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/
|
NEWSLETTER
|
|
Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list
|
|
|
