down with murder inc

Space wars?

operation paperclip

Project Paperclip: Dark side of the Moon
Sixty years ago the US hired Nazi scientists to lead pioneering projects, such as the race to conquer space. These men provided the US with cutting-edge technology which still leads the way today, but at a cost.
The end of World War II saw an intense scramble for Nazi Germany's many technological secrets. The Allies vied to plunder as much equipment and expertise as possible from the rubble of the Thousand Year Reich for themselves, while preventing others from doing the same.
The range of Germany's technical achievement astounded Allied scientific intelligence experts accompanying the invading forces in 1945.

Supersonic rockets, nerve gas, jet aircraft, guided missiles, stealth technology and hardened armour were just some of the groundbreaking technologies developed in Nazi laboratories, workshops and factories, even as Germany was losing the war.
And it was the US and the Soviet Union which, in the first days of the Cold War, found themselves in a race against time to uncover Hitler's scientific secrets.
In May 1945, Stalin's legions secured the atomic research labs at the prestigious Kaiser Wilhelm Institute in the suburbs of Berlin, giving their master the kernel of what would become the vast Soviet nuclear arsenal.
US forces removed V-2 missiles from the vast Nordhausen complex, built under the Harz Mountains in central Germany, just before the Soviets took over the factory, in what would become their area of occupation. And the team which had built the V-2, led by Wernher von Braun, also fell into American hands.
Crimes
Shortly afterwards Major-General Hugh Knerr, deputy commander of the US Air Force in Europe, wrote: "Occupation of German scientific and industrial establishments has revealed the fact that we have been alarmingly backward in many fields of research.
"If we do not take the opportunity to seize the apparatus and the brains that developed it and put the combination back to work promptly, we will remain several years behind while we attempt to cover a field already exploited."
Thus began Project Paperclip, the US operation which saw von Braun and more than 700 others spirited out of Germany from under the noses of the US's allies. Its aim was simple: "To exploit German scientists for American research and to deny these intellectual resources to the Soviet Union."

Arthur Rudolph: "100% Nazi"

Events moved rapidly. President Truman authorised Paperclip in August 1945 and, on 18 November, the first Germans reached America.
There was, though, one major problem. Truman had expressly ordered that anyone found "to have been a member of the Nazi party and more than a nominal participant in its activities, or an active supporter of Nazism militarism" would be excluded.
Under this criterion even von Braun himself, the man who masterminded the Moon shots, would have been ineligible to serve the US. A member of numerous Nazi organisations, he also held rank in the SS. His initial intelligence file described him as "a security risk".

And von Braun's associates included:
Arthur Rudolph, chief operations director at Nordhausen, where 20,000 slave labourers died producing V-2 missiles. Led the team which built the Saturn V rocket. Described as "100 per cent Nazi, dangerous type". Kurt Debus, rocket launch specialist, another SS officer. His report stated: "He should be interned as a menace to the security of the Allied Forces."
Hubertus Strughold, later called "the father of space medicine", designed Nasa's on-board life-support systems. Some of his subordinates conducted human "experiments" at Dachau and Auschwitz, where inmates were frozen and put into low-pressure chambers, often dying in the process.
All of these men were cleared to work for the US, their alleged crimes covered up and their backgrounds bleached by a military which saw winning the Cold War, and not upholding justice, as its first priority.
And the paperclip which secured their new details in their personnel files gave the whole operation its name. Sixty years on, the legacy of Paperclip remains as vital as ever.
With its radar-absorbing carbon impregnated plywood skin and swept-back single wing, the 1944 Horten Ho 229 was arguably the first stealth aircraft.

The Stealth bomber: Based on a 1944 German design

The US military made one available to Northrop Aviation, the company which would produce the $2bn B-2 Stealth bomber - to all intents and purposes a modern clone of the Horten - a generation later.
Cruise missiles are still based on the design of the V-1 missile and the scramjets powering Nasa's state-of-the-art X-43 hypersonic aircraft owe much to German jet pioneers.
Added to this, the large number of still-secret Paperclip documents has led many people, including Nick Cook, Aerospace Consultant at Jane's Defence Weekly, to speculate that the US may have developed even more advanced Nazi technology, including anti-gravity devices, a potential source of vast amounts of free energy.
Cook says that such technology "could be so destructive that it would endanger world peace and the US decided to keep it secret for a long time".
But, while celebrating the undoubted success of Project Paperclip, many will prefer to remember the thousands who died to send mankind into space. - BBC

Von Braun (third from left) in Nevada after the war. Note the swastika on the sign. He and his friends made no attempt to hide their allegiances while working on "our" space program.
Also note the shape of the sign - is this a flying saucer?
"[Werner] Von Braun was far more than just a "German rocket scientist" or a mere "Nazi". Documents obtained by TEM researchers show he was nothing less than a Major in Hitler's "SS", the fearsome and fanatically loyal arm of the Nazi war machine entrusted to carry out the most inhuman acts of the regime"
Orwell and the Internet
but what of Robert H Goddard?
[the censored reality]
German Scientist Werner von Braun Anticipated Terrorists, Asteroids and ETs on American "Enemy's List"

Werner Von Braun (second from right) and pals tour the Nazi rocket facility at Peenemünde. Between 7,000 and 20,000 slave laborers were worked to death at various German rocket facilities during the war.

Former Nazi removed from Space Hall of Fame
Museum visitor complained after spotting name during tour
ALAMOGORDO, N.M. - MSNBC - A former Nazi scientist has been booted from the International Space Hall of Fame.
The New Mexico Museum of Space History's commission unanimously voted last week to remove Hubertus Strughold.
He had been inducted in 1978 for work in developing the spacesuit and space capsule, and contributions to space medicine.
But Strughold was also linked to experiments on prisoners in the Dachau concentration camp in his native Germany.
A museum visitor noticed Strughold's name in the hall last fall and told the New Mexico Anti-Defamation League - which then uncovered records on his past.

from one death cult to another - Aum Shinrikyo
Hideo Murai, the late Aum Shinrikyo science and technology minister, was one of the most intelligent Japanese who ever lived, with an IQ higher than Einstein's. He studied astrophysics, concentrating on X-ray detection. His field, it turns out, was the key to developing new types of weapons more powerful than nuclear bombs, which are still being developed and tested by Japan's military-industrial complex after his death. Murai's most outrageous claim was that Kobe was destroyed with laser-powered seismic weapons -- a claim many in the media scoffed. But a closer look at Murai's own research in Kobe shows that the possibility should not be discounted.
Info about Electromagnetic Weapon

The Russians have spacecraft called "COSMOSPHERES", which were originally built and used for "Starwars" defense. They are spherical in shape, INvisible to radar beyond about 50 miles away, atomic-powered [possibly Migma fUsion], electro-gravitic (can hover against gravity), and equipped with "Psycho-energetic Range Finding" (PRF) which tunes-in to the actual atomic signature of an object or target.
The 3rd-generation JUMBO Cosmospheres occupy more volume than the Hindenburg blimp, and are ELECTRO-MAGNETICALLY PROPELLED (can accelerate continuously and rapidly, and make it to Saturn in three WEEKS!). [Many of them are armed with charged-particle beam weapons, neutron beam weapons, and/or microwave brain-scrambling equipment!] - source
INFORMATION REGARDING UFOs (ALIENS)

SMALL ORBS FILMED AROUND CHEMTRAILS IDENTIFIED?
In other developments, video of small white orbs filmed near Italian chemtrails have been identified as advanced robot drones originally developed by the Italian military's 'Project Cipher'. The program, says Vincent, was sold to the US military after funding ran out in the Seventies. - Rense

In the Eye of the Galaxy
Few people around the world suspect the existence of electromagnetic weapons, and most would probably disbelieve the power, accuracy and variety of these weapons. Even the scientists and engineers at the center of the world's most powerful electronics-producing nation -- Japan -- were stunned to discover that long-range EM weapons with global reached were being secretly deployed by the superpowers. It happened by sheer accident, in February 1987.

GINGA satellite
The Japanese satellite called Ginga, or Galaxy, was launched that month in a high orbit, searching the skies for X-ray emissions from distant stars. But it also had another, secret mission -- to detect gamma radiation from Chinese underground nuclear weapons explosions at the Lop Nor test site and Soviet nuclear tests in Semipalatinsk, Kazakhstan. Such military intelligence was crucial because trans-continental air currents would carry fallout from leakage from Central Asian tests sites directly over the Japanese archipelago -- an environmental and public health nightmare.
When Ginga crossed the Equator in early June, it picked up massive staccato bursts of gamma rays, at twice the frequency of stellar sources. Astronomers linked to ground control at the Institute of Space and Astronautical Science wondered if they had found some sort of mutant quasar, but the data did not come close to any known source. Then, they realized the gamma ray discharges had come from below Ginga -- but below it there was just a vast body of water, far from any nuclear plant, cyclotron or test site. They contacted NASA, which ran a computer check on satellite orbits.

NASA replied that the probable source was a Russian spacecraft, Japanese scientists came to the chilling realization that another satellite in lower orbit was irradiating the ionosphere. Each time Ginga overflew the path of Cosmos 1900-- a craft that the Soviets claimed was an oceanic observation satellite -- the readings were the same: massive bursts of radioactivity. Accidental leakage? Not likely because Cosmos had not been launched until 10 months after Ginga, in December 1987. Therefore, Ginga had detected radiation-seeding by a predecessor satellite that burned on reentry, which was soon replaced by Cosmos. The Soviets were using a series of satellites to deliberately irradiate the Van Allen belts of the upper atmosphere. But why?

Cosmos 1900 satellite

Ring over the Equator
What satellite Ginga stumbled upon was an electromagnetic "mirror," a ionized reflector for transmission of low-frequency beams, which was a part of the Russian EMW arsenal. The electromagnetic technology has been used to alter the climate in the Northern Hemisphere to lessen the economic cost of Russia's severe winters. It is also used for advanced global communications, for anti-missile defenses and to induce earthquakes. In other words, it is extremely sophisticated and dangerous technology, wide open for abuse in the wrong hands. A similar system was patented by Bernard Eastlund, former chief of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission, which forms the core of the U.S. Navy's HAARP program in Alaska. (V2, the companion article provides an overview on this technology.)
If this artificially ionized belt acts like a mirror, then electromagnetic waves sent from ground stations in the Southern Hemisphere would be reflected back to a roughly equal longitude and a roughly equidistant latitude in the Northern Hemisphere, and vice versa. For example, to change the weather patterns on the steppes of Kazaldistan (Nikita Khruschev's hare-brained scheme was to grow wheat there; after initial failures, it is now one of the world's top breadbaskets, thanks to milder weather), one would have to place a EM transmitter in the vicinity of French-controlled Kerguelen Island, south of the Indian Ocean.
The ability to focus the EM waves, however, is the most technically difficult problem, which can be solved by using two intersecting beams of scalar energy to create an interference pattern, that is, a third standing wave. This standing wave could be applied in different formats to create various electromagnetic effects or to ionize the atmospheric gases to create deadly plasma. This would account for a diversity of shapes and light effects, that is, UFOs, seen by many thousands of observers around the world that cannot be attributed to passing planes and other physical objects. STARWARS & THE FINAL WAR

Haarp Subject: Secret Government Research, The battle for Aum Shinrikyo

Earthquake Inducing Electromagnetic Weapons Used at Kobe?

TESLA DOOM WEAPONS & AUM SHINRIKYO Ginga satellite Fire From The Sky

Cosmos 1900 had nuclear reactor onboard? cover story?

Cosmos 1900 Nation: USSR. Program: RORSAT. Mass: 3,800 kg. Class: Surveillance. Type: Naval Radarsat. Spacecraft: US-A. Agency: MO SSSR. Perigee: 696 km. Apogee: 735 km. Inclination: 66.1 deg. Period: 99.1 min. COSPAR: 1987-101A. USAF Sat Cat: 18665. source
The Lincoln Laboratory's Haystack radar system near Boston supported a NASA research in charaterizing the size of space debris. They detected that the Cosmos 1900 spacecraft, is leaking coolant (sodium potassium) from its nuclear power source. Cosmos 1900, a Radar Ocean Reconnaissance Satellite using a nuclear reactor to power its surveillance equipment, was launched in december 1987, but suffered a boost problem that left it in a lower than planned orbit. One year later the satellite was turned off and transferred to a higher orbit. source

In April 1988 the Soviet radar reconnaissance satellite Cosmos 1900 failed to separate and boost the reactor core into a storage orbit. This failure of the basic system raised the possibility that the reactor could re-enter the Earth's atmosphere some time in late summer or early fall. The Soviet Union announced that the satellite was equipped with both a basic system for radiological protection and a redundant system. The redundant system apparently succeeded in separating the nuclear core of Cosmos-1900 on Sept. 30 at which time the reactor core was boosted into a "stable" storage orbit at about 720 km altitude. The intended storage orbit, however, was to have been at more than 800 km altitude. - source

EPA's Response to the Reentry of Cosmos Satellites Information Notice No. 88-71: POSSIBLE ENVIRONMENTAL EFFECT OF THE REENTRY OF COSMOS 1900 AND REQUEST FOR COLLECTION OF LICENSEE RADIOACTIVITY MEASUREMENTS ATTRIBUTED TO THAT EVENT Space Nulear Accidents lecture PDF The wrong stuff: Nukes in space

Satellite defense shield patent acknowledges EM / kinetic weapons
Several systems are known which are used to cripple or destroy orbiting satellites or other space vehicles. These systems may be ground based or space based. Typical systems used for destroying satellites include kinetic energy weapons delivered by anti-satellites; directed energy weapons such as high energy lasers, neutral particle beams, high-powered microwave radiation, and other nuclear radiations; and broad-area electromagnetic pulses. Before the satellite can be destroyed, however, it must be detected in space, and the weapon must be aimed such that the destructive force will intercept the path of the satellite. This invention relates to a device which makes it difficult or impossible to locate and track the satellite. When the word "satellite" is used in this specification, other space based mechanisms and vehicles are considered to be within the realm of the invention.
To destroy a satellite, the weapon operator must aim his weapon either to lead the satellite such that the energy beam (or the like) and target arrive at the same location at the same time, or the weapon must be able to track the satellite's location. Should the aim of the gunner be off, in the case of an unguided projectile, the gunner will miss the target. In the case of a guided projectile, the target position, velocity and acceleration information must be accurate enough to enable the projectile to come near enough to its target to be effective. If the input data is inaccurate or too late, the operator will not be able to make the appropriate corrective actions, and the weapon will miss. Cryptome

Is Electro-Magnetic Warfare a satellite based project?
Manipulating the planet from the outside in?

HAARP, China, Russia And The Moon
HAARP / Environmental control / TESLA / Chemtrails
Big Brothers worldwide digital 3D remote sensing

"Space itself will become a theater of war, as nations gain access to space capabilities and come to rely on them; further, the distinction between military and commercial space Systems combatants and noncombatants will become blurred."
'Rebuilding Americas Defences' -
The Project for the New American Century
[file under 'NUTBALLS']

The distinction between military and commercial???

what happened to space shuttle Columbia?

"This is amazing. It's really getting fairly bright out there." McCool.
"Yeah, you definitely don't want to be outside now." Husband.
[my emphasis] source

Did somebody want to be outside earlier? to check something...

maybe it's all just a strange co-incidence

odd images of an bright blue electrical bolt hitting the shuttle were taken nearby by an amatuer on video...

S.F. man's astounding photo mysterious purple streak is shown hitting Columbia 7 minutes before it disintegrated

Wednesday, February 5, 2003
Top investigators of the Columbia space shuttle disaster are analyzing a startling photograph -- snapped by an amateur astronomer from a San Francisco hillside -- that appears to show a purplish electrical bolt striking the craft as it streaked across the California sky.
The digital image is one of five snapped by the shuttle buff at roughly 5: 53 a.m. Saturday as sensors on the doomed orbiter began showing the first indications of trouble. Seven minutes later, the craft broke up in flames over Texas.
The photographer requested that his name not be used and said he would not release the image to the public until NASA experts had time to examine it.
Although there are several possible benign explanations for the image -- such as a barely perceptable jiggle of the camera as it took the time exposure -- NASA's zeal to examine the photo demonstrates the lengths at which the agency is going to tap the resources of ordinary Americans in solving the puzzle.
Late Tuesday, NASA dispatched former shuttle astronaut Tammy Jernigan, now a manager at Lawrence Livermore Laboratories, to the San Francisco home of the astronomer to examine his digital images and to take the camera itself to Mountain View, where it was to be transported by a NASA T-38 jet to Houston this morning.
A Chronicle reporter was present when the astronaut arrived. First seeing the image on a large computer screen, she had one word: "Wow."
Jernigan, who is no longer working for NASA, quizzed the photographer on the aperture of the camera, the direction he faced and the estimated exposure time -- about four to six seconds on the automatic Nikon 880 camera. It was mounted on a tripod, and the shutter was triggered manually.
In the critical shot, a glowing purple rope of light corkscrews down toward the plasma trail, appears to pass behind it, then cuts sharply toward it from below. As it merges with the plasma trail, the streak itself brightens for a distance, then fades.
"It certainly appears very anomalous," said Jernigan. "We sure will be very interested in taking a very hard look at this."
Jernigan flew five shuttle missions herself during the 1990s, including three on Columbia. On her last flight, the pilot of the craft was Rick Husband, who was at the controls when Columbia perished.
"He was one of the finest people I could ever hope to know," said Jernigan.
It was an astounding day for the San Francisco photographer, who said he had not had any success in reaching NASA through its published telephone hot lines.
He ultimately reached investigators through a connection with a relative who attends the same church as former astronaut Jack Lousma, who flew 24 million miles in the Skylab 3 mission in 1973.
Lousma put him in direct touch with Ralph Roe Jr., chief engineer for the shuttle program at Johnson Space Flight Center in Houston.
After a series of telephone conversations Tuesday afternoon, the photographer had a veteran shuttle mission specialist knocking at his door by dinnertime. Within hours, he was left with a receipt, and his camera was on its way to Houston. -- sfgate.com

Bearing in mind that only NOW have NASA issued a plan to enable in-flight repairs on board the shuttle...

a little late in the procedure, don't you think?!!!

The cover up...? The shoot down...?
Columbia Strike Linked To Ariane Rocket Explosion ?

"One aspect not covered in the Sentinel expose was the possibility of the transcripts and other information being classified as confidential, secret or top secret by NASA or the board. Board members would be in jeopardy of criminal prosecution if they disclosed any information so classified.
On March 25, 2003 President Bush signed an Executive Order (EO 13292) amending the authority to classify information. It allows an agency head to designate anyone he wishes with the authority to classify information. It is not known if that authority has been given the board or if any documents have been classified. The delegation of that authority is required to be in writing, but then that document itself might be classified. "
SHUTTLE PROBE - WHAT THEY ARE HIDING

Timeline COLUMBIA MYSTERY DEEPENS rense datapage NASA Biotechnology Activities Enhancing Quality of Life Shuttle Sparks Electro-Physics & Explosions watch the last video

Electromagnetic Scalar energy weapons?
"A scalar-burst strike on the US space shuttle Columbia has dealt a debilitating preemptive blow to Anglo-American plans for a Middle-East takeover.
Psychological warfare tactics were to the fore in continuing pre-conflict skirmishing over the planned US-UK invasion of the Middle-East. This time the blow was devastating, as the Columbia ran into an electromagnetic wall, in the sky over Texas."
Scalar Strike On Columbia Ends WW3?
High Profile Target Makes For Devastating Blow
The 'ignorosphere?'!!! US dumbs down it's science
The space shuttle Columbia's troubles began as it dropped like a meteor from orbit into a mysterious and poorly understood atmospheric region that scientists have dubbed the "ignorosphere." The Concorde, the supersonic jet, flies in the bottom of this region at more than 11 miles above the Earth's surface. Nothing but a rocket can fly at its upper limit of 53 miles. The "ignorosphere" encompasses the mesosphere and upper stratosphere.
Invisible clouds, strange electrical flashes called red sprites and blue lightning bolts that strike upward from the tops of clouds inhabit the thin air. This is the place where falling stars are made.
The "ignorosphere" earns its nickname from the fact that you can't get there from here without a rocket. It is too high for weather balloons and too low for satellites to dip down to gather information. USA today
[Who] can ignore the childlike language used by one of the Americans most read national newspapers in addressing its citizens in their use of the make believe word Ignorosphere instead of its proper name, ionosphere? -
Western World Sleeps as Global Cataclysms Approach

sprites, jets and elves in the upper atmosphere
All these phenomena are caused by the discharge of lightning from storm clouds into the upper atmosphere and ionosphere, which begins at an altitude of about 100 kilometers (63 miles). These discharges produce much different effects from the craggy lightning discharges to the ground. But little is known about them because they occur between 50 and 100 kilometers above the earth's surface, too high for airplanes to study and too low for most satellites. - [my emphasis]Satellite experiment snaps photos

NASA Scientific community - A culture of Programmed complacency?
One NLP guru, Dale Kirby, informs us that one of the presuppositions of NLP is "No one is wrong or broken." So why seek remedial change? On the other hand, what Mr. Kirby does have to say about NLP which is intelligible does not make it very attractive. For example, he says that according to NLP "There is no such thing as failure. There is only feedback." Was NLP invented by the U.S. Military to explain their "incomplete successes"? When the space shuttle blew up within minutes of launch, killing everyone on board, was that "only feedback"? If I stab my neighbor and call it "performing non-elective surgery" am I practicing NLP?
skepdic.com

History not learned - doomed to repeat it...
NASA Postpones Shuttle Launch
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla., April 29, 2005 (CBS/AP) NASA on Friday delayed by another two months the first space shuttle flight since the Columbia disaster, saying it needs more time to ensure that the fuel tank does not shed dangerous pieces of ice or foam at liftoff.
Discovery is now scheduled for launch no earlier than July 13. The flight had been targeted for late May.
A large chunk of foam insulation from the external fuel tank punched a hole in Columbia's wing that led to the shuttle and crew's demise during re-entry in February 2003. Now, the lingering concern involves the possible buildup of ice on the tank once it's filled with super-cold fuel, and the hazard such shards would pose if they came off during the launch and hit the shuttle.
NASA's new administrator, Michael Griffin, announced the delay at a midmorning televised news conference, saying it was the result of recent launch-debris reviews.

"This is consistent with our overall approach to return to flight, which is that we're going to return to flight. We are not going to rush to flight, and we want it to be right, so we're doing what we need to do to ensure that," Griffin said.
Extra repairs to Discovery's fuel tank will be needed, namely the addition of a heater, said NASA's top spaceflight official, Bill Readdy.
The foam responsible for Columbia's demise was intended to prevent ice from building up around the fittings that attach struts holding the nose of the shuttle to the tank, reports CBS News Space Consultant Bill Harwood. The so-called bipod foam has been eliminated in favor of small heaters.
Foam application techniques were changed to minimize the chances for foam shedding in general. Engineers believe the largest piece of foam that can come off the tank today is less than a half ounce. The piece that hit Columbia weighed some 1.67 pounds.
But recent testing shows ice buildups in two areas of the tank still pose a threat. One of those areas is in the so-called inter-tank region between the upper oxygen tank and the lower hydrogen tank where an oxygen feedline bellows is located. The bellows allows the line to flex slightly during launch.
The testing shows ice can build up on the bellows or on a bracket holding the line in place. Another ice problem area is near the tip of the tank around a bracket that holds a repressurization line.
NASA managers held a second debris verification review, or DVR, at the Johnson Space Center in Houston earlier this week and still were unable to conclusively demonstrate ice was not a threat, according to sources who requested anonymity. cbsnews
UPDATE: Shuttle Atlantis Mission Delayed Again; Faces Slip Until September

Did the shuttle disaster help in the final steps towards the militarisation of NASA...?

The culmination of a programme that was started way back in 1946 [ CIA ]
and continued with the development of the U2 spyplane, sattelite intelligence and
continued with primo nutso Ronald Reagen and his 'Star wars' programme...

"In 1973, the Office of Special Projects, established in 1965 to manage CIA satellite reconnaissance operations became the Office of Development and Engineering (OD&E), with a mission that extended beyond satellite development. In 1987, Deputy Director for Science and Technology Evan Hineman established a new Special Projects Staff, which soon became a new Office for Special Projects. This version of the office was concerned not with satellites, but with emplaced sensors sensors that could be placed in a fixed location to collect signals intelligence or measurement and signature intelligence (MASINT) about a specific target. Such sensors had been used to monitor Chinese missile tests, Soviet laser activity, military movements, and foreign nuclear programs."
Science technology and the CIA

"To ensure Congressional and Presidential support, NASA began making concessions. To ensure a steady supply of DOD (Department of Defense) payloads, NASA made several concessions to the USAF (United States Air Force). On-board air-breathing engines were sacrificed to increase the payload mass capabilities. The required cross-range capabilities with no air-breathing engines further compromised the design."
Doomed from the Beginning- The Solid Rocket Boosters for the Space Shuttle by Kurt Hoover and Wallace T. Fowler

Here is a picture
of a spaceman,
go back to sleep...
We haven't been to the moon since 1972! HONEST!???
CNN report September 8, 2004
"We hope to have the first manned mission to the moon by 2020," Foing said from the British Association Science Festival in Exeter. Foing said the moon -- which man last visited in 1972 -- [oh really?] had an environment most similar to that of Earth so it was a "wise investment" CNN news for idiots....

in 1999 Russians were flying their spacecraft via remote control

Here is a report from 1999 -
an UNMANNED spaceship docks with the MIR space station...Progress delivered 1,256 kilogrammes of cargo - including vital supplies of food, water and medical equipment for the cosmonauts, as well as fuel and equipment needed to prepare the aging space station for unmanned orbiting.
so an unmanned craft thats capable of docking...would be a remote controlled Spaceship, then...wouldn't it? hmmm....?

Now that's progress!

6 years later: International Space Station receives cargo vessel
BY SPACEFLIGHT NOW - Posted: March 2, 2005
A Russian cargo-delivery freighter safely docked to the International Space Station today, ferrying more than two tons of supplies and equipment for the outpost and its resident crew. While flying over the equator west of Africa, the Progress M-52 spacecraft made an automated linkup to the rear docking port of the station's Zvezda service module at 2010 GMT (3:10 p.m. EST). The ship was launched Monday from Baikonur Cosmodrome.
The docking happened a few minutes ahead of schedule since it was not required to happen over Russian ground tracking stations. Video from the Progress' nose-mounted video camera was routed to the Russian mission control center via U.S. communications assets.
Expedition 10 commander Leroy Chiao and flight engineer Salizhan Sharipov plan to open hatches and enter the Progress later today. Unloading of its contents will begin Thursday. This was the 17th Progress flown to the station.
The cargo includes 2,932 pounds of equipment, experiment hardware and life support system gear, 1,071 pounds of water, 386 pounds of propellant and 242 pounds of oxygen and air. The delivery of 86 food containers will provide more than 160 days of provisions for Expedition 10 and continuing into Expedition 11, which is due to arrive in April.

In preparation for the space shuttle return-to-flight mission in May, the digital cameras and lenses that station residents will use to photograph Discovery's thermal tiles in the search for damage were brought by the Progress. The shuttle performs a quick backflip before docking with the station, presenting Discovery's belly for Expedition 11's crew to take the pictures during a 90-second window. The shuttle will be 600 feet below the station.
Also aboard the resupply ship are spare parts for the station's toilet, oxygen-generating and carbon dioxide-scrubbing units, and a new heat exchanger device for the Quest airlock module. The device, which is used for cooling U.S. spacesuits, will replace a faulty unit that forced all recent spacewalks to be performed from the Russian-side of the outpost.
Proximity Communication Equipment that will aid Europe's Automated Transfer Vehicles during their future dockings to the station is packed inside the Progress, too. After installation in the Zvezda module, tests of the equipment will occur this spring.
The PCE hardware enables two fully redundant S-band communications paths during the last 19 feet of an ATV's approach. The first ATV cargo ship, dubbed Jules Verne, is scheduled for shipment to the Ariane 5 rocket launch site in South America by year's end. - spaceflightnow

The smokescreen: Bright lights, camera, action....

This Apollo 8 reentry photograph was taken by U.S. Air Force ALOTS (Airborne Lightweight Optical Tracking System) camera mounted on a KC-135-A aircraft flown at 40,000 ft altitude. Apollo 8 splashed down at 10:15 a.m., December 27, 1968, in the central Pacific approximately 1,000 miles south-southwest of Hawaii.
source

At the start of re-entry, hot ionized gases surround the shuttle. Throughout the decent the friction between the shuttle and the earth's atmosphere create even more and more heat beneath the orbiter. The black ceramic tiles located on the bottom and along the wing tips and nose of the orbiter protect it from the nearly 1,648 degrees Celsius (3000 degrees F) temperatures. To rid the orbiter of some of this heat, it makes a series of small rolls from left and right throughout its fiery fall. The space shuttle

It's the physics of spaceflight that make re-entry so risky: All the energy required to get the spaceship into orbit ? enough power to make objects move 17,500 mph ? has to be dissipated relatively quickly to return to the planet's surface. The high speed of a spaceship plowing through the atmosphere generates heat in excess of 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit. At these speeds, if the angle of entry isn't perfect, the spacecraft could burn up during descent or bounce out of the atmosphere and become stranded in space.
discovery channel

Space ship 1 - silenced re-entry...?

Under its own power it will soar to a height of 100 kilometres - where space begins - before gliding back to the runway.
It does not have enough speed to go into orbit.
The $US20 million ($A30 million) craft, sponsored by billionaire Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen and built by Scaled Composites, is one of 20 competing for the $US10 million Ansari X prize. The prize is awarded to a reusable craft that can launch three people into orbit, return them safely home, and repeat the feat two weeks later...INN - BBC watch Real-movie of first flight

SpaceShipOne glided very briefly after its launch from White Knight before firing up its rocket for about 80 seconds. It then blasted off to reach its target height in a vertical climb at Mach 3 (three times the speed of sound). The vehicle then altered its wing configuration to allow for high drag, and started to fall back towards Earth during which the pilot was weightless.
At re-entry, the ship's special wing configuration allowed it to glide back down to Earth in about 20 minutes. Private craft makes space history - BBC watch Real-movie of second 'historic' flight

Can this privately funded project launch from high altitude,
fly out into space and re-enter the atmosphere by dropping in...?

As SpaceShipOne leapt into the sky, its bright white contrail shot up vertically, at a striking right angle to the horizontal contrails of the White Knight carrier ship and chase planes.

After a brief firing, the rocket motor shut down, and the craft coasted to the top of its trajectory, before dropping back into the atmosphere and gliding to its landing.

Rutan said the flight was remarkable because SpaceShipOne both reached space and then returned so smoothly.
"It's the first time that a winged vehicle can have a carefree re-entry," Rutan said.

spaceship 1

[snip]

The space shuttles, for example, require extensive computerized control mechanisms to maintain proper attitude and stability during the plunge back into the atmosphere.
SpaceShipOne, however, employs a novel design in which its twin tailbooms and the back half of each wing rotate upward to create drag for a brief time, much like feathers slow and stabilize the flight of a badminton shuttlecock. The tailbooms and wings then return to normal for the glide back to Earth.
The mechanism worked flawlessly, Rutan said.
Plane leaps into space, sails back

Did SpaceShipOne break the barrier or not?
SpaceShipOne cracked the barrier to manned commercial space flight in June by flying 328,491 feet, or about 62 miles, above Earth about 400 feet above the distance scientists widely consider to be the boundary of space. The flight lasted 90 minutes.
SpaceShipOne's effort was bankrolled by billionaire Microsoft Corp. co-founder Paul Allen.
Virgin said its agreement to license technology from Allen's company, Mohave Aerospace Ventures, could be worth up to $25 million over the next 15 years, depending on the number of spaceships built by Virgin. - Yahoo news

Can this craft re-enter the atmosphere by dropping in?
If so...It begs the question...why couldn't NASA... with it's Gazillions of dollars?
Was the 'fireworks show' of previous space-craft re-entry
a distraction from the money laundering NASA was secretly set up for?

Will Spacecraft 1 be stopped from going into orbit?

US export rules frustrate Virgin
Cape Canaveral, Florida - Sir Richard Branson's plans to offer a commercial sub-orbital spaceflight service have run into some difficulty.
His Virgin Galactic company wants to license the technology in the record-breaking SpaceShipOne vehicle created by US designer Burt Rutan.
But the process is being obstructed by US export control rules, particularly those that address technology with potential military applications.
The issue is likely to delay the service debut of Virgin's space liners.
BBC

The mars / moon project - an excuse for extortion

For those of us who don't realize that NASA is actually a Pentagon project...Bush's (Read Carl Rove) decision to go "Buzz Lightyear" on us is a pathetic, if not blatantly obvious, attempt to dodge Congressional oversight on fund this administration is desperate trying to "re-distribute" to favorite sons, daughters and political groups throughout the Planet Earth! At the same time, NASA funding would also avoid certain limitations on Pentagon contractors. There is so much buried deep in that "lofty" goal, it's truly scary that My Favorite Martian President has now given unfettered discretion to the totalitarian nightmare-team fantasies of Carl Rove and Tom Delay.
memes.org
US wants to own space

"Earlier this year, the General Accounting Office issued a report that showed 27,000 contractors owe the government as much as $3 billion. "
Local 6 News

more distractions:

Genesis - Billions in the Sand...

Two Hollywood stunt pilots and a space capsule full of stardust were on track for a historic mid-air encounter above the Utah desert on September 8, 2004 at the end of a three-year mission to probe the origins of the solar system. The Genesis spacecraft was expected to swing by Earth and jettison a capsule containing particles that may yield insights about the early formation of planets. [Reuters] China Daily
stunt pilot Cliff Fleming will be waiting to snag it around 10:15 am.
Cliff Fleming?
OR Cliff Lemming?

...scientists on NASA's Genesis mission, due to return Sept. 8, use sapphire, silicon, gold and diamond to collect raw solar wind particles in outer space.
"The exciting thing about Genesis is that the data it returns will be important for understanding how our solar nebula developed into a planetary system," said Genesis Project Scientist Dr. Amy Jurewicz at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif. "Genesis data can bridge much of this gap because independent evidence suggests that the outer portion of the Sun, what we are sampling, hasn't changed in the past 4.5 billion years." NASA
The Genesis sample return capsule's drogue and parafoil did not deploy as expected. The image at left shows the capsule where it has landed on the ground. The recovery team is currently analyzing and assessing the condition of the sample return capsule. - NASA

Scientists use disaster - Asteroid tracking?
Asteroid-tracking scientists who had been following the craft with optical measurements got a more realistic enactment of an asteroid crashing to Earth. Rather than deploying its parachutes and floating gently toward Earth to be snagged by awaiting helicopters, as planned, the capsule made a beeline for the desert sand.
This may not bode well for the capsule's precious contents of delicate solar wind particles, but the crash was more like the path of would-be Armageddon asteroid.
"It was indeed a true Earth impact," said Donald Yeomans, manager of the Near-Earth Asteroid Program at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. "From that point of view it's interesting, but I'm not suggesting it's good news."
People like Yeomans who focus on tracking potentially devastating asteroids and other objects whizzing near Earth had been in need of some practice. Their network of optical telescopes keeps tabs on objects near Earth and could potentially offer critical information in the event that they find a large asteroid or comet heading our way.
Before today's return of the Genesis spacecraft, the closest they've come to tracking a collision was in 1994 when a comet plunged into Jupiter. The chances of a large asteroid or comet striking Earth are small, but scientists are preparing for the possibility.
By compiling observational readings of near-Earth objects and calculating their speed and course, scientists could predict when and where an object might strike. Just last March, an asteroid the size of a trailer zoomed within 4,100 miles of Earth, making it the closest encounter ever recorded. ABC

Aerogel is the least dense solid substance yet discovered, 1,000 times less dense than glass. It is 99.8 percent empty space, and appears eerily indistinct, as in the unaltered image [above]
Aerogel is an excellent thermal insulator, up to 39 times as effective as fiberglass. NASA first used aerogel as insulation aboard the Sojourner rover that went to Mars in 1997, and it protects the electrical systems of the Spirit and Opportunity rovers that have been exploring the red planet since 2004.
Aboard the Stardust probe, blocks of aerogel are arranged in a grid to trap samples of interstellar particles and comet dust. Aerogel has previously been used as a capture medium in experiments on the space shuttle, Spacelab II and the Eureca probe.
High-speed particles that collide with aerogel leave a conical trail. The length and direction of the trail tell scientists the velocity and direction at which the particle hit. At the point of the cone, the particle is captured, not deformed by heat or impact.
Stardust capsule lands in Utah
Scientists hopes for clues to formation of solar system
Sunday, January 15, 2006 Posted: 1636 GMT (0036 HKT)
Scientists and engineers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory react Sunday to the return of Stardust.
(CNN) -- A capsule carrying dust particles from the tail of a comet parachuted to Earth on Sunday, and elated NASA scientists were eager to examine the samples for clues about how the solar system formed.
The Stardust mission capsule landed two minutes ahead of schedule at the Air Force's Utah Test and Training Range southwest of Salt Lake City.
"We traveled almost 3 billion miles in space," principal investigator Don Brownlee said from nearby Dugway Proving Grounds. "We visited a comet, grabbed a piece of it, and it landed here this morning. It's an incredible thrill."
The canister containing the samples was taken to a "clean room" at the proving grounds; it will be shipped to NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, this week. Complete analysis of the material, some of which will be conducted on the molecular level, should take years.

Brownlee has said scientists would have some results, such as the number of particles recovered, within days and more detailed findings within weeks. The material, expected to be about a thimble full, must be separated from a substance called aerogel, used to help trap the particles. Aerogel is a strong, lightweight silica glass that is 99.8 percent air and looks like frozen smoke. (What is aerogel)
Brownlee has likened the discovery process to the ongoing study of rocks brought back from the moon. "The last Apollo mission was 1972. And people are still discovering very exciting things on the Apollo samples," he said. "Samples are a resource that are unending. And so unless we consume all the samples, they will certainly be studied decades from now."

Safe landing
NASA's last sample return mission did not go as planned. In 2004, the parachutes on the Genesis spacecraft didn't open, and it crashed into the ground at full speed. Stardust appeared to land without a hitch. Applause swept the mission control room at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California, as "All stations, we have touchdown!" was announced at 3:10 a.m.
"We pushed about every frontier you can think of," said Project Manager Tom Duxbury. "We went half way to Jupiter on solar cells. Coming back into Earth faster than anything has ever done before. So many, many things that we did in this little project."
Saturday night, the spacecraft flew by Earth after nearly 3 billion miles traveled, and released the 100-pound capsule containing the samples. It entered the atmosphere over the Pacific Ocean, traveling almost 29,000 miles per hour, and crossed over Oregon and Nevada on its way to its landing zone on the Utah salt flats. (Watch how cosmic duster collector was to make its return -- 1:57)
Skywatchers in Nevada saw the capsule streak across the sky, officials at JPL mission said.
At 105,000 feet, a small parachute deployed to begin to stabilize the craft, and at 10,000 feet the main parachute opened to bring it in for a soft landing. Because of the dark sky, NASA tracked the capsule using infrared cameras and helicopters found the capsule once it landed.
Nearly 7-year voyage
Launched in 1999, Stardust orbited the sun on a long intercept course with the comet Wild-2 (pronounced Vild-two). On January 2, 2004, it flew through the comet's tail, collecting bits of dust in a tennis racket-shaped collector filled with aerogel.
Brownlee compared the process to a police ballistics test. "You know, when they want to test a bullet, they shoot it into a box full of cotton to capture it, because it is traveling at high speed. And we are essentially doing that," he said. "Except instead of using a box of cotton, we're using this very low density aerogel, so the particle goes into the aerogel and stops."
Scientists say comets are icy, rocky debris left over from the beginning of the solar system 4.5 billion years ago. They expect analysis of the Stardust samples will help them better understand how the planets formed and evolved.
"The fundamental reason for this mission is that we are collecting what we believe are the best preserved samples of the formation of our solar system and they are preserved because they formed these comet bodies beyond the major planets out beyond Neptune," Brownlee had told CNN. "So we're just using the comet as a storage device," he added.
Wild 2 is thought to come from the Kuiper Belt, a band of debris that orbits the sun beyond Neptune. Stardust has transmitted photographs and other measurements that provided some valuable data.
"The appearance of the nucleus of this comet was kind of surprising, and different from other comet nuclei that have been recording in spacecraft type detail, so that was quite exciting," David Jewitt, an astronomer at the University of Hawaii, said. Jewitt and astronomer Jane Luu discovered the Kuiper Belt in 1992.
Jewitt said that Kuiper Belt objects appear as faint, unresolved points of light, even in the world's largest telescopes. He said astronomers can count them and track their orbits and even learn some things about their surface composition, but they are too far away to learn about their geography. "The dust that it hopefully picked up in the aerogel collectors in some sense is a sample of materials from the Kuiper Belt so that's very exciting, too, because we don't have the technology to go out to the Kuiper Belt grab some stuff and then come back with it. It's just too hard to do," Jewitt said. - cnn.com

This has been happening for years. The history of space shuttle development shows that NASA's
designs for the payload size within the cargo bay were compromised, because
the Defense dept. needed to get military equipment into orbit quickly during the 80's.
now...twenty years on, it seems that the US defense dept.
is readying itself for the final push towards
FULL SPECTRUM DOMINANCE.

Colonization of space? new space race with China?

Looking back NASA's early successes in human spaceflight and looking forward to more of it, legendary physicist and space colonization visionary Freeman Dyson suggested the space agency has crucial roles to play in the future.
"Keep the space science going," the 81-year-old Dyson advised the agency. And "build the infrastructure" and set policies that encourage private enterprise to enter space.
Dyson worked on the Orion project in the late 1950s. Orion was a parallel program to Apollo. It planned to detonate nuclear devices to launch a spacecraft. "The thing could have flown," he said. The project was dropped because of the now-obvious nuclear fallout problem, he said.
Dyson sees humans eventually colonizing space; "because it is there, Howeve, he says there must first be "huge advances in propulsion." He thinks space travel should be for pleasure and sport. Competition with the Chinese, who now have their sights on the Moon, will be good for NASA, Dyson said.
"If the Chinese push us, we'll go faster," he said. - NASA Offers Big Bucks To Privatize Space

"National Aeronautics and Space Administration sources said the plan could call for resuming manned lunar missions by around 2015 and to use the Moon as a springboard for putting people on Mars or even beyond at a later date. "
Bush Could Announce New Manned Space Missions To Moon And Mars [Space daily]
"Sources stressed that under the new space plan NASA would have to abandon its current approach of maintaining separate programs for manned and unmanned missions. Both efforts would have to be combined, using the advantages and best features of each to explore the moon, Mars, and other parts of the solar system, which is the goal at the heart of the new Bush space doctrine."
UPI Exclusive: Space plan to push robots

Meanwhile: Satellites launch from modified oil platforms?
what are they building up there?
Enclosure: Transmittal No. DDTC 008-04.

Hon. J. Dennis Hastert, Speaker of the House of Representatives. March 30, 2004.

Dear Mr. Speaker: Pursuant to Section 36(c) of the Arms Export Control Act, I am transmitting, herewith, certification of a proposed license for the export of defense articles or defense services sold commercially under a contract in the amount of $50,000,000 or more.

The transactions contained in the attached certification concern future commercial activities with Russia, Ukraine and Norway related to the launch of commercial satellites from the Pacific Ocean utilizing a modified oil platform beyond the period specified in DTC 015-04; DTC 023-03 dated February 28, 2003, DTC 002-03 dated January 24, 2003; DTC 148-02 dated July 26, 2002; DTC 123-02 dated May 22, 2002; DTC 023-02 dated May 1, 2002; DTC 048-01 dated April 30, 2001; DTC 026-00 dated May 19, 2000; DTC
Cryptome

Space army?
"Four servicemembers were among 11 candidates NASA has chosen to be the next generation of space explorers, officials announced May 6. Maj. James Dutton, 35, and Marine Corps Maj. Randolph Bresnik, 36, were chosen to be space shuttle pilots. Navy Lt. Cmdr. Christopher Cassidy, 34, and Army Maj. Shane Kimbrough, 36, will be mission specialists."
Air force link
2004 Astronauts named

NASA has and always will be,
a smokescreen for the
militarization of SPACE

Exploration for the Benefit of mankind? BULLSHIT!!!
Take a look at this!

NASA REGULATES CONTACTS WITH THE PUBLIC
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration adopted a new policy this week to regulate contacts with the general public. The policy seems intended in part to insulate the agency from unscripted and unapproved interactions with the public.
Instead of responding directly to public inquiries, NASA employees are instructed to forward such inquiries to an authorized public affairs representative.
"Effective immediately, if you receive an e-mail from a member of the public, promptly forward it to the designated e-mail address for your Center," the NASA message stated.
And then forget about it.
"You will not receive a reply that the e-mail has been successfully accepted, nor will you receive a copy of the response."
The new policy, which also addresses messages that are sent to NASA by mistake, is needed "to ensure a responsive public communications program and enhance public perception of NASA," the message states.
FAS

THE AIR FORCE SPACE COMMAND PLAN 2004 5 Nov 02
page 7
"Consider the following words extracted from AFDD 2-2:
Just as the advent of airpower greatly enhanced military operations of the time, space forces, likewise, greatly enhance modern military operations across the spectrum of conflict.
Air Force doctrine views air, space, and information as key ingredients for dominating the battlespace and ensuring superiority.

Effective use of space-based resources provides a continual and global presence over key areas of the world satellites permanently "forward deployed" add another dimension to the capability of our force's ability to quickly position themselves for employment.
Military forces have always viewed the "high ground" position as one of dominance and warfare advantage. With rare exception, whoever owned the high ground owned the fight.
This capability (Space) is the ultimate high ground of US military operations. Today, control of this high ground means superiority in information and significant force enhancement. Tomorrow, ownership may mean instant engagement anywhere in the world.
Planners should consider integrating future development capabilities, such as the capability to deliver attacks from space, into the campaign plan when determining how best to strike adversary Centers of Gravity (COG). Space force application Systems would have the advantages of rapid global access and the ability to effectively bypass adversary defenses."
page 28
"No matter how it is structured, the end result is a fiscally reasonable and technologically achievable plan--one that produces a fully integrated Air and Space Force that is persuasive in peace, decisive in war and pre-eminent in any form of conflict."
[space command plan 2004 -.pdf file] WARNING!! THIS IS A CURE FOR INSOMNIA!!!

Beep! er...Houston, we have a problem!!!
... to these jokers a nuclear war is both 'thinkable and doable'

why not read: The nuclear radiation handbook... pub. 1957

Atomic Midnight is declared...
The Nuclear posture review.
search

Atomic Rockets! Nuts!
To send astronauts back to the moon, NASA is planning to begin by making maximum use of existing U.S. and foreign rockets as launching systems. Vehicles under consideration may use updated propulsion systems that could blast a flotilla of spacecraft from the Earth to the vicinity of the moon.
For voyages of longer duration, however -- to Mars and possibly even more distant destinations -- NASA is designing a whole new system for both space propulsion and space power. If successful, the system could provide future astronauts a swifter means of voyaging far beyond the moon and equip their ships and robotic scouts with far more electrical power than ever has been available to space missions before.
Named for the Greek God that gave humans fire, Project Prometheus was first announced in 2002, well prior to President Bush's space exploration proposals.
Prometheus originally was conceived as a revamped package under NASA's Nuclear Systems Initiative. It was intended to develop and flight-demonstrate an advanced, atomic-powered space vehicle. The vehicle, which NASA prefers not to call a rocket -- rather, a nuclear electric propulsion system -- might be able to triple the speed at which spacecraft travel beyond the Earth.
The heart of the Prometheus research effort -- a $3 billion project planned across five years -- would be a set of power systems evolved from the powerplants and electric thrusters carried aboard existing space probes.
Instead of conventional rockets, which start out with a maximum thrust of short duration, a nuclear-electric space vehicle would fly away from Earth slowly, then gradually increase its speed via continuous, long-lasting thrust from relatively small, electric engines Exclusive: NASA's new space 'hot rod'

Anti-Nuke Activists Protest Pluto Mission
By MIKE SCHNEIDER Associated Press Writer - CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) -- More than eight years ago, hundreds of protesters chanted anti-nuclear slogans before NASA launched a spacecraft to Saturn carrying 72 pounds of plutonium fuel. The noise before this week's launch of a craft with a similar payload has been more muted.
Only 30 anti-nuclear protesters showed up recently to oppose a plutonium-fueled mission to Pluto. The most raucous it got was when protesters tied colorful origami birds to the fence of the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station.
"Folks tend to forget," said protest organizer Maria Telesca of the Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space. But Telesca and other protesters said the threat of a nuclear accident is no less real with the New Horizons mission to Pluto than it was with the launch of Cassini to Saturn in 1997.
Plutonium fuel has been used on two other spacecrafts taking off from the Cape Canaveral area since Cassini's launch. The two Mars rovers, Spirit and Opportunity, sent up in 2003, had much smaller amounts of plutonium, which creates energy from natural radioactive decay.
Twenty-four pounds of radioactive plutonium is located in New Horizon's radioisotope thermoelectric generator, an aluminum-encased, 123-pound cylinder, 3 1/2 feet long and 1 1/2-foot wide, that sticks out of the spacecraft like a gun on a tank. Inside the cylinder are 18 graphite-enclosed compartments, each holding 1 1/3 pounds of the plutonium dioxide. Similar generators previously have been used to power six Apollo flights and 19 other U.S. space missions. NASA and the U.S. Department of Energy have put the probability of an early-launch accident that would cause plutonium to be released at 1 in 350 chances. NASA last year estimated the cost of decontamination, should there be a serious accident with plutonium released during the launch, at anywhere from $241 million to $1.3 billion per square mile, depending on the size of the area.
If there was an accident during an early phase of the launch, the maximum mean radiation dose received by an individual within 62 miles of the launch site would be about 80 percent of the amount each U.S. resident receives annually from natural background radiation, according to NASA's environmental impact statement.
The space agency is setting up two radiological control centers and deploying 16 mobile field teams that can detect radiation around the launch site. Medical personnel at local hospitals also have been trained in the treatment of patients exposed to radioactive materials, and the launch required the approval of the White House.
The emergency plans are ready for Tuesday, "if need be, but hopefully not," NASA launch director Omar Baez said Sunday at a news conference.
Some NASA safety managers had raised concerns about the New Horizons mission when a fuel tank similar to the one expected to be used failed a pressure test during factory evaluation.
The original launch date was pushed back a few days to allow more time to examine the flight tank, but the decision ultimately was made to fly since the flight tank was in pristine condition and had no signs of any defects, Baez said.
Even if plutonium were released during an accident at launch, the risk to the population would be low because of the small amount of nuclear material and the remoteness of the launch pad from populated areas, said Alice Caponiti, nuclear material and safety manager at the Department of Energy's Office of Space and Defense Power Systems.
"Once you get a probability of an accident occurring, the question is what's the impact to people?" Caponiti said. "That's where the risk is low."
On the Net: Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space: http://www.space4peace.org">
New Horizons Mission: http://pluto.jhuapl.edu
mercury news

Journey to the edge of the Solar System
Blackanthem Military News, PATRICK AIR FORCE BASE, Fla., January 21, 2006 11:10
The 45th Space Wing supported the successful launch of the NASA Pluto New Horizons spacecraft on an Atlas V rocket from Space Launch Complex 41 here Jan. 19. The wing provided Eastern Range and launch base support to Lockheed Martin and International Launch Services, who served as the commercial spacecraft and booster vehicle provider to NASA.
Launch officials scrubbed the mission twice earlier due to weather issues.
This launch marked the first time an Atlas V has flown with five boosters strapped-on. Prior to this mission, three was the most. This was the fastest rocket to leave the Earth's atmosphere with about two and a half million pounds of thrust at launch and ending up traveling to Pluto at 36 thousand mph.
The spacecraft passed by our moon in nine hours. It took the Apollo astronauts three days to get that far on a Saturn V rocket, the largest rocket ever launched from Earth. New Horizons needed to launch prior to Feb. 14 in order to arrive at Jupiter in 13 months. That timeframe was necessary to achieve the right trajectory between the planets and receive a gravity-assist slingshot from the giant planet. Slingshotting around Jupiter will cut about five years off the mission time. It is projected to reach Pluto, which is three billion miles from Earth, in 2015, utilizing the slingshot.

The New Horizons mission is the first mission solely dedicated to the exploration of Pluto, its moon Charon and then another one to two years to the Kuiper Belt, a region of icy objects at the edge of our solar system.
The $700-million mission's payload is about the size of a grand piano and weighs 1,060 pounds. It will carry seven scientific instruments, which will help scientists examine the geologic features, determine temperature, map the terrain and surfaces and examine Pluto's atmosphere. Pluto was discovered by Clyde Tombaugh in 1930 at the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Ariz., is the only planet to be discovered in a U.S observatory.
This mission will give high-resolution photos of Pluto and Charon. Earlier pictures taken by the Hubble Space Telescope were grainy and fuzzy.
Following the 30-minute flyby of Pluto, and once it reaches the Kuiper belt, scientists hope to gather more information on Xena, considered by some to be the solar system's tenth planet.
"The men and women of the 45th Space Wing once again came through with the success of the New Horizons mission," said Brig. Gen. Mark Owen, commander of the 45th Space Wing. "It is going to be exciting to see the outcome of this mission in 2015 and everyone who was involved will be looking forward to seeing Pluto and Charon up close and personal," he said.
By 1st Lt Kevin Coffman - 45th SW Public Affairs

NASA as a tool of the Pentagon...

Nighttime takeoff of space shuttle Atlantis in February 1990.
This mission is believed by analysts to have deployed a MISTY spysat.

The United States is building a new generation of spy satellites designed to orbit undetected, in a highly classified program that has provoked opposition in closed congressional sessions where lawmakers have questioned its necessity and rapidly escalating price, according to U.S. officials.
The previously undisclosed effort has almost doubled in projected cost -- from $5 billion to nearly $9.5 billion, officials said. The National Reconnaissance Office, which manages spy satellite programs, has already spent hundreds of millions of dollars on the program, officials said.
The stealth satellite, which would probably become the largest single-item expenditure in the $40 billion intelligence budget, is to be launched in the next five years and is meant to replace an existing stealth satellite, according to officials. Non-stealth satellites can be tracked and their orbits can be predicted, allowing countries to attempt to hide weapons or troop movements on the ground when they are overhead.
Anatomy of a Spy Satellite
Cooperative Satellite Tracking and Low Observable Satellites
Spy satellite debate comes out in the open
Is the missile defense sheild yet Another bogus distraction project?
- Scott Ritter: US missile defense sheild is useless!!!

AIR FORCE SPACE COMMAND factsheet

History [Global security]

"We need to learn how to better protect our space assets. In this way will we be better able to develop our future plans." Wargames: Air Force Space Command's Battle Plans [space.com]
"Planners should consider integrating future development capabilities, such as the capability to deliver attacks from space, into the campaign plan when determining how best to strike adversary Centers of Gravity (COG). Space force application systems would have the advantages of rapid global access and the ability to effectively bypass adversary defenses..." Air Force Space Command: "Strategic Master Plan FY04 and Beyond" [memory hole]
Air Force Space Command Doctrine [Federation of American Scientists]
What better place to dictate full spectrum dominance than from the moon...?
I mean, who's going to attack them up there?
LUKE SKYWALKER, where are you!!!

"Space operations enhance combat operations and play an increasingly critical role in ensuring U.S. military forces can see, shape, and dominate the battlespace in the coming decades. In truth, the Army cannot achieve the Objective Force's characteristics or its Transformation goals without fully exploiting space. Space assets provide capabilities to a rapidly moving force while minimizing the logistics tail and deployed infrastructure. Today, space assets deploy where needed and when needed. Tomorrow, space assets must respond to the highly mobile warfighter and be tailored to the Objective Force's needs. Only through the continued efforts of all space operations elements can space-based products enable warfighting. Lucky Sentinel 01 proved that timely, accurate space products can ensure warfighters' success. The 1st Space Battalion, USSPACECOM, brings space to the warfighter."
51 Space Meets Sand at Lucky Sentinel Major Terry Torraca, U.S. Army , Military Reveiw Nov 2001, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas
U.S. Deploys Satellite Jamming System
Fri Oct 29, 2004 The U.S. Air Force quietly has put into service a new weapon designed to jam enemy satellite communications, a significant step toward U.S. control of space.
The so-called Counter Communications System was declared operational late last month at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs, the Air Force Space Command said on Friday in e-mailed replies to questions from Reuters.
The ground-based jammer uses electromagnetic radio frequency energy to knock out transmissions on a temporary and reversible basis, without frying components, the command said.
"A reversible effect ensures that during the time of need, the adversary's space-based capability to threaten our forces is diminished," said Capt. Angie Blair, a spokeswoman. "Following the time of need, the space-based capabilities used by the adversary can return to its original state."
The device appears to have been put into service considerably earlier than had been projected by the Air Force as recently as February.
At that time, a long-range planning document, dubbed the Transformation Flight Plan, said such a system would let the United States by 2010 "deny and disrupt an adversary's space-based communications and early warning" of attack. reuters

Northrop Grumman [..] supported the Air Force in 2005 when it used converted retired Minuteman II ICBMs to launch the Experimental Satellite System-11 and Space Test Program R-1 missions. These missions continued the use of refurbished Minuteman II ICBMs to place research and development payloads into space. - source
XSS-11 is an experimental Air Force technology demonstrator designed to track other satellites. Controllers simply tell the spacecraft where to look for a piece of orbiting hardware-another U.S. satellite, for instance-and the XSS-11 autonomously plots a course, accelerates to the object, and begins to orbit and observe. It's the first step toward automatic satellite inspection and repair. - popsci.com

U.S. Air Force Plans for Future War in Space
By Leonard David Senior Space Writer posted: 22 February 2004
The U.S. Air Force has filed a futuristic flight plan, one that spells out need for an armada of space weaponry and technology for the near-term and in years to come.
Called the Transformation Flight Plan, the 176-page document offers a sweeping look at how best to expand Americas military space tool kit.
The use of space is highlighted throughout the report, with the document stating that space superiority combines the following three capabilities: protect space assets, deny adversaries access to space, and quickly launch vehicles and operate payloads into space to quickly replace space assets that fail or are damaged/destroyed.
From space global laser engagement, air launched anti-satellite missiles, to space-based radio frequency energy weapons and hypervelocity rod bundles heaved down to Earth from space the U.S. Air Force flight plan portrays how valued space operations has become for the warfighter and in protecting the nation from chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and high explosive attack.
Now to far-term needs
A number of space-related transformational capabilities are described in the document. While some of these are seen as needed in the near-term (until 2010), others are described as mid-term efforts in 2010-2015, while some efforts are viewed as far-term, beyond 2015.
Among a roster of projected Air Force space projects:
Air-Launched Anti-Satellite Missile: Small air-launched missile capable of intercepting satellites in low Earth orbit and seen as a past 2015 development.
Counter Satellite Communications System: Provides the capability by 2010 to deny and disrupt an adversary's space-based communications and early warning.
Counter Surveillance and Reconnaissance System: A near-term program to deny, disrupt and degrade adversary space-based surveillance and reconnaissance systems.
Evolutionary Air and Space Global Laser Engagement (EAGLE) Airship Relay Mirrors: Significantly extends the range of both the Airborne Laser and Ground-Based Laser by using airborne, terrestrial or space-based lasers in conjunction with space-based relay mirrors to project different laser powers and frequencies to achieve a broad range of effects from illumination to destruction.
Ground-Based Laser: Propagates laser beams through the atmosphere to Low-Earth Orbit satellites to provide robust, post-2015 defensive and offensive space control capability.
Hypervelocity Rod Bundles: Provides the capability to strike ground targets anywhere in the world from space.
Orbital Deep Space Imager: A mid-term predictive, near-real time common operating picture of space to enable space control operations.
Orbital Transfer Vehicle: Significantly adds flexibility and protection of U.S. space hardware in post-2015 while enabling on-orbit servicing of those assets.
Rapid Attack Identification Detection and Reporting System: A family of systems that will provide near-term capability to automatically identify when a space system is under attack.
Space-Based Radio Frequency Energy Weapon: A far-term constellation of satellites containing high-power radio-frequency transmitters that possess the capability to disrupt/destroy/disable a wide variety of electronics and national-level command and control systems. It would typically be used as a non-kinetic anti-satellite weapon.
Space-Based Space Surveillance System: A near-term constellation of optical sensing satellites to track and identify space forces in deep space to enable offensive and defensive counterspace operations.
Rapid launch needs
The newly issued Air Force document makes the following point: "The U.S. space capability rests on the foundation of assured access." There is need to deploy, replenish, sustain, and redeploy space-based forces in minimum time to allow them to accomplish the missions assigned to them - through all phases of conflict.
In this regard, the Air Force is exploring various future system concepts to launch, operate, and maintain space assets responsively. These include the Air Launch System, a dedicated, weather avoiding, on-demand (within 48 hours) system that can rocket into the sky at a wide variety of trajectories and can loft a Space Maneuver Vehicle, Common Aero Vehicle, or a conventional payload.
As explained in the Air Force document, a Space Operations Vehicle (SOV) enables an on-demand spacelift capability with rapid turnaround. This SOV can be one of the vehicles that could deploy the Space Maneuver vehicle a rapidly reusable orbital vehicle capable of executing a range of space control missions. In addition, the SOV can be utilized to deploy the Common Aero Vehicle, or CAV.
The CAV is an unpowered, maneuverable, hypersonic glide vehicle deployed in the 2010-2015 time period. The CAV could be delivered by a range of delivery vehicles such as an expendable or reusable small launch vehicle to a fully reusable Space Operations Vehicle. It can guide and dispense conventional weapons, sensors or other payloads world wide from and through space within one hour of tasking. It would be able to strike a spectrum of targets, including mobile targets, mobile time sensitive targets, strategic relocatable targets, or fixed hard and deeply buried targets. The CAVs speed and maneuverability would combine to make defenses against it extremely difficult.
Directed energy beams
Given the growing number of nations that utilize space, Air Force strategists see that trend as worrisome.
"The ability to deny an adversarys access to space services is essential so that future adversaries will be unable to exploit space in the same way the United States and its allies can. It will require full spectrum, sea, air, land, and space-based offensive counterspace systems capable of preventing unauthorized use of friendly space services and negating adversarial space capabilities from low Earth up to geosynchronous orbits.
The focus, when practical, will be on denying adversary access to space on a temporary and reversible basis," the document states.
Air Force scientists and technologists are busy in the labs exploring the possibility of putting a warning energy "spot" on any target worldwide that could be rapidly followed with varying levels of effects.
A possible breakthrough, the document adds, deals with a solid-state directed energy beam systems, operating at 100-kilowatt levels. "If the generation of large quantities of heat could be managed, the Air Force could develop highly effective, cheap, high power energy weapons."
For example, Air Force researchers are looking at ways to collect or generate large quantities of energy on orbit in order to rely on space-based platforms for more missions and provide a greater degree of true global presence. "This would change many equations about traditional ideas of rapid response," the document explains.
Sensor-to-shooter
The report emphasizes that space capabilities are integral to modern war fighting forces, providing critical surveillance and reconnaissance information, especially over areas of high risk or denied access for airborne craft.
Space capabilities also provide weather and other Earth observation data, global communications, precision position, navigation, and timing to troops on the ground, ships at sea, aircraft in flight, and weapons en route to targets.
Space assets are critical to achieving information superiority as they enable predictive and dominant battlespace awareness. As a result there can be a reduction in the "sensor-to-shooter" cycle to minutes or even seconds, the document explains.
Real-time picture of the battlespace would involve an initial space-based Ground Moving Target Indicator capability.
This capacity provides U.S. global strike forces with the ability to identify and track moving targets anywhere on the surface of the Earth. Also desirable is the ability to detect, locate, identify, and track a wide range of strategic and tactical targets that the United States currently has minimal capability to detect. These include weapons of mass destruction, hidden targets, and air moving targets.
A real-time picture of the battlespace enables a commander to know where all friendly forces are, not only to better coordinate operations and avoid fratricide -- accidentally injuring or killing your own troops.
Roadmap to the future
In a February 17 press statement issued from the office of the Secretary of the Air Force, the public document on Air Force transformation is described as "a roadmap to the future".
The Air Force flight plan is a reporting document that enables the Secretary of Defense to evaluate and interpret the Air Force's progress toward transformation.
"Transformation is using new things and old things in new ways, and achieving truly transformational effects for the joint warfighter," said Lt. Gen. Duncan McNabb, Air Force director of plans and programs.
The newly issued, publicly releasable report is the one unclassified document that presents an overarching picture of Air Force transformation, added Lt. Col. James McCaw, from the plans and programs directorate's transformation branch.
"It will help the reader understand where the Air Force is going, and why we chose this path," McCaw concluded. - space.com

Beam weapons 'almost ready' for battle

A laser fires from space toward Earth in this artistic rendering. The Air Force Research Laboratory's Directed Energy Directorate is conducting research in a wide variety of laser weapons technologies.
Directed energy could revolutionize warfare, expert says
By Leonard David Senior space writer Space.com Updated: 11, 2006
LOS ALAMOS, N.M. - There is a new breed of weaponry fast approaching - and at the speed of light, no less. They are labeled "directed-energy weapons," and they may well signal a revolution in military hardware - perhaps more so than the atomic bomb.
Directed-energy weapons take the form of lasers, high-powered microwaves and particle beams. Their adoption for ground, air, sea, and space warfare depends not only on using the electromagnetic spectrum, but also upon favorable political and budgetary wavelengths too.
That's the outlook of J. Douglas Beason, author of the recently published book "The E-Bomb: How America's New Directed Energy Weapons Will Change the Way Wars Will Be Fought in the Future." Beason previously served on the White House staff working for the president's science adviser under both the Bush and Clinton administrations.

After more than two decades of research, the United States is on the verge of deploying a new generation of weapons that discharge beams of energy, such as the Airborne Laser and the Active Denial System, as well as the Tactical High Energy Laser, or THEL.
"History has shown that, without investment in high technology, fighting the next war will be done using the 'last war' type of technique," Beason told Space.com. Putting money into basic and long-range research is critical, Beason said, adding: "You can't always schedule breakthroughs."
A leading expert in directed-energy research for 26 years, Beason is also director of threat reduction here at the Los Alamos National Laboratory. However, he noted that he was expressing his own views rather than the policy of the laboratory, the Defense Department or the Energy Department.
Ripe for transformation?
Though considerable work has been done in lasers, high-power microwaves and other directed-energy technologies, weaponization is still an ongoing process.
For example, work is continuing in the military's Airborne Laser program. It utilizes a megawatt-class, high-energy chemical oxygen iodine laser toted skyward aboard a modified Boeing 747-400 aircraft. Purpose of the program is to enable the detection, tracking and destruction of ballistic missiles in the boost phase, or powered part of their flight.
Similarly, testing of the U.S. Army's Tactical High Energy Laser in White Sands, N.M., has shown the ability of heating high-flying rocket warheads, blasting them with enough energy to make them self-detonate. THEL uses a high-energy, deuterium fluoride chemical laser. A mobile THEL also demonstrated the ability to kill multiple mortar rounds.
Then there's Active Denial Technology - a non-lethal way to use millimeter-wave electromagnetic energy to stop, deter and turn back an advancing adversary. This technology, supported by the U.S. Marines, uses a beam of millimeter waves to heat a foe's skin, causing severe pain without damage, and making the adversary flee the scene.
Beason also pointed to new exciting research areas underway at the Los Alamos National Laboratory: Free-electron laser work with the Navy and a new type of directed energy that operates in the terahertz region.
Niche for new technology
While progress in directed-energy is appreciable, Beason sees two upfront problems in moving the technology forward. One issue has to do with "convincing the warfighter that there's a niche for this new type of weapon," and the other relates to making sure these new systems are not viewed as a panacea to solve all problems. "They are only another tool," he said.
Looming even larger is the role of those who acquire new weapons. "The U.S. could put ourselves in a very disastrous position if we allow our acquisition officials to be non-technically competent," Beason explained.
Over the decades, Beason said that the field of directed-energy has had its share of "snake-oil salesmen", as well as those advocates who overpromised. "It wasn't ready for prime time."
At present, directed-energy systems "are barely limping along with enough money just to prove that they can work," Beason pointed out. Meanwhile, huge slugs of money are being put into legacy-type systems to keep them going.
"It's a matter of priority," Beason said. The time is now to identify high-payoff, directed-energy projects for the smallest amounts of money, he said.
Unknown unknowns
In Beason's view, Active Denial Technology, the Airborne Laser program and the THEL project, as well as supporting technologies such as relay mirrors, are all works in progress that give reason for added support and priority funding.
"I truly believe that as the Airborne Laser goes, so goes the rest of the nation's directed-energy programs. Right now, it's working on the margin. I believe that there are still 'unknown unknowns' out there that are going to occur in science and technology. We think we have the physics defined. We think we have the engineering defined. But something always goes wrong … and we're working too close at the margin," Beason said.
Stepwise demonstration programs that spotlight directed-energy weapon systems are needed, Beason noted. Such in-the-field displays could show off greater beam distance-to-target runs, mobility of hardware, ease-of-operation, battlefield utility and other attributes.
Directed-energy technologies can offer a range of applications, from botching up an enemy's electronics to performing "dial-up" destructive strikes at the speed of light with little or no collateral damage.
Beason said he has a blue-sky idea of his own, which he tags "the voice from heaven." By tuning the resonance of a laser onto Earth's ionosphere, you can create audible frequencies. Like some boom box in the sky, the laser-produced voice could bellow from above down to the target below: "Put down your weapons."
Relay mirrors
Regarding use of directed-energy space weapons, Beason advised that "we'll eventually see it."
However, present-day systems are far too messy. Most high-powered chemical lasers - in the megawatt-class - require onboard fuels and oxidizers to crank out the amount of energy useful for strategic applications. Stability of such a laser system rooted in space is also wanting.
On the other hand, Beason said he expected to see the rise of more efficient lasers - especially solid-state laser systems. "What breakthroughs are needed … I'm not sure. Eventually, I think it's going to happen, but it is going to be a generation after the battlefield lasers."
Shooting beams "through space" is another matter, Beason quickly added. Space-based relay mirrors - even high-altitude airships equipped with relay mirrors - can direct ground-based or air-based laser beams nearly around the world, he said.
"So you're using space … exploiting it. But you are going through space to attack anywhere on Earth," Beason said.
History lesson
Late last year, speaking before the Heritage Foundation in Washington, Beason told his audience that laser energy, the power sources and beam control, as well as knowledge about how laser beams interact with Earth's atmosphere, are quite mature technologies that are ready for the shift into front-line warfare status.
"The good news is that directed energy exists. Directed energy is being tested, and within a few years directed energy is going to be deployed upon the battlefield," Beason reported. "But the bad news is that acquisition policies right now in this nation are one more gear toward evolutionary practices rather than revolutionary practices." - msnbc.msn.com

the above story was written in 2006 - now see this story which is referred to briefly at the top of this page
Electomagnetic Weapons
Esoteric Info on Electromagnetic Weapons
from Conspiracy Buff 8676147 - Mon Aug 24 22:58:24 1998
that's 8 years ago folks!
An artist's conception shows a reddish beam emanating from an Airborne Laser system, with another beam being used against missiles in the background. In reality, the beam itself might be invisible.

This is a conceptual look at putting a solid-state laser on an armored ground combat vehicle for potential use in the U.S. military's Future Combat Systems program.

Oct 2001:
"Heavily defended targets, deep-in-country targets, hard and deeply buried facilities, wmd targets and time-sensitive targets all must be taken out to deny an adversary's ability to prosecute a conflict or prevent the US and its allies from
combating aggression of whatever kind.
Whether delivered by a space plane or other technology, it is of critical importance that we get such a capability. A Military Space Plane, a Hypersonic cruise vehicle, a Space Operations Vehicle, a Space Based Platform, an Air Launched Global Strike System, and a Directed Energy Strike System, in part or together could form a systems of systems approach to this problem. The technologies are critical to avoid escalation of a crisis and to quickly prevent an adversary from coercing neighboring countries." Testimony of Peter R. Huessy, President of PRH & Company, Potomac,

Common Aero Vehicle (CAV)

"whako's" plane
Pentagon Has Far-Reaching Defense Spacecraft in Works
2005: Bush Administration Looking to Space to Fight Threats
The Pentagon is working to develop a suborbital space capsule within the next five years that would be launched from the United States and could deliver conventional weapons anywhere in the world within two hours, defense officials said.
This year, the Falcon program will test a launcher for its Common Aero Vehicle (CAV), an unmanned maneuverable spacecraft that would travel at five times the speed of sound and could carry 1,000 pounds of munitions, intelligence sensors or other payloads. Among the system's strengths is that commanders could order a CAV -- an unpowered glide vehicle -- not to release its payload if they decided not to follow through with an attack.
The first-generation CAV, expected to be ready by 2010, will have "an incredible capability to provide the warfighter with a global reach capability against high payoff targets," Gen. Lance W. Lord, commander of Air Force Space Command, told the House Armed Services Committee last Wednesday.
Within the next three years, the Falcon program hopes to enter a second stage of the effort: flight-testing two versions of a reusable hypersonic cruise vehicle, sometimes referred to as a space plane, that could travel a suborbital path, about 100,000 feet high, carrying a CAV anywhere in the world. Unlike a missile, the vehicle could return to its base after releasing the CAV to deliver bombs or intelligence sensors. - Global Security

THIS LOOKS AN AWFUL LOT LIKE THE "AURORA"

People have been seeing this ship FOR YEARS

2005 - A Hypersonic Cruise Vehicle capable of taking off from a conventional military runway and striking targets as far as 9,000 miles away is one of three aerial vehicles under conceptual development under the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency's FALCON initiative.Defense gov.

Conceptualized "Aurora"
Flashback: On 16 November 1998, a camcorder video was taken of a mysterious "fireball" in the sky. While this was very interesting, what was even more amazing was the aircraft which was seen shortly after flying at very high speed producing the mysterious "donuts-on-a-rope" contrails. Does this video, which is currently undergoing intense study at JPL, show the mysterious Aurora spyplane? Above Top Secret

The excuse for secrecy -
"If we admit this is operational - they'll Nuke us!" -
The conferees agree to provide $29,110,000 for the Air Force and DARPA FALCON/Common Aero Vehicle (CAV) programs. The conferees are concerned that safeguards are not in place to guarantee that nations possessing nuclear weapons capabilities would not misinterpret the intent or use of the FALCON/CAV programs. Therefore, the funds provided herein are for the development of hypersonic technologies for non-weapons related research, such as micro-satellite or other satellite launch requirements and other purposes as listed under the conferees recommendations. The conferees direct that none of the funds provided in this Act may be used to develop, integrate, or test a CAV variant that includes any nuclear or conventional weapon. The conferees further direct that none of the funds provided in this Act may be used to develop, integrate, or test a CAV for launch on any Intercontinental Ballistic Missile or Submarine Launched Ballistic Missile. The Committees on Appropriations will consider expanding the scope of this program in subsequent years if safeguards negotiated among our international partners have been put in place. House Report 108-622 - MAKING APPROPRIATIONS FOR THE DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE FOR THE FISCAL YEAR ENDING SEPTEMBER 30, 2005, AND FOR OTHER PURPOSES

Read that amount again: 29 million dollars...That is not even enough to buy a decent pro football player!
And yet this is supposedly to fund 'development' of this sinister spaceship
You know what?...I think these are actually the running costs... that this bird has been flying for a while now...

Here is what this thing can do -

Common Aero Vehicle is a maneuvering reentry vehicle capable of carrying a payload (primarily munitions) down from a suborbital or orbital atmospheric reentry and either impacting a target directly or dispensing munitions at a chosen dispense location and condition. CAV has a relatively high hypersonic lift to drag ratio (L/D) to give good cross-range. CAV cross-range is roughly 1000 times the hypersonic L/D and typical CAV hypersonic L/Ds of 2.0-3.0 thus give 2000-3000 nautical miles of cross-range. CAV needs to be deployed at very high velocities to be effective and Mach numbers less than 20 for suborbital deliveries produce relatively short ranges and cross-ranges.
DARPAÂ's FALCON (Force Application and Launch from CONUS) program will produce a CAV capable of providing a reasonable penetrator capability from an expendable launch vehicle or retired ICBM in the 2008 timeframe. FALCON has no funding for any on-orbit CAV effort. Common Aero Vehicle doc. file

Any time, any place on Earth
The Air Force has spent billions of dollars developing a space-based system able to deploy weapons at a moment's notice to strike any location on the face of the Earth. Here are some examples:
Common Aero Vehicles
Launched from a military space plane, the Common Aero Vehicle would be able to deliver up to 1,000 pounds of munitions to a target 3,000 nautical miles away (1 nautical mile = 6,076 feet). From space it could hit deeply buried bunkers as well as mobile targets.
Hypervelocity Rods

pic source

Hypervelocity Rod Bundles - nicknamed Rods from God - could hit ground targets anywhere in the world from space. Long metal rods weighing perhaps 100 kilograms and deployed from an orbiting platform would strike at a speed of about 7,200 miles per hour.
Lasers

pic source

The Evolutionary Air and Space Global Laser Engagement concept involves "airborne, terrestrial, or space-based lasers in conjunction with space-based relay mirrors to project different laser powers and frequencies to achieve a broad range of effects from illumination to destruction."
Sources: Air Force; Department of Defense; Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency - Debate intensifies over weapons in space Administration wants to protect military satellites
U.S. Air Force Plans for Future War in Space

China looks to launch moon probe in three years
2003-10-08 12:44:00
BEIJING, Oct.8, (Xinhuanet) -- China plans to launch an explorer to the Moon as early as in three years time. The Beijing Youth Daily newspaper reports that the Chang'e lunar probe will probably take a three-phase journey to the Moon, which is 380 thousand kilometers from earth.
Named after a mythical lady who flew to the Moon for a lonely but peaceful and harmonious life, Chang'e will travel for less than week, before its lunar orbiting mission. China plans to conduct experiments related to a moon landing, said a senior science official Sunday.
"China will continue to develop its space exploration plans. At a future time, China will carry out lunar landing and flight experiments," Wang Shuquan, deputy secretary of the Commission for Science, Technology and Industry for National Defence, was quoted as saying.
The report on the website of China News service said Wang had mentioned China's plans to put a man in space, but gave no details such as the exact date of the launch. China is expected in the next few days to become only the third country to put a person into orbit after the former Soviet Union and the United States. China's long-term space plans are expected to include an unmanned probe to the moon, followed by a manned lunar mission, experts have said. Enditem (People's Daily October 6, 2003)

Here is a picture
of a spaceman,
go back to sleep...
We haven't been to the moon since 1972! HONEST!???
doesn't this sound like a Bad 007 movie? vee must re-produce on zee moon...!
Human Noah's Ark plan for moon
LONDON, England (CNN) September 8, 2004 -- A Noah's Ark-type base could be established on the moon to sustain life in the event of a catastrophe on Earth, according to Europe's top space scientist.
Dr. Bernard Foing told CNN that while the risk of a nuclear war was low, it was possible that an asteroid could hit Earth in the next 400 years and eradicate life. The chief research scientist at the European Space Agency (ESA) said on Wednesday one solution would be to set up a permanent lunar base where humans could survive and repopulate Earth after a catastrophe. While Foing stressed the idea of a Noah's Ark was one he had proposed and was not an official ESA policy, the agency's first unmanned mission to the moon is scheduled to arrive in November. Other robotic probes could follow.

"We hope to have the first manned mission to the moon by 2020," Foing said from the British Association Science Festival in Exeter. "Perhaps five years later it would be possible to establish a permanent lunar base with a closed biosphere where a crew of 10 people could live for 100 days at a time. "There we could conduct experiments and learn to be independent of Earth by living off the moon's resources: by using solar energy and the minerals from the soil. "The next project would be to build a real community on the moon comprising hundreds of people of both sexes. "In the event of a catastrophe on Earth -- either caused by a nuclear attack or an asteroid collision, which we hope would not happen -- using samples of all organisms and a DNA repository, a Noah's Ark could be used to repopulate Earth when it was safe to return."
Foing said the moon -- which man last visited in 1972 -- [oh really?] had an environment most similar to that of Earth so it was a "wise investment" to ensure that life could be sustained there. He said the ESA was cooperating with space programs in other countries, such as the United States, Japan and China, to make use of all the different systems and resources.
U.S. President George W. Bush announced an initiative this year to spend $12 billion on a new space exploration plan over next five years. CNN news for idiots....

China astronauts blast into space
China has successfully launched its second manned spacecraft, carrying two Chinese astronauts into orbit.
The lift-off, from Jiuquan in the Gobi desert, was shown live on state television and included views from a camera on the outside of the craft. The mission is expected to see the Shenzhou VI orbit the Earth for five days, during which the astronauts will carry out experiments. It comes almost exactly two years after China's first manned space flight.
In a sign of growing official confidence about the programme, the launch was announced in advance and broadcast in full on state television. The two men chosen for the mission, former fighter pilots Fei Junlong and Nie Haisheng, were selected after a rigorous screening process. TV pictures of the two men were seen by millions of people across China, as the rocket blasted off at 0900 local time (0100 GMT).
"Feeling pretty good," Mr Fei said, in the first broadcast comments from the craft.
State television later reported that the two men had eaten pineapple-filled moon cakes for breakfast. The astronauts' mission is expected to be more complicated, and last longer, than the 2003 launch.
China's official media has speculated that the space capsule will be in orbit for five days, circling the Earth up to 80 times before landing in the Chinese region of Inner Mongolia.
China's official media said the astronauts would take off their space suits and travel back and forth between two parts of the spacecraft - a re-entry capsule and an orbiter. They are also expected to carry out various experiments.
Elite club
Shenzhou VI, like Shenzhou V, has been influenced by Russia's Soyuz spacecraft, a model developed in the late 1960s. Beijing has attached great importance to its space programme, viewing it as a source of national pride and international prestige. Shortly after the take-off, Chinese Prime Minister Wen Jiabao congratulated all involved in the programme, saying the flight had been a "success".
China's first manned space voyage two years ago made it only the third country to launch a human into space on its own, along with Russia and the US. The astronaut chosen for that mission - Yang Liwei - was hailed as a national hero on his return to Earth. China hopes to set up a space station within five years and eventually it wants to put an astronaut on the moon.
A Chinese official was quoted by Xinhua as saying that spending on the Shenzhou project had reached $2.3bn, compared to US' annual space budget of $16bn. - bbc.co.uk

2005 - NASA unveils vision for return to Moon
Four astronauts will fly to the Moon in a new spacecraft in 2018, then land and walk on the surface, according a new plan revealed by NASA on Monday. The plan is very similar to the Apollo lunar programme of the 1960s and 1970s, but will incorporate elements of the shuttle programme.
"Think of it as Apollo on steroids," says NASA administrator Michael Griffin. The Crew Exploration Vehicle (CEV) capsule will weigh about 50% more than the Apollo capsule. "But understand, we did not set out to make it look like Apollo," he adds, explaining that the design was simply the best option out of all those considered.
The new Moon programme will have timetable of 13 years instead of Apollo's 8, and the crew of four astronauts is double the number that landed on the Moon first time around. The maximum time the first astronauts will spend on the Moon's surface will also increase to seven days from Apollo's three.
The "something-old-something-new project" will build heavily on space shuttle hardware. It will use revamped versions of the shuttle's solid rocket boosters, external tank and main engines, but will scrap the system's most familiar component, the winged orbiter.
[snip]
Some critics are already complaining that the new vision looks too much like the 40-year-old Apollo programme and that it will take too long. And some key US Congressional leaders are already sounding a cautionary note about the cost. - new scientist

Russia, China could create spacecraft to explore Mars, the Moon
31/ 10/ 2005 - SANYA (China), October 31 (RIA Novosti) - Russia and China are considering jointly creating spacecraft to explore Mars and the Moon, a senior official of the Russian Federal Space Agency Roscosmos said Monday.
Roscosmos deputy head Yury Nosenko said Russia proposed that both countries develop a small satellite to orbit Mars and that the 2008-2009 Mars exploration program proposed launching one or two light satellites into Mars' orbit to transmit data to earth.
The Roscosmos official also said Russia could offer China its help to explore the Moon within the Chinese space program.
"We will participate in exploring the Moon within the Chinese space program until China reaches the stage of a joint project," the official said.
According to Nosenko, Russia plans to create a satellite to study the Moon by 2012 and proposed that China participate in the project. A final stage in the Moon's exploration could be the creation of conditions for sending cosmonauts there, Nosenko said.
China has already added two successful launches of its manned space vehicles into orbit to its resume. China's first manned flight two years ago made it the third country to launch a human into space on its own along with Russia and the U.S. - en.rian.ru

Israeli spy satellite to monitor Iranian nuclear programme to launch with help of Russians
25th April 2006 - Ireland OnLine reports - Israel is to launch a spy satellite today to collect information on Iran's nuclear programme. The Eros B satellite is capable of spotting images on the ground as small as 70 centimetres, the Israeli daily newspaper Yediot Ahronot reported. The satellite, a more sophisticated version of the Eros A that is currently in space, will be launched in Russia.
"We are talking about an extraordinary capability that will allow intelligence officials to follow small details in sensitive places," Yediot quoted an unnamed Israeli expert as saying. "This camera has a sharp eye that sees everything."
so they didn't use this on Iraq to spot potential WMD - because they hadn't got the technology? BOLLOCKS!

Satellites already spying? spotting Nuke bunkers in Iran? More Psyops from Mainstream Media?
April 18 (UPI) UPI reported on a Telegraph report!: A former U.N. weapons inspector claims satellite imagery indicates Iran is building underground nuclear facilities south of Tehran. David Albright, a former U.N. weapons inspector who now works for the Institute for Science and International Security in Washington, said commercially available pictures show construction work on two huge fuel enrichment halls at Natanz, about 180 miles south of Tehran. Each structure is about 480-by-510 foot, he told The Telegraph.
But David Allbrights actual report stipulated this:
Estimates of Iran's nuclear capabilities, accomplishments, and timelines need far greater public and Congressional scrutiny than they are currently receiving. This scrutiny becomes even more important as those in the Bush Administration who favor confronting Iran and pressing for regime change may be hyping up Iran's nuclear threat and trying to undermine intelligence assessments that Iran is several years from having nuclear weapons.
William Bowles has more

click to enlarge

NY TIMES reports Iran launched Microsatellite in October...with help of Russians
The spacecraft is small by world standards - a microsatellite of a few hundred pounds. Launched in October by the Russians for an oil-rich client, it orbits the earth once every 99 minutes and reportedly has a camera for peering down on large swaths of land.
If Iran can build and test a nuclear weapon, and prove that it has the capability to build and launch a satellite, even a small one, it will join a new category of states that could be referred to as "mini-superpowers." A nation that can launch a satellite can theoretically build an ICBM. - source
yeah! and because ICBM are Ballistic [have a prescribed course that cannot be altered after the missile has burned its fuel ] they could also perform a re-entry into the atmosphere & drop a satellite on a city somewhere too...
Hey! why is no one mentioning that one?...not fitting with the regime change gameplan? wooooooo! scary!
is this why NASA were playing with impacting a comet with a probe the size of a micro-satellite?
ESA's Probe microsatellite[top left] is about the size of a washing machine

Russians announce Space based Ionospheric Earthquake prediction / measument program
A Russian strategic nuclear-powered submarine is poised to launch an innovative, compact, 80-kg spacecraft from the Barents Sea in the second quarter of this year. The Compass 2 satellite is expected to help make the first step in the practical forecasting of earthquakes from space.
The move comes as a result of extensive research into specific phenomena in the Earth's magnetosphere and ionosphere, often observed prior to earthquakes, by the Institute of Terrestrial Magnetism, Ionosphere and Radio Waves Propagation (IZMIRAN) of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
The International Space Station has been long helping collect ionosphere information. Thanks to the ISS's low orbit, some research programs crucial for the future Vulkan disaster forecasting system have been conducted here as part of a broader effort codenamed Uragan (Hurricane).
On the ground, the Vulkan will include a network of geophysical laboratories, a downlink station and an analysis center. The ground facilities lack the scope and access to recordable events, which explains the need for an orbital component to yield a global survey of seismic activity with accurately timed warnings (one to five days between a precursor and a possible earthquake).
All in all, two groups of small satellites are to be deployed at 400-500- and 900-1,000-km solar synchronous orbits. When fully operational, the Vulkan's ground and spaceborne components will collect, process and analyze the disaster precursor data, thus contributing to medium-, long- and short-term plans of emergency management services in Russia and internationally.
case study: 2004 tsunami

Military Studies Altering
Earth's Ionosphere

"If radio transmissions are long and powerful enough, the beams actually change the distribution of electrons in the ionosphere, altering for a brief time literally the way the sky is put together. "

Carlyle Group owned QinetiQ involved in Asteroid threat evaluation
ESA has been addressing the problem of how to prevent large Near-Earth Objects (NEOs) from colliding with the Earth for some time. In 1996 the Council of Europe called for the Agency to take action as part of a long-term global strategy for remedies against possible impacts . Recommendations from other international organisations, including the UN and the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), soon followed.
ESA commissioned a number of threat evaluation and mission studies through its General Studies Programme (GSP). In July 2004 the preliminary phase was completed when a panel of experts appointed by ESA recommended giving the Don Quijote asteroid-deflecting mission concept maximum priority for implementation.
Now it is time for industry to put forward their best design solutions for the mission. Following an invitation to tender and the subsequent evaluation process, three industrial teams have been awarded a contract to carry out the mission phase-A studies:
a team with Alcatel Alenia Space as prime contractor includes subcontractors and consultants from across Europe and Canada; Alcatel Alenia Space developed the Huygens Titan probe and is currently working on the ExoMars mission
a consortium led by EADS Astrium, which includes Deimos Space from Spain and consultants from several European countries, brings their experience of working on the design of many successful ESA interplanetary missions such as Rosetta, Mars and Venus Express
a team led by QinetiQ (UK), which includes companies and partners in Sweden and Belgium, draws on their expertise in mini and micro satellites including ESA s SMART-1 and Proba projects
This month the three teams began work and a critical milestone will take place in October when the studies will be reviewed by ESA with the support of an international panel of experts. The results of this phase will be available next year.

- a US defense report noted that: "A Hong Kong newspaper article in January 2001 reported that China had developed and ground-tested and would soon begin space-testing an antisatellite (ASAT) system described as a 'parasitic microsatellite.' This claim is being evaluated."
Are Parasite satellites really a hoax?
In congressional reports and testimony, the Pentagon suggested in 2003 that China may be developing a "parasite microsatellite"-a small satellite, weighing less than 100 kilograms, that would secretly attach to an American satellite and destroy it on command. The claim was picked up by the press including the online news outlets Space Daily and Space.com, the latter noting that "China appears to be sharpening its war fighting space skills" and then devoting a third of the story to the "parasite microsatellite." In the end, it turned out to be all a hoax. Although a representative from the Pentagon noted that their claim was based on a single story that had appeared in a Hong Kong tabloid but was "being evaluated," the Pentagon never actually looked into the assertion. A pair of scholars recently discovered the story and more than 70 others like it in Chinese sources appear to have originated on a single Internet bulletin board maintained by a self-described "space enthusiast" from a small town in Anhui province. How could the Pentagon be so gullible?
April 14, 2006 - Joint US-Taiwan satellites launched
A six-satellite mission, a joint US- Taiwan project, was launched successfully from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California, the government in Taiwan confirmed Saturday. The rocket, which was launched Friday [14th April] evening California time, carried six small weather satellites at once, on a five-year mission to track hurricanes, monitor climate change and study space weather, Space.com reported. The 100-million-dollar venture was funded by the government of Taiwan and several US agencies, including the National Science Foundation. A Minotaur rocket carried the crafts aloft after 6:30 pm local time, into orbit about 400 kilometres above Earth.
The entire project, known as FORMOSAT-3, "is an important cooperation between Taiwan and the US," Taiwan President Chen Shui-bian said. "Through it, we hope to exchange meteorological data with foreign countries and raise Taiwan's international status in the field of meteorology." He made his remarks in a videotaped message to the Taiwan-US team in California. FORMOSAT-3, Taiwan's third satellite, is also called Constellation Observing System for Meteorology, Ionosphere and Climate (COSMIC).
The low-orbiting satellites are intended to help improve forecasting space weather and in foreseeing geomagnetic storms that can disrupt satellite and communications systems on Earth.

what if... it comes to a shooting war ... ?
China has played it's trump card by activating its maneuverable "parasite" micro-satellites that have unknowingly clung to vital (NORAD) radar and communication satellites and have either jammed, blinded or physically destroyed their hosts.

Administration Researches Laser Weapon
By WILLIAM J. BROAD - May 3, 2006 nytimes.com
The Bush administration is seeking to develop a powerful ground-based laser weapon that would use beams of concentrated light to destroy enemy satellites in orbit.
The largely secret project, parts of which have been made public through Air Force budget documents submitted to Congress in February, is part of a wide-ranging effort to develop space weapons, both defensive and offensive. No treaty or law forbids such work.
The laser research was described by federal officials who would speak only on the condition of anonymity because of the topic's political sensitivity. The White House has recently sought to play down the issue of space arms, fearing it could become an election-year liability.
Indeed, last week Republicans and Democrats on a House Armed Services subcommittee moved unanimously to cut research money for the project in the administration's budget for the 2007 fiscal year. While Republicans on the panel would not discuss their reasons for the action, Congressional aides said it reflected a bipartisan consensus for moving cautiously on space weaponry, a potentially controversial issue that has yet to be much debated.
The full committee is expected to take up the budget issue today.
The laser research is far more ambitious than a previous effort by the Clinton administration nearly a decade ago to test an antisatellite laser. It would take advantage of an optical technique that uses sensors, computers and flexible mirrors to counteract the atmospheric turbulence that seems to make stars twinkle.
The weapon would essentially reverse that process, shooting focused beams of light upward with great clarity and force.
Though futuristic and technically challenging, the laser work is relatively inexpensive by government standards - about $20 million in 2006, with planned increases to some $30 million by 2011 - partly because no weapons are as yet being built and partly because the work is being done at an existing base, an unclassified government observatory called Starfire in the New Mexico desert.
In interviews, military officials defended the laser research as prudent, given the potential need for space arms to defend American satellites against attack in the years and decades ahead. "The White House wants us to do space defense," said a senior Pentagon official who oversees many space programs, including the laser effort. "We need that ability to protect our assets" in orbit.
But some Congressional Democrats and other experts fault the research as potential fuel for an antisatellite arms race that could ultimately hurt this nation more than others because the United States relies so heavily on military satellites, which aid navigation, reconnaissance and attack warning.
In a statement, Representative Loretta Sanchez, a California Democrat on the subcommittee who opposes the laser's development, thanked her Republican colleagues for agreeing to curb a program "with the potential to weaponize space."
Theresa Hitchens, director of the Center for Defense Information, a private group in Washington that tracks military programs, said the subcommittee's action last week was a significant break with the administration. "It's really the first time you've seen the Republican-led Congress acknowledge that these issues require public scrutiny," she said.
In a statement, the House panel, the Armed Services Subcommittee on Strategic Forces, made no reference to such policy disagreements but simply said that "none of the funds authorized for this program shall be used for the development of laser space technologies with antisatellite purposes."
It is unclear whether the Republican-controlled Congress will sustain the subcommittee's proposed cut to the administration's request, even if the full House Armed Services Committee backs the reduction.
The Air Force has pursued the secret research for several years but discussed it in new detail in its February budget request. The documents stated that for the 2007 fiscal year, starting in October, the research will seek to "demonstrate fully compensated laser propagation to low earth orbit satellites."
The documents listed several potential uses of the laser research, the first being "antisatellite weapons."
The overall goal of the research, the documents said, is to assess unique technologies for "high-energy laser weapons," in what engineers call a proof of concept. Previously, the laser work resided in a budget category that paid for a wide variety of space efforts, the documents said. But for the new fiscal year, it has moved under the heading "Advanced Weapons Technology."
In interviews, Pentagon officials said the policy rationale for the arms research dated from a 1996 presidential directive in the Clinton administration that allows "countering, if necessary, space systems and services used for hostile purposes."
In 1997, the American military fired a ground-based laser in New Mexico at an American spacecraft, calling it a test of satellite vulnerability. Federal experts said recently that the laser had had no capability to do atmospheric compensation and that the test had failed to do any damage.
Little else happened until January 2001, when a commission led by Donald H. Rumsfeld, then the newly nominated defense secretary, warned that the American military faced a potential "Pearl Harbor" in space and called for a defensive arsenal of space weapons.
The Starfire research is part of that effort.
Federal officials and private experts said the antisatellite work drew on a body of unclassified advances that have made the Starfire researchers world-famous among astronomers. Their most important unclassified work centers on using small lasers to create artificial stars that act as beacons to guide the process of atmospheric compensation.
When astronomers use the method, they aim a small laser at a point in the sky close to a target star or galaxy, and the concentrated light excites molecules of air (or, at higher altitudes, sodium atoms in the upper atmosphere) to glow brightly.
Distortions in the image of the artificial star as it returns to Earth are measured continuously and used to deform the telescope's flexible mirror and rapidly correct for atmospheric turbulence. That sharpens images of both the artificial star and the astronomical target.
Unclassified pictures of Starfire in action show a pencil-thin laser beam shooting up from its hilltop observatory into the night sky.
The Starfire researchers are now investigating how to use guide stars and flexible mirrors in conjunction with powerful lasers that could flash their beams into space to knock out enemy satellites, according to federal officials and Air Force budget documents.
"These are really smart folks who are optimistic about their technology," said the senior Pentagon official. "We want those kind of people on our team."
But potential weapon applications, he added, if one day approved, "are out there years and years and years into the future."
The research centers on Starfire's largest telescope, which Air Force budget documents call a "weapon-class beam director." Its main mirror, 11.5 feet in diameter, can gather in faint starlight or, working in the opposite direction, direct powerful beams of laser light skyward.
Federal officials said Starfire's antisatellite work had grown out of one of the site's other military responsibilities: observing foreign satellites and assessing their potential threat to the United States. In 2000, the Air Force Research Laboratory, which runs Starfire, said the observatory's large telescope, by using adaptive optics, could distinguish objects in orbit the size of a basketball at a distance of 1,000 miles.
Another backdrop to the antisatellite work is Starfire's use of telescopes, adaptive optics and weak lasers to track and illuminate satellites. It is considered a baby step toward developing a laser powerful enough to cripple spacecraft.
Col. Gregory Vansuch, who oversees Starfire research for the Air Force Research Laboratory, said in an interview that the facility used weak lasers and the process of atmospheric compensation to illuminate satellites "all the time." Such tests, Colonel Vansuch emphasized, are always done with the written permission of the satellite's owner.
He said that about once a month, Starfire conducted weeklong experiments that illuminate satellites up to 20 times.
Though the House subcommittee recommended eliminating all financing next year for antisatellite laser research, it retained money for other laser development. Congressional aides said the proposed cut to the Air Force's $21.4 million budget request for such work would eliminate two of three areas of development, for a total reduction of $6.5 million.
At least one public-interest group has seized on the issue. Last week, the Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space, based in Brunswick, Me., said that if Congress approved the antisatellite money, "the barrier to weapons in space will have been destroyed."

Flashback: Los Angeles Times January 12, 1986 - front page
'Star Wars' Lasers Held - Able to Incinerate Cities
Consequences of Resulting Massive Firestorms - Called as Disastrous as Those of 'Nuclear Winter'
By Robert Scheer, Times Staff Writer LIVERMORE, Calif. - Story from 1986- source
Laser weapons being developed as part of President Reagan's Strategic Defense Initiative could more easily be used to incinerate enemy cities than to protect the United States against Soviet missiles, according to an article in the current issue of a leading physics magazine and a separate study being circulated among government weapons scientists.
Many advocates of the "Star Wars" defense systems hope lasers fired down from space stations or shot up from the Earth and reflected off space-based mirrors onto targets below may one day be part of a defensive shield against enemy missiles. But new analysis suggests that high-intensity laser light from such weapons could also be used offensively to unleash massive firestorms, possibly producing an environmental disaster similar to a "nuclear winter."
Non-Nuclear Armageddon
The study, which was produced by R&D Associates, an influential defense think tank based in Marina del Rey, cites data indicating that, "in a matter of hours, a laser defense system powerful enough to cope with the ballistic missile threat can also destroy the enemy's major cities by fire. The attack would proceed city by city, the attack time for each city being only a matter of minutes. Not nuclear destruction, but Armageddon all the same."
Lasers "have the potential of initiating massive urban fires and even of destroying the enemy's major cities by fire in a matter of hours," according to the article by Caroline L. Herzenberg, a government physicist at the Argonne National Laboratory near Chicago.
"Such mass fires might be expected to generate smoke in amounts comparable to the amounts generated in some major nuclear exchange scenarios," the article in the current issue of Physics and Society, a publication of the American Physical Society, warned. This could cause "a climatic catastrophe similar to 'nuclear winter,'" a reference to the disastrous lowering of the Earth's temperature many scientists believe would result from a nuclear war.
The R&D study does not mention a "nuclear winter" but does stress that lasers are not intrinsically defensive weapons and can be used offensively to start massive fires. "The lasers can be employed in a manner not contemplated by the (Strategic Defense Initiative)," caution Albert L. Latter and Ernest A. Martinelli, who wrote the eight-page R&D Associates study and are highly regarded advocates of a stronger U.S. defense. "Specifically, they can be targeted against the same entities they were designed to protect: the cities.

The fires in California

Total World domination through Lasers in space...targeting you!!!
Global space based dominance
we have seen the testing of Lasers aboard 747's? Where else?

"After spending hundreds of billions of dollars, we would be back where we started from: deterrence by retaliation. Our cities would be hostage to lasers instead of nuclear weapons," the report said.
President Reagan has offered ultimately to share "Star Wars" technology with the Soviet Union. But the R&D Associates report suggests that such weapons in the hands of the Soviets might prove menacing: "A Soviet laser weapon system . . . powerful enough to defend against the U.S. ballistic missile threat can incinerate our cities without warning on a time scale of minutes-per-city; minutes to hours for the whole country. To deter such an attack, the U.S. could only threaten to retaliate."
The authors suggested that laser weapons might also be used against Soviet conventional forces. "For those who have advocated limited nuclear options against the Soviet Union itself, limited laser options would produce less collateral damage and be just as effective otherwise," they wrote.
The danger of laser-induced fires had not been much noticed by critics or proponents of the Strategic Defense Initiative until the appearance of the article and the R&D study. When asked to comment, a Strategic Defense Initiative spokeswoman stated on a non-attribution basis after checking with other officials that "lasers could start fires." But she added that "this is not a problem that we are addressing at this time. It is not the intention of (the Strategic Defense Initiative) to start fires. This is an anti-ballistic (missile) program."
She denied also that lasers designed for defense could be used as offensive weapons. "They would have to be designed differently to cause fires," she said. However, in an interview Friday, Herzenberg, the author of the physics magazine article, responded that "all you need is to dump enough energy on something and, if it's flammable, it will go up. The free electron laser, the excimer laser, and the deuterium fluoride chemical laser (which are the subjects of current research) all can go through the atmosphere and cause fires."
The free electron laser is being developed at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory here. However, lab spokesman Norris Smith said that "the lab will have no comment" on the matter.
Theodore A. Postol, until recently adviser on nuclear weapons to the chief of naval operations and an expert on the implications of firestorms, said: "If you were attempting to set fires with an optical laser that was already sufficiently powerful to attack hardened ICBM boosters, there is no question that such a device could also be used to create mass fires of enormous scale and ferocity-mass urban fires potentially larger and more intense than those created by the great incendiary raids on Hamburg and Dresden in World War II."

Moonbase or Deathstar?
the real STAR WARS PROJECT?

"That's no moon...that's a SPACE STATION!"

click

Earth-Moon-Earth - Bouncing signals off the Moon?
To reach targets around the world you could design a floating mobile HAARP that would have to equal the surface area of five large aircraft carriers or 8 super tankers tied together costing billions of dollars, or you could use a stationary permanent array such as HAARP and use the moon as a reflector to effectively bounce your signals anywhere on Earth given mutual Moon visibility between the source and the target! Ham radio enthusiasts call this reflection technique EME (Earth-Moon-Earth) or Moonbounce, and have been utilizing the moon with High Frequencies since the 1950's to communicate around the world. HAARP can transmit both Low and High Frequencies.
HAARP array may use Moon as a reflector to reach distant targets on Earth to create Nuclear-Sized Explosions Without Radiation!
LUNAR / SATELLITE BASED ENVIRONMENTAL CONTROL?
wireless transmission of power Not Possible?