Subject: AFP-731/1990-019B/NORAD-20516 Where Are You? From: John Pike <johnpike@fas.org> Date: 1995/08/13 Message-Id: <40kr23$98h@clarknet.clark.net> Newsgroups: sci.astro,sci.space.policy,alt.politics.org.cia,alt.war This is a rather longish piece that eventually starts to get interesting toward the end. It concludes with a request that amateur astronomers assist in a search for a missing intelligence satellite. In article <40gubq$l7a@clark.net>, prb@clark.net (Pat) wrote: >... Pike ..... catch him with a real gaffe, like his >tendency to declare classified missile launches as KH sats. He over >uses Photo recon as a supposition. Philip Chien has posted some >nice long analyses of orbital dynamics, and mission roles. I think that Chien has made a major [if not the principle] contribution to our understanding of new classified missions in recent years and we are all grateful for his excellent work. Back around the beginning of the decade my default setting on classified launches was IMINT. Of course, the problem was that we were seeing a lot of new missions for the first time where we had just never seen that particular launch profile before, and IMINT was probably as good a guess as any. But after a while, two things happened: 1 - The number of birds that I had called as IMINT was really getting out of control [I think I was up to something like 10 [!!!] LEO IMINT birds at one point, which was starting to look preposterous even to me. 2 - Some patterns started to emerge, as we finally started to see some of these programs conduct a second launch which matched the pattern of the first launch, and it was increasingly clear that some of these patterns were pretty hard to fit into the IMINT mold. So I think that by now it is clear that we are looking at two new classes of spacecraft going to Molniya orbits that I had previously called as LEO IMINT: 1 - Jumpseat-2 2 - SDS-2/Heritage I am still a bit puzzled as to how [or whether] to differentiate such launches in advance, as well as to just what the objective constellation configuration is, and would appreciate discussion on this point. The really big source of confusion, however, was the 26 Feb 1990 LEO IMINT launch ["KH-12"] [[AFP-731 / 1990-019B / NORAD-20516 ]]. This is the one that the Soviets reported as having "exploded" a few weeks after launch, but that amateur observers recovered around 9-14 October 1990, and then subsequently went back and found other intervening observations that confirmed that the objects were one and the same. Well, the problem was that: 1 - this thing was *clearly* a LEO IMINT bird, 2 - the dang thing just flat out disappeared around November 1990 and hasn't been seen since -- not a hint, no way, zippo, etc etc etc. Now this was a bit hard to figure, but at a minimum it suggested that the bird had maneuvered to some sorta MEO orbit that would be hard for observers to spot. So this established some precedent in my mind for the proposition that IMINT birds could be launched into ~63 degree MEO orbits, where they would not be seen by optical observers. But over time, the inexorable accumulation of more and more ~63 degree launches rendered the default IMINT call increasingly implausible. And then over the past two years or so, it became increasingly clear that the SDS and Jumpseat missions were still alive and well, which cleared up some of the confusion, with Chien's work being an absolutely essential component of this process. But, we are still left with the question of what happened to 1990-019B. My current working hypothesis is that the thing was maneuvered into some sorta eliptical MEO orbit, with parameters of something like: 1 - 63 degree inclination - almost certainly 2 - 1000x5000 km -- these numbers are consistent with propulsion capacity 3 - an equatorial argument of perigee -- an interesting possibility In an offline discussion with one observer, we concluded that this would give wide area moderate resolution coverage of Iraq, in preparation for Desert Storm. It was also noted that a Russian publication of intell satellites on Day 1 of Desert Storm exactly match what is known about these US satellites, with the exception of one ground-track, which simply didn't match. It may be that running some proxy for the above-conjectured elset would resolve this. Another observer has pointed to many subsequent statements concerning the desirability of having such a capability. So now the question at hand is whether we can confirm this conjecture. The Boston Museum of Science Hayden Planetarium has recently reported excellent results using a computerized observatory consisting of a twin Meade 12" SCT/ 7" refractor setup meades) with an ArchImage mount, which can aim within 1 arcmin on a 180 degree slew. They have written software for the mount to enable them to track and photograph satellites with established orbital elements. They note that their maximum resolution is 0.5 arc seconds (or down to 0.4 arc seconds with image processing), with satellites being observed at powers up to 500x [with improved software]. During the STS-71 Atlantis / Mir mission they tracked the vehicles docking at powers of 100x, and were able to see the six solar panels on Mir, and they reported that the wings, tail and nose of the shuttle were easily identified, as their setup has a resolution of about a meter at a range of 400 km. Other observers in France report similar results. I would like to propose the following: 1 - A telescopic observing campaign to obtain optical signatures of identified LEO IMINT birds [those with known elsets] 2 - An observing campaign to attempt to recover 1990-019B, based on the conjecture that it is in a MEO orbit, perhaps one defined by the previously noted Russian ground-track chart. 3 - A telescopic observing campaign to evaluate whether candidate objects identified in campaign #2 have optical signatures similar to those identified in campaign #1. Here at FAS we have been doing some notional design studies of the LEO IMINT birds, and would be in a position to assit with image interpretation. It would seem to me that the first decent photos of these birds would be a rather newsworthy event, particularly if published in conjunction with some high-quality art-work making sense of what will probably be semi-blurry images. So what do you think? Personally, I am not in a position to provide direct technical support for these campaigns, but my impression is that this ain't rocket science. If the lure of fame and glory proves inadequate, I think that maybe I am thinking about offering some modest though non-trivial cash prize for the first/best entries in each of the campaigns, and would be interested in any thoughts folks might have as to whether/how to organize this... -- Director, Space Policy & Cyberstrategy Projects http://www.fas.org/pub/gen/fas/
