosive 

tests, we were and are unsure of the true hardness, especially the upper 

limit, of the MINUTEMAN facilities. In any case, thispart of the report 

is somewhat irrelevant because even at the lower hardness level 200 psi), 

and at projected U.S. CEPs of about 1-1 00 feet, we are very, very unlikely 

to buy the 2,000 or so 1 megaton weapons, with their delivery systems, 

required to get a .9 damage expectancy on SoViet silos.: If we were to 

find out their silos are 1,000 psi, we certainly would not buy the 5,000 

or so required for a .9 damage expectancy.- If we were to discover the 

silos to be essentially soft (100 psi or less), we probably will find 

enough payload already deployed in our programmed forces to achieve a rea, 

sonable damage expectancy. In short, we do not .now size ourforces to 

achieve given damage levels on Soviet coUnterforce targets. We are unlikely to do so in.the future. Soviet silo,hardnesS is of:,interest, but 

does not drive either our force requirements or the way we might use:these 

forces. 

The study also argued that DORIAN might get VHR pictures of Soviet 

reentry systems, This seems highly unlikely; 'Advanced re-entry systems 

of the type we are developing and testing just aren't exposed to overhead 

photography; MIRVs, decoys, chaff, etc., are nearly always, as 4 minimum, 

under wind shields when the boosters are on the test pads. Even if such 

photographs were obtained, they would tell us very little about penetration 

capabilities. If we were to deploy a heavy ABM against the Soviets, we 

would still need collectors like Sentinel Foam to acquire necessary reentry data. DORIAN would add very little to our knowledge in this case. 

In sum, VHR photography is unlikely to make a major additional contribution to U.S. DL capabilities. Even if it could provide these data, 

DORIAN should not be bought for DL purposes ivrilessthe-U.S: decides to invest heavily in DL forces. 

BYETortivi 
NRO APPROVED FOR 

RELEASE I JULY 2015 

HANDLE WA BYEM/J4 

CONTROL 61'7°14 

8 

VIM Imagery and War Planning 

As is pointed out, the VHR study, Volume I, page 45, knowledge of 

our ability to penetrate' directly a Soviet A3 might be used in our war • 

plans to limit damage to our cities in the event of war. Attached to 

these comments is a paper prepared for another purpose which bears on the 

value of knowledge about the performance of Soviet ABM in war planning. 

This paper suggests that at reasonable levels of Soviet ABMdeployment and 

for reasonable upper uncertainty limits on the performance, of,Soviet. ABM; 

relatively few lives can be saved by modifying our war plan if it isdis 

covered that a Soviet ABM is in fact totally ineffective. 

The paper also emphasizes that war plans are unlikely to be based on 

estimates of inferior Soviet ABM performance unless they are very high 

confidence estimates. This results from the fact that if a target is 

attacked assuming poor ABM performance, and this assumption is wrong, 

defended Soviet cities are likely to escape damage completely. If the 

ABM performance is over-estimated, some weapons are spent inefficiently, 

but the target will be destroyed. With this payoff structure, only high 

confidence estimates are likely to be used. The VHR study suggests that 

even with resolution of ■ our confidence in estimates of 

ATM parameters will not exceed a subjective estimate of about 90%. This 

suggests that we will never be sure enough that the ABM can be penetrated 

by other than exhaustion tactics to change our war plans (just as we will 

never intentionally fail to deploy enough payload to exhaust an ABM). The 

report fails to consider both the low payoffs of such a change and the low 

probability that we will ever have enough confidence to make the change 

in any case. The foregoing arguments are further bolstered by the observation that the most likely Soviet ABM deployment over the next several 

years will be even less than the smaller of those used in the attached 

study. In this event, the value of VHR imagery in war planning would 

surely be negligible. 

Value of VHR Photography to Tactical Forces Decisions 

-----The thrust of the study's arguments on tactical forces seems to be 

that the design of our general purpose forces weapon systems are very 

threat-sensitive and that early acquisition of very specific information 

on the strengths and vulnerabilities of Soviet and Chinese weapons would 

be a distinct advantage. We do not agree. 

- - First, our tanks and personnel carriers, etc., are being designed for 

relatively long lives. MBT-70, for example, is meant to be an effective 

first line tank for at least 5 to 10 years. The threat we are designing 

this tank for must be a conservative postulation of things the Soviets' 

technology will likely permit over the 1970-1980 period in all relevant 

- fields, e.g., anti-tank weapons as well am tanks. If VHR imagery were to 

reveal lesser threats, we would not reduce the design requirements on the 

Eiare,11., 

TOP SECRET 

. MN=VT BYEMAN 

OONTNOL SYSTEM oNLy 
NRO APPROVED FOR 

RELEASE 1 JULY 2015 

wrnmax inN BYEMAN 

OONTROC SYSTEM ONLY 

9 

MET-70. On the other hand, it is very unlikely that we would see advances 

exceeding our conservative postulation since: (1):many of the weapons 

simply would not be available to overhead photography of any resolution, 

and (3) because our postulations are very conservative, it is, by definition, unlikely that we would discover more serious threats. 

Second, the capabilities of Soviet general purpose fordes change 

slowly because it simply takes along time to modernize these- forces, 

since such modernization may require literally thousands of new weapons. 

A large change in the balance of our general purpose forces and the 

Soviets' is very unlikely to come about because of Soviet technical innovations. We will gain much information on such changes from COMINT, direct 

observation, and other sources in time to respond if a response is needed. 

What is far more likely is a sudden relocation of major forces to achieve 

local superiority or a crash program to produce a very large number of 

proven weapons. Neither of these is uniquely vulnerable to detection and 

analysis by VHR photography. 

In short, the study does not show that VHR photography is likely to 

make significant difference in either the technical characteristics of our 

general purpose forces or in the sizes of these forces. It does not evalu-. 

ate alternative ways of dealing with the things VHR might detect. It also 

does not follow the arguments through- that high priority efforts to get 

high resolution photography should result in similar efforts to, respond to 

such photography--possibly because we have not in the recent past engaged 

in any major high priority programs to change the general purpose force 

weapons in response to surprises discovered by means other than VHR imagery. 

Dad 9.fr rrirl '?" 

TOP SECRET lci!c,NTPoL sYsTiEm