Eye in the Sky: The Story of the CORONA Spy Satellites
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The Air Force and DNRO McMillan’s drive to completely control the reconnaissance program actually jeopardized the Secretary of Defense’s capacity to utilize reconnaissance data. In order to make independent judgments on weapons procurement and strategic planning, Secretary McNamara decided he needed an independent analytical capability in the Office of the Secretary of Defense. If the Air Force controlled the reconnaissance program completely, it would have an enormous advantage in pressing its own claims. McNamara, aware of the threat, often sided with McCone against the Air Force in order to maintain his own position as arbiter of DoD planning and resource allocations.
This led to a third NRP agreement, signed by McCone and Gilpatric in March 1963. This time the duties and responsibilities of a deputy director of the NRO were carefully spelled out, with the expectation that a CIA officer would fill the slot. Wheelon appointed Eugene Kiefer to the position. The agreement also stated that the Secretary of Defense was to be the executive agent for the NRP and that the NRO was under the direction, authority, and control of the Secretary of Defense. The NRO was to be developed, managed, and conducted jointly by the Secretary of Defense and the DCI and it was to be a highly secret, separate operating agency of the Department of Defense, no longer under the control of the Office of the Secretary of the Air Force.
Despite the new agreement, the Air Force continued to press for complete control of the overhead reconnaissance programs. McMillan was caught in the middle. He wanted a strong NRO and often clashed with both the Air Force and the CIA. McMillan’s determination to make the NRO the leading organization in satellite development and the antagonism that had grown between the CIA and the Air Force hampered the NRO decisionmaking process during 1964. Conflicts arose over contracting, funding, and the CIA’s role and responsibilities in the reconnaissance area. Added to the problem was a major personality conflict between Wheelon and McMillan.17
Dr. Albert “Bud” Wheelon, Deputy Director of Science and Technology at the Central Intelligence Agency from 1963 to 1966. Wheelon fought for continued CIA involvement in satellite reconnaissance in the mid-1960s and built the Directorate of Science and Technology into a powerful engineering development center. (Photo courtesy of Albert D. Wheelon)
The situation deteriorated so much that DCI McCone and new Deputy Defense Secretary Cyrus Vance finally agreed to meet as an NRP executive committee in order to make funding decisions for the NRP. McCone suggested to McNamara at the same time that the only way to solve the problem was to remove the NRO completely from the parochialism of the Office of the Secretary of the Air Force and place it firmly in the Office of the Secretary of Defense. McCone constantly complained to Dr. Eugene Fubini, director of DOD’s Defense Research and Engineering, that he “never knew the first damn thing that was going on with regard to the NRO budget.” McCone feared that the entire overhead reconnaissance program was becoming little more than an instrument of the Air Force and that national intelligence requirements were sinking to second, third, or fourth priority. McMillan also complained to Fubini that the CIA was attempting to undermine the NRO by refusing to disclose program data.
MORE PEACE TREATIES
Before any actions were taken, in April 1965 the formidable McCone resigned as DCI and President Lyndon Johnson replaced him with Vice Admiral William E Raborn Jr. The CIA’s battle with the Air Force and McMillan was the first major issue confronting the new DCI. Raborn appointed John Bross, the director for the National Intelligence Programs Evaluation, to negotiate a settlement along the lines suggested by McCone.18 Brass’s efforts resulted in Raborn and Vance signing a fourth NRP agreement in August 1965, which recognized the need for a single national satellite reconnaissance program to meet the intelligence needs of the United States. It gave the DCI and the Secretary of Defense decisionmaking authority over all national reconnaissance programs. It established the NRO as a separate agency within the DoD and officially designated the Secretary of Defense as the executive agent for the NRP. It also set up a three-person executive committee (EXCOM) for the management of the NRP. The EXCOM membership included the DCI, the Deputy Secretary of Defense, and the president’s science advisor. The EXCOM reported to the Secretary of Defense. The new arrangement also recognized the DCI’s right as head of the Intelligence Community to establish collection requirements in consultation with the USIB.19
The agreement represented a compromise between the Air Force and the CIA. It led to the CIA and the Air Force cooperating successfully on several satellite collection projects. As a decisionmaking structure, it worked well. The compromise agreement, however, left the inherent competition between the two organizations over satellite collection systems intact, a situation not entirely detrimental to the development of the U.S. satellite program. Urged on by their rivalry and a sense of national mission, both the CIA and the Air Force pushed the cutting edge of technology in satellite development and data return from space.
INNOVATIONS AND SUCCESSES
The Soviet threat and the Cold War dominated U.S. foreign policy for nearly half a century. For much of that time, the NRO and its revolutionary overhead reconnaissance systems, whose very existence remained classified, were the single most important source of information on Soviet military programs and capabilities. The NRO produced, according to some estimates, nearly 90 percent of all intelligence data on the Soviet Union during this period. NRO satellite systems established, with considerable accuracy, the actual military capability and preparedness of the Soviet Union.20
The KH-4B was the most advanced version of the CORONA satellite. Representing the limits of the CORONA design, it operated from 1969 to 1972.
Costs were rarely questioned. The NRO mission held the highest national priority. The NRO was to gather intelligence on “denied areas,” especially the Soviet Union, which represented the greatest threat to U.S. national security. This mission engaged not only the top political leaders, including the president, but also the nation’s major intelligence and military officials, as well as its senior scientists and defense industrial talent. The NRO and its satellite reconnaissance systems radically changed the entire concept of intelligence gathering. It allowed the United States to collect an ever-increasing volume of detailed intelligence vital to U.S. national security interests.21 There is little doubt that the NRO played a major role in the U.S. victory in the Cold War.
CONCLUSION
Despite its problems, the NRO worked. Its mission was of preeminent importance to the United States. Nevertheless, for some years after its origin in 1961 the NRO experienced constant turmoil and crisis. Organizationally, its most important feature during the Cold War years was that it consisted of three different program offices that were managed by three different agencies: the CIA, the Air Force, and the Navy (Program D was eliminated in the late 1960s). This produced natural and, at times, heated competition. CIA/Air Force elements of the infant NRO fought constantly for control over overhead reconnaissance systems.
The result of a “forced marriage,” the NRO, nevertheless, operated in a national interest that transcended the parochial views of the CIA, Air Force, and Defense Department. It operated continuously in a crisis atmosphere. Despite its enormous successes, however, it was never able to resolve the fundamental intelligence differences represented by the CIA and the Air Force regarding a strategic or tactical intelligence focus. Efforts by the Department of Defense and the U.S. military command structure to gain greater control over space reconnaissance development and operations continued.
Nevertheless, with its critical national security requirements, the NRO developed unique, flexible, and streamlined acquisition and management procedures to build, operate, and maintain a U.S. space reconnaissance capability. Streamlined procurement practices used by the NRO cut approximately one year out of the time it would otherwise have required to bring a satellite system on-line. The NRO brought the best engineering and designing talent in government and private industry together in a unique partnership. The U.S
. aerospace industry actually performed much of the research and development, design engineering, systems integration, manufacturing, testing, launch integration, and much of the actual operation of the NRO’s satellite systems under a flexible government-industry partnership.
In the early years of CORONA, the NRO and its private industry partners created the technology needed to produce imagery and intercept signals from space. The NRO pushed photoreconnaissance technology from fuzzy, barely identifiable images with low resolution to clear, detailed photographs with high resolution. In addition, the NRO went from reconnaissance satellites that it hoped would last a few revolutions around the earth to satellites that remain in orbit for years. It set the stage in communications technology for the information superhighway revolution. Operating during the crisis atmosphere of the Cold War, the NRO and its reconnaissance satellites were truly a remarkable intelligence achievement. They allowed U.S. policymakers and military planners to keep a close, accurate watch on the Soviet Union throughout much of the Cold War.
PETER A. GORIN
7
ZENIT
The Soviet Response to CORONA
The space program in the Soviet Union developed much along the same lines as in the United States. Both countries knew from the start that an orbital perspective would offer unparalleled opportunities for gathering information about activities on the earth’s surface. As in the United States, strategic reconnaissance was an early objective of Soviet space efforts.
A LONG ROAD TO SPACE
The first Soviet study of artificial satellites was initiated by a group of engineers under Colonel Mikhail Tikhonravov at the military rocket research institute, NII-4, from 1948 through 1950.1 Not officially sponsored, the study nearly cost Tikhonravov his career when he gave his proposals to the Soviet high command. In 1950, he was demoted from deputy director of NII-4 to scientific consultant.2 At that time, most political and military officials considered satellites a no-value deviation from the primary task of the Soviet rocket industry, which was the development of ballistic missiles.
Dr. Tikhonravov had long been dedicated to the idea of rocket flight into space; in 1933, he had designed and launched the first Soviet liquid-propellant rocket. After his demotion in 1950, he continued his satellite research with a small group of enthusiasts and lobbied the government with proposals for rocket flight. A number of high-ranking officials from the defense industry supported their efforts, especially Mstislav Keldysh (director of NII-1, research institute of Ministry of Aviation Industry) and Sergei Korolev (Chief Designer of the Experimental Design Bureau [OKB-1] of the Ministry of Defense Industry).
Korolev and Tihkonravov had known each other since the early 1930s and both had worked on rocket research before World War II.
Keldysh and Korolev received sufficient support from the Soviet Academy of Science for their idea of an artificial satellite. On May 27, 1954, Korolev wrote to Minister of Defense Industry Dmitriy Ustinov proposing that a satellite be launched by a future ICBM. The letter was supplemented with a detailed proposal for various types of satellites, which was prepared by Tikhonravov with Korolev’s and Keldysh’s input.3 Just a week earlier, the government had officially adopted a program for the first Soviet ICBM, R-7 (U.S. code name: SS-6), to be directed by Korolev. As a result of this proposal, the government in August 1954 officially began to sponsor preliminary satellite research.4
Korolev and some in the Soviet leadership apparently realized the propagandistic importance of being the first in space during the International Geophysical Year (IGY). (The USSR openly proclaimed that intention in 1956, but the Western world apparently did not pay attention.)5 The launch of the satellite was intended to demonstrate the capability of the ICBM even before it became operational, an idea consistent with the Soviet strategy of “psychological deterrence” of the anticipated American nuclear attack. The idea of using a satellite for reconnaissance was probably proposed during the period of preliminary satellite research in 1954. The feasibility of artificial satellites indicated that their military applications would become feasible as well.
The artificial satellite development program was adopted by a secret government decree on January 30, 1956, authorizing the development of a scientific, uncontrolled satellite, designated Object D. That project resulted in the launch of Sputnik-3 on May 15, 1958. The first two Sputniks, designated PS and PS-2, were simplified spinoff projects of Object D, designed solely to beat the Americans to space. Tikhonravov, one of the pioneers of rocket flight, was initially a consultant for the satellite program, but in early 1957 he was put in charge of all space projects of OKB-1 as the head of the newly established Department-9.6 Consequently he became the “father” of the world’s first artificial satellite.
Work on the photoreconnaissance satellite was apparently authorized by the same decree. Judging by Sergei Korolev’s letter to the government of April 12, 1957, substantial preliminary research had already been done on another project, Object OD-1, a three-axis stabilized satellite for photo-imaging from space—an obvious photoreconnaissance prototype.7 OD-1 was similar to its American counterpart, CORONA. It had a large, roughly cylindrical body containing a camera with a 1,000mm focal length and all the support systems in it. The conical-shaped return capsule was to carry the exposed film and the minimal number of systems essential for reentry and recovery.8 The OD-1 orbital mass was limited to 1,500 kg. Heavier variants (for another launch vehicle) were considered as well.
The TSSKB/Progress Factory, Samara, Soviet Union. This CORONA image depicts the site where the Soviets manufactured their Zenit reconnaissance satellites. (Photo courtesy of C. P. Vick)
Conditions for the project’s implementation were not ideal. The reconnaissance satellite’s development paralleled several other top-priority programs at OKB-1. Department-9 was involved in preparing the first Sputniks and early lunar probes, which were in high demand for propaganda. It was determined in 1957 that, because the reconnaissance satellite weighed 400 kg more than the rocket could lift, the launch vehicle would need to be modified for use with OD-1.9 A modified launch vehicle was developed, but was never used for OD-1 because of radical changes in the satellite’s design. The only space mission for this modified booster was to launch Sputnik-3. As a result of the higher priority of other projects and the sheer complexity of the photo-imaging satellite, between 1956 and 1960 OD-1 progressed only as a paper study.10
In late 1958, Korolev initiated a complete redesign of the satellite, making it compatible with another ambitious project of his design bureau—Object OD-2. The OD-2 project, which started in early 1958, was a study of a heavy three-axis stabilized satellite for human spaceflight. The rationale behind this decision was simple: the OD-1 and the OD-2 projects had one common feature—they were supposed to ensure the safe reentry and return of the capsuies. Why develop two different systems for the same purpose? The exposed film could be returned by the same type of reentry vehicle that would carry a cosmonaut.
ZENIT-2
Soviet government decrees on May 22 and 25, 1959, authorized the parallel development of a manned spacecraft (3K), its simplified prototype (1K), and the photoreconnaissance satellite (2K); all were based on the same design, the OD-2 project.11 All these spacecraft received the additional designation Vostok (Russian for “East”), and were respectively called Vostok-3, Vostok-1, and Vostok-2. The name Zenit-2 (Zenith) was apparently first applied to the Vostok-2 (2K) reconnaissance satellite in 1961, when the name Vostok became publicly known as the world’s first manned spacecraft. Zenits received the designation number 2, and later the number 4, because their original projects were called 2K and 4K. Hence there was no Zenit-1 or Zenit-3.
OKB-1, now known as Rocket-Space Corporation Energiya (RKK Energiya), was the primary contractor for the photoreconnaissance satellite and its launch vehicle, while the Ministry of Defense was OKB-1’s primary customer. The technical requirements for the spacecraft and its mission profile were prepared by the NII-4 milit
ary research institute under Lieutenant General Andrey Sokolov. Major mathematical support, especially in ballistics, was provided by the Department of Applied Mathematics (headed, along with NII-1, by Dr. Mstislav Keldysh) from the Steklov Mathematics Institute of the USSR Academy of Science. Other institutions of the Academy of Science did additional theoretical research as well. The Institute of Applied Geophysics conducted a study on locating and recovering returned capsules. Vavilov State Optical Institute studied suitable optical systems.12 In all, more than 120 various scientific institutes and production plants from the Soviet military and civilian industry participated in the photoreconnaissance satellite program.13
Zenit and the manned Vostok shared reentry and service modules as well as a launch vehicle, but the two spacecraft were not identical. Only nine out of Zenit’s nineteen primary systems were borrowed from Vostok.14 The rest had to be developed from scratch. In 1961, a group of satellite designers was separated from Department-9 and reorganized into the specialized Department-29 under Evgeniy Ryazanov. Zenit-2 was developed at that department under Yuri Frumkin (the section chief) and Boris Rublev (the leading designer). Pavel Tsybin, Korolev’s deputy, supervised the project.15 No novice in strategic reconnaissance, Tsybin had directed an ambitious but unsuccessful supersonic strategic reconnaissance aircraft project (RSR) in the late 1950s, prior to his transfer to OKB-1.
Zenit was the most complex Soviet space project of the time, exceeding even the manned Vostok. Many particularly difficult technical problems had to be resolved. Zenit required a sophisticated three-axis stabilization system, which was required for pinpointing the cameras. Unlike the manned Vostok, Zenit-2 required constant orientation at all times. New gyroscopic stabilizing platforms and infrared sensors had to be developed for the spacecraft. The orientation control system included an array of cold gas thrusters with a large load of compressed nitrogen, which was stored in a collar of spherical tanks between the return and service modules. A group of engineers under Boris Rauschenbach and Evgeniy Tokar from the NII-1 scientific research institute pioneered the development of space orientation systems in the Soviet Union.16 The first of these systems was used aboard the Luna-3 spacecraft, which took pictures of the moon’s dark side in October 1959. In 1960, Rauschenbach’s group was transferred to OKB-1 and developed a more complex orientation system for Zenit.