Subject: Re: K-2 = AFP-731 [aka Impending Launch of Stealth Spy Satellite??] From: John Pike <johnpike@fas.org> Date: 1996/06/30 Message-Id: <31D680E7.74F3@fas.org> Newsgroups: alt.politics.org.cia,sci.space.policy,sci.astro.amateur,rec.aviation.military On 6/29/96 a correspondent wrote: >Seems like if you are going stealth, it will have to be stealth from >all directions. AFAIK the trick in aeronautical stealth [aka LO = low observability] has always been to optimize LO features in a fashion that is responsive to anticipated threat sensors. Space stealth would probably be no different. As I have previously noted, Aero LO is mainly concerned with threats that are essentially horizontal to the vehicle, and secondarily with those that are below it. This is why one finds chines on some of these vehicles, and why vehicles such as TACIT BLUE < http://www.fas.org/irp/mystery/tacitblu.htm > have higher RCS features such as air inlets on their dorsal side. At 1000x5000 km or thereabouts AFP-731 would be flying above all Russian IMINT birds, so space-to-space imaging would produce the same bewilderment as ground-to-space imaging. I am assuming, however, that the nature of the stealth concept here is to imperceptably blend the AFP-731 into a debris swarm, so that neither ground nor space based optical sensors ever even bother to look at the thing [this would probably be essential, since if someone did obtain a decent image of it I think that the game would be up, since its appearance would be even more distinctive than that of a regular KH -- it would clearly *not* be the piece of debris it was pretending to be]. This is a fundamental difference between aero and space LO -- aero LO is operating in a sensor rich low-clutter environment, whereas space LO is facing a sensor poor high clutter environment. So aero LO pretty much has to just fall off the radar screen, whereas space LO just has to blend into the background clutter of debris [could this perhaps have something to do with the current great interest in space debris???? and interesting thought]. One of the problems with trying to make a spacecraft stealty is that it would seem that things that one might wish to do to reduce the radar signature, and certainly things that one would wish to do to reduce the optical signature [paint it optical grey] would enhance the infrared signature, defeating the whole exercise. The solution to this problem is obtained when it is realized that radar and optical [and IR] sensors are all *below* the spacecraft, and that [at present and for the foreseeable future] there just aren't any [non-US] sensors that would be looking down on the ventral side of such a [relatively] high-orbiting spacecraft. Thus to the extent that radar/IR/optical LO features increased the overall IR signature of the spacecraft, this additional waste heat could just be redirected away from Earth [and its prying eyes] towards deep space. -- John Pike Federation of American Scientists http://www.fas.org/ Public Eye http://www.fas.org/eye/ Intelligence Reform Project http://www.fas.org/irp/ Space Policy Project http://www.fas.org/spp/ Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just. - Jefferson
|
NEWSLETTER
|
| Join the GlobalSecurity.org mailing list |
|
|
|
