Military Intelligence
Jim Carr
While checking the NYTimes today, I could not help but note that
their historic headline du jour was from 4 October 1957 when
Sputnik was launched. The article by William J. Jorden includes
the following (sadly unattributed) tidbits about Sputnik:
" Military experts have said that the satellites would have no
practicable military application in the foreseeable future.
They said, however, that study of such satellites could
provide valuable information that might be applied to flight
studies for intercontinental ballistic missiles.
The satellites could not be used to drop atomic of hydrogen
bombs or anything else on the earth, scientists have said. Nor
could they be used in connection with the proposed plan for
aerial inspection of military forces around the world. "
Sweet, eh?
--
James A. Carr <j...@scri.fsu.edu> | Commercial e-mail is _NOT_
http://www.scri.fsu.edu/~jac/ | desired to this or any address
Supercomputer Computations Res. Inst. | that resolves to my account
Florida State, Tallahassee FL 32306 | for any reason at any time.
Joe Fischer
: While checking the NYTimes today, I could not help but note that
: Sputnik was launched. The article by William J. Jorden includes
: the following (sadly unattributed) tidbits about Sputnik:
:
: " Military experts have said that the satellites would have no
: practicable military application in the foreseeable future.
Sputnik was about the size of a softball,
and beeped, not really a lethal weapon. :-)
: They said, however, that study of such satellites could
: provide valuable information that might be applied to flight
: studies for intercontinental ballistic missiles.
And a complete Atlas rocket was already assembled,
and the whole thing, except for the half stage, could have
been placed in LEO anytime.
: The satellites could not be used to drop atomic of hydrogen
: bombs or anything else on the earth, scientists have said. Nor
: could they be used in connection with the proposed plan for
: aerial inspection of military forces around the world. "
:
: Sweet, eh?
Pretty accurate appraisal, it was 1957. Without
CCD imaging, it would essentially all still be true. :-)
Joe Fischer
MILKY WAY
Michael Kagalenko
]: While checking the NYTimes today, I could not help but note that
]: their historic headline du jour was from 4 October 1957 when
]: Sputnik was launched. The article by William J. Jorden includes
]: the following (sadly unattributed) tidbits about Sputnik:
]:
]: " Military experts have said that the satellites would have no
]: practicable military application in the foreseeable future.
]
] Sputnik was about the size of a softball,
]and beeped, not really a lethal weapon. :-)
Sputnik was launched on the rocket that was slightly modified ICBM.
]: They said, however, that study of such satellites could
]: provide valuable information that might be applied to flight
]: studies for intercontinental ballistic missiles.
]
] And a complete Atlas rocket was already assembled,
]and the whole thing, except for the half stage, could have
]been placed in LEO anytime.
Could have been, but wasn't.
]: The satellites could not be used to drop atomic of hydrogen
]: bombs or anything else on the earth, scientists have said. Nor
]: could they be used in connection with the proposed plan for
]: aerial inspection of military forces around the world. "
]:
]: Sweet, eh?
]
] Pretty accurate appraisal, it was 1957. Without
]CCD imaging, it would essentially all still be true. :-)
No, it wouldn't. Look up "Corona" at www.fas.org .
Harry H Conover
:
: While checking the NYTimes today, I could not help but note that
: their historic headline du jour was from 4 October 1957 when
: Sputnik was launched. The article by William J. Jorden includes
: the following (sadly unattributed) tidbits about Sputnik:
:
: " Military experts have said that the satellites would have no
: practicable military application in the foreseeable future.
: provide valuable information that might be applied to flight
: studies for intercontinental ballistic missiles.
: bombs or anything else on the earth, scientists have said. Nor
: could they be used in connection with the proposed plan for
: aerial inspection of military forces around the world. "
:
: Sweet, eh?
Jim, you and I both are aware that there is a legitimate need not to
tell the public everything. Given the absolute horror and shock
reaction that Sputnik created in the scientific and defense sectors,
I can only imagine the public outcry and panic that would have erupted
in the public sector if the total potential impact of this even had
been surfaced. (At the time I was still a student, but had close friends
working as co-op students on our Vanguard program at the time. It was
absolute chaos for those on the inside.)
By the time of Sputnik, the American public was already in a frenzy of
fear as a result of the cold war, and a nuclear attack without warning
seemed a very real possibility. Objective, uncensored reports about the
true significance of Sputnik and the potential for Russian space
superiority would have driven many Americans over the edge.
Recall that at the time, most of our citizens were still barely recovered
from the trauma of WWII when they were suddenly thrust into the Cold War
era, backyard bomb shelters, gas masks, geiger counters, and survival
supplies. Popular discussions centered on what action is approprate
if you neighbors try to invade your fall-out shelter, and if it was
morally justifiable to shoot them if they did! Even as school children,
schools held nearly weekly "duck and cover" drills, and monthly screened
films showing the effects of a nuclear attack.
So, under the circumstances, would you think it advisable to inform the
public that with Sputnik, the Russians had (at least for the moment)
space superiority and the full dimension of military possibilities that
this opened?
I totally oppose censorship of just about every type, but I recognize
that there are (hopefully temporary) periods where it is needed in
limited areas of information.
Harry C.
David Hatunen
Jim Carr <j...@ibms48.scri.fsu.edu> wrote:
>
> While checking the NYTimes today, I could not help but note that
> their historic headline du jour was from 4 October 1957 when
> Sputnik was launched. The article by William J. Jorden includes
> the following (sadly unattributed) tidbits about Sputnik:
>
> " Military experts have said that the satellites would have no
> practicable military application in the foreseeable future.
> They said, however, that study of such satellites could
> provide valuable information that might be applied to flight
> studies for intercontinental ballistic missiles.
>
> The satellites could not be used to drop atomic of hydrogen
> bombs or anything else on the earth, scientists have said.
> Nor could they be used in connection with the proposed plan
> for aerial inspection of military forces around the world. "
>
> Sweet, eh?
What did you expect them to say? Run Henny Penny, the sky is
falling in, the Russians might be able to orbit a bomb in a few
years?
I wonder who these military experts were.
>
>--
> James A. Carr <j...@scri.fsu.edu> | Commercial e-mail is _NOT_
> http://www.scri.fsu.edu/~jac/ | desired to this or any address
> Supercomputer Computations Res. Inst. | that resolves to my account
> Florida State, Tallahassee FL 32306 | for any reason at any time.
--
********** DAVE HATUNEN (hat...@sonic.net) ***********
* Daly City California *
******* My typos are intentional copyright traps ******
Edward Green
> While checking the NYTimes today, I could not help but note that
> their historic headline du jour was from 4 October 1957 when
> Sputnik was launched. The article by William J. Jorden includes
> the following (sadly unattributed) tidbits about Sputnik:
>
> " Military experts have said that the satellites would have no
> practicable military application in the foreseeable future.
> They said, however, that study of such satellites could
> provide valuable information that might be applied to flight
> studies for intercontinental ballistic missiles.
>
> The satellites could not be used to drop atomic of hydrogen
> bombs or anything else on the earth, scientists have said. Nor
> could they be used in connection with the proposed plan for
> aerial inspection of military forces around the world. "
I don't know. Were microelectronics "foreseeable" in 1957? Without
them, the surveillance functions were certainly unforeseeable. And,
for whatever reason, the function of orbital bombardment has never
been developed. So, not particularly farsighted, but not, I think,
up there with the "no foreseeable use for rockets" editorial following
Goddard's work.
The ballistic missile comment was, sadly, right on.
Edward Green
>Jim, you and I both are aware that there is a legitimate need not to
>tell the public everything. Given the absolute horror and shock
>reaction that Sputnik created in the scientific and defense sectors,
>I can only imagine the public outcry and panic that would have erupted
>in the public sector if the total potential impact of this even had
>been surfaced. <...>
Yet oddly, what should have been the most disturbing implication, that
practical ICBM's were not far behind, was made. So where is the
whitewash?
David Hatunen
>Jim Carr (j...@ibms48.scri.fsu.edu) wrote:
>: The satellites could not be used to drop atomic of hydrogen
>: bombs or anything else on the earth, scientists have said.
>: Nor could they be used in connection with the proposed plan
>: for aerial inspection of military forces around the world.
>: "
>:
>: Sweet, eh?
>
>Pretty accurate appraisal, it was 1957. Without CCD imaging, it
>would essentially all still be true. :-)
You must not be aware of the soon used satellite photos taken on
film, then ejected over the Pacific and caught by special
aircraft. Satellites were being used for aerial inspection within a
few years of Sputnik.
Harry H Conover
: Jim Carr <j...@ibms48.scri.fsu.edu> wrote:
:
:
: I don't know. Were microelectronics "foreseeable" in 1957? Without
: them, the surveillance functions were certainly unforeseeable.
Early orbital surveillance functions didn't require microelectronics.
In fact, the earliest "R" and "K" series orbital surveillance systems
were almost entirely electromechanical in functioning, and sent
re-entry packages of actually photographic film back to Earth. In fact,
by around 1966, we had already orbited the moon with a miniature version
of one of these (Lunar Orbiter) which while considerably smaller, used
on-board developed film, and scanned the results using a "flying-spot
scanner" for transmission of the images back to Earth. (Not as good
resolution as returning the actual film, but who wants to return
actual film all the way from the moon?")
Even logic functions were implemented with magnetic latching relays
driven my a minimal amount of power hungry electronics. Also, the film
imaging technique they used is unsurpassed for detailed surveillance
through even today.
These systems were deployed and fully operational within just a few years
after Sputnik.
Harry C.
Edward Green
<...>
>These systems were deployed and fully operational within just a few years
>after Sputnik.
I stand corrected.
Harry H Conover
: Harry H Conover <con...@tiac.net> wrote:
:
: >Jim, you and I both are aware that there is a legitimate need not to
Orbiting surveillance, orbiting MIRV bomb platforms, global communications
capabilities, just to name a few things that might have disturbed the
public just a bit. Just the notion of many nuclear devices in perpetual
orbit and ready to rain down on every major U.S. target awaiting only
a radio signal from Moscow? (Scares the Hell out of me even today.)
Realize that today's public, the vast majority of which have never been
exposed to orchestrated warfare, would not respond to such threats as
did people in the 1950's, many of whom had direct personal experience
with this horror. Indeed, how many readers of this newsgroup were even
alive during man's last experience with this level of systematic destruction
(1945)?
Today, the most terrifying thought for me is that since there has not
been a major global war in over 50 years, a majority of those alive
today have only read about such things. Now you can learn a great
deal about something by reading, but you can never share the essence
of the first hand experience, which in this case is coming face to
face with absolute terror. I beleive that this is why we haven't
seen a major war in over 50-years, but now this situation is changing.
The cowboys, lunatics, and greedy are once again starting to seize power,
and once again history is likely to repeat. This, for me, is far more
terrifying than any horror that science can possibly dish out!
Harry C.
Harry H Conover
: In article <37f9...@news.iglou.com>, Joe Fischer <joe...@iglou.com> wrote:
: >Jim Carr (j...@ibms48.scri.fsu.edu) wrote:
:
: >: The satellites could not be used to drop atomic of hydrogen
: >: bombs or anything else on the earth, scientists have said.
: >: Nor could they be used in connection with the proposed plan
: >: for aerial inspection of military forces around the world.
: >: "
: >:
: >: Sweet, eh?
: >
: >Pretty accurate appraisal, it was 1957. Without CCD imaging, it
: >would essentially all still be true. :-)
:
: You must not be aware of the soon used satellite photos taken on
: film, then ejected over the Pacific and caught by special
: aircraft. Satellites were being used for aerial inspection within a
: few years of Sputnik.
Yep, I worked on two of these big guys when first out of college.
Orbital film systems are still available for use in "special situations"
where only their unrivaled resolution will satisfy the mission needs.
For example, research the KH-11's ancestry.
Harry C.
Russell Crook
>
> Edward Green (e...@panix.com) wrote:
> : Harry H Conover <con...@tiac.net> wrote:
> :
> : >Jim, you and I both are aware that there is a legitimate need not to
> : >tell the public everything. Given the absolute horror and shock
> : >reaction that Sputnik created in the scientific and defense sectors,
> : >I can only imagine the public outcry and panic that would have erupted
> : >in the public sector if the total potential impact of this even had
> : >been surfaced. <...>
> :
> : Yet oddly, what should have been the most disturbing implication, that
> : practical ICBM's were not far behind, was made. So where is the
> : whitewash?
>
> Orbiting surveillance, orbiting MIRV bomb platforms, global communications
> capabilities, just to name a few things that might have disturbed the
> public just a bit. Just the notion of many nuclear devices in perpetual
> orbit and ready to rain down on every major U.S. target awaiting only
> a radio signal from Moscow? (Scares the Hell out of me even today.)
"Never ascribe to malice what can be explained by incompetence."
It may well have been that the military of the time simply didn't
understand the strategic value of these to be developed capabilities.
(the phrase "generals fighting the last war" comes to mind).
If it was that obvious, I would have expected far more work on
developing rockets, etc. in the pre-Sputnik era.
But they *did* understand missiles ...
(Also, don't forget that much of the information value of space
wouldn't be apparent until intergrated circuits came into
existence later. Trying imagining building intelligence satellites
using only vacuum tubes and point-contact transistors for
processing :->).
>
> Realize that today's public, the vast majority of which have never been
> exposed to orchestrated warfare, would not respond to such threats as
> did people in the 1950's, many of whom had direct personal experience
> with this horror. Indeed, how many readers of this newsgroup were even
> alive during man's last experience with this level of systematic destruction
> (1945)?
Not me. I'd posit that the vast majority (in this case, vast > 80%)
fall into this class, and even higher if you only want to count
those old enough to understand being affected at the time.
>
> Today, the most terrifying thought for me is that since there has not
> been a major global war in over 50 years, a majority of those alive
> today have only read about such things. Now you can learn a great
> deal about something by reading, but you can never share the essence
> of the first hand experience, which in this case is coming face to
> face with absolute terror. I beleive that this is why we haven't
> seen a major war in over 50-years, but now this situation is changing.
> The cowboys, lunatics, and greedy are once again starting to seize power,
> and once again history is likely to repeat. This, for me, is far more
> terrifying than any horror that science can possibly dish out!
>
> Harry C.
Although I agree with your concern, I think that that the premise
is badly flawed. Consider that we had WWII start just 21 years
after WWI, which was a much more horrible war than WWII (much
higher casualty rate, insanely stupid generals, poison gas,
waste laid to large tracts of France and Germany, and so on).
Didn't stop the next war at all; all that was needed was a
cost/benefit perception.
The only constraint on the cowboys, etc. is (a) whether they
might get personally hurt, and (b) persuasiveness of the
cost/benefit ("it'll only cost 50,000 lives, and then we get
to conquer Grenada" type of reasoning). Past damage to the populace
is at most an indirect concern, in that it lessens the chance
of getting the resources to wage war. Consider, for example,
that General Westmoreland seriously advocated nuclear bombing
of North Vietnam; he didn't think it would provoke nuclear
retaliation, so it was therefore the correct military
option. Public opinion or public experience with the horrors of
war didn't matter at all.
I'd blame the cowboy ascension more on the demise of the Soviet Union.
There's no longer a credible threat to vapourize large chunks of
the U.S. in case of war, hence reason (a) has largely disappeared.
Hence, the U.S. basically can do what it wants... which is
whatever it is deemed to be in its self interest, or (more
accurately) the interest of those running it.
Same as any other country.
Note also that the attempts to revive parts of SDI are
to ensure that, in case of war, some other
nuclear-armed country can't make reason (a) a realistic threat ...
We now return you to our regularly scheduled cynicism. :-<
>
>
--
Russell Crook rmc...@interlog.com
"To a first approximation, the hardware is free." - Tom Duff, 1989.
Jim Carr
Having seen many replies, I'll try to collect my comments in a
few places regardless of where they might actually fall in the
entire thread. BTW, my main reason for posting this was that it
shows how an urban legend could develop from statements that
were known to be false by the people the spokescritters were
speaking for at that time.
Jim Carr (j...@ibms48.scri.fsu.edu) wrote:
|
| While checking the NYTimes today, I could not help but note that
| their historic headline du jour was from 4 October 1957 when
| Sputnik was launched. The article by William J. Jorden includes
| the following (sadly unattributed) tidbits about Sputnik:
|
| " Military experts have said that the satellites would have no
| practicable military application in the foreseeable future.
In article <37f9...@news.iglou.com>
joe...@iglou.com (Joe Fischer) writes:
>
> Sputnik was about the size of a softball,
>and beeped, not really a lethal weapon. :-)
Except that it was not that small. It was 22 inches (about 56 cm)
in diameter and weighed 184 pounds (about 84 kg). You are thinking
of the first US satellite. Note that the ability to place an object
of that mass in an orbit 560 miles (about 900 km) high indicated a
_present_ capability to deliver a nuclear weapon to the US via a
sub-orbital trajectory.
| They said, however, that study of such satellites could
| provide valuable information that might be applied to flight
| studies for intercontinental ballistic missiles.
> And a complete Atlas rocket was already assembled,
>and the whole thing, except for the half stage, could have
>been placed in LEO anytime.
If it had worked. What is amusing is the "could" and "might" when
anyone with a clue (the readers of this newsgroup, had it existed)
would know that tracking Sputnik would be use for exactly that
purpose by us as well as them. More specifically, they knew it
would be used by them to understand the ICBM used to launch the
satellite -- and they also knew the launch was coming. ;-)
| The satellites could not be used to drop atomic of hydrogen
| bombs or anything else on the earth, scientists have said. Nor
| could they be used in connection with the proposed plan for
| aerial inspection of military forces around the world. "
|
| Sweet, eh?
> Pretty accurate appraisal, it was 1957. Without
>CCD imaging, it would essentially all still be true. :-)
No, it was total disinformation making use of a standard propaganda
technique that you see used quite often in newsgroup debates, the
half-truth where selected true statements are used to convey the
impression that a number of other things are true also.
You could not "drop" a bomb from a satellite (it would just stay in
orbit next to you), but you could fire a retro rocket and send the
whole thing to earth. So all you need is the ability to make an
atomic bomb that only weighs about 150 pounds (with higher mass
possible for a lower orbit, and all assuming totally static rocket
technology). Note that they were also careful not to say that
the _rocket_ could not be used to drop atomic bombs on the US.
And I especially like "proposed plan" for "aerial inspection", given
that the US had been flying U-2 spy planes over the USSR since April
1956. But since that "proposed plan" did exist, and probably made no
mention of space rather than "aerial" observation, that statement was
true as well. Yet 1957 is when planning for replacement of the U-2
started [according to a talk by Wheelon at the Atlanta APS meeting]
leading to creation of the SR-71 and Corona projects. The latter
flew before the SR-71, and had its first success in August 1960,
returning photographic film with 6' resolution. You can see an example
of this technology on display in the Smithsonian. Thus I see this
last set of remarks directed at the Soviets, not Americans.
That is why I found it such fascinating reading.
me...@cars3.uchicago.edu
>Harry H Conover wrote:
>>
>> Orbiting surveillance, orbiting MIRV bomb platforms, global communications
>> capabilities, just to name a few things that might have disturbed the
>> public just a bit. Just the notion of many nuclear devices in perpetual
>> orbit and ready to rain down on every major U.S. target awaiting only
>> a radio signal from Moscow? (Scares the Hell out of me even today.)
>
>"Never ascribe to malice what can be explained by incompetence."
>
>It may well have been that the military of the time simply didn't
>understand the strategic value of these to be developed capabilities.
>(the phrase "generals fighting the last war" comes to mind).
>If it was that obvious, I would have expected far more work on
>developing rockets, etc. in the pre-Sputnik era.
>
pre-Sputnik era.
>(Also, don't forget that much of the information value of space
>wouldn't be apparent until intergrated circuits came into
>existence later. Trying imagining building intelligence satellites
>using only vacuum tubes and point-contact transistors for
>processing :->).
>
Was done and worked.
Mati Meron | "When you argue with a fool,
me...@cars.uchicago.edu | chances are he is doing just the same"
Jim Carr
>
>Jim, you and I both are aware that there is a legitimate need not to
>tell the public everything.
Right, and some of those comments were directed at an audience in
Moscow, as noted in my other comment. It was the use of half-truths
to hide both US plans and Soviet capability that was interesting.
>Given the absolute horror and shock
>reaction that Sputnik created in the scientific and defense sectors,
>I can only imagine the public outcry and panic that would have erupted
>in the public sector if the total potential impact of this even had
>been surfaced.
Ah, but that assumes the US public really believed all those
words rather than what they could see overhead at night or
hear on their HAM radio sets. As you noted further down
>By the time of Sputnik, the American public was already in a frenzy of
>fear as a result of the cold war, and a nuclear attack without warning
>seemed a very real possibility. Objective, uncensored reports about the
>true significance of Sputnik and the potential for Russian space
>superiority would have driven many Americans over the edge.
so it is unclear if they would believe the official pronouncements.
(I have visions of the guy in Animal House saying "remain calm"
in a frenzied voice.) Maybe just enough to keep people who thought
like Gen. LeMay from taking over the government. The presence of
a respected general in the White House might have been the main
thing that kept that from happening. You see, I think the people
did realize the Soviets had superiority in space, but had enough
confidence in Eisenhower and the USAF and our huge lead in nuclear
weapons to believe that we could deter a Soviet missile attack.
I am a bit younger than you, so I remember the Cuban Missile Crisis
vividly as well as watching Echo (easily seen with the naked eye,
like Mir and the Shuttle today), but only picked up the general
post-Sputnik atmosphere as well as being at the leading edge of the
changes it led to in education. That the impact was huge, with or
without propaganda, was obvious.
>(At the time I was still a student, but had close friends
>working as co-op students on our Vanguard program at the time. It was
>absolute chaos for those on the inside.)
Fascinating. Yeah, I can imagine what that must have been like.
I only remember watching them blow up. Consider posting something
about that sometime.
Dirk Bruere
Russell Crook wrote:
>
> I'd blame the cowboy ascension more on the demise of the Soviet Union.
One might claim that Communism was what kept Capitalism reasonably
moral.
> There's no longer a credible threat to vapourize large chunks of
> the U.S. in case of war, hence reason (a) has largely disappeared.
> Hence, the U.S. basically can do what it wants... which is
> whatever it is deemed to be in its self interest, or (more
> accurately) the interest of those running it.
> Same as any other country.
> Note also that the attempts to revive parts of SDI are
> to ensure that, in case of war, some other
> nuclear-armed country can't make reason (a) a realistic threat ...
I think the US will discover the hard way that SDI is irrelevent if a
nuke is carried as luggage on a passenger jet to NY.
Dirk
Jim Carr
... reduced followups ...
In article <7tbvmn$c7m$1...@panix2.panix.com>
e...@panix.com (Edward Green) writes:
>
>Were microelectronics "foreseeable" in 1957? Without
>them, the surveillance functions were certainly unforeseeable.
Ah, but the surveillance functions already existed (U-2) and the
idea for Corona (code name for the first spy satellite) was in
gestation with actual engineering production starting in 1959.
>And,
>for whatever reason, the function of orbital bombardment has never
>been developed.
Many good reasons. This was one of the first things banned by
treaty, although I can't recall which one. It was obviously an
extremely destabilizing type of weapon to have around in time of
crisis, obvious to both sides. The scorpions knew they were in
a bottle; they were not about to put on blindfolds.
me...@cars3.uchicago.edu
>
> ... reduced followups ...
>
>
>In article <7tbvmn$c7m$1...@panix2.panix.com>
>e...@panix.com (Edward Green) writes:
>>
>
>>And,
>>for whatever reason, the function of orbital bombardment has never
>>been developed.
>
> Many good reasons. This was one of the first things banned by
> treaty, although I can't recall which one. It was obviously an
> extremely destabilizing type of weapon to have around in time of
> crisis, obvious to both sides. The scorpions knew they were in
> a bottle; they were not about to put on blindfolds.
>
minutes to 5 minutes or less, the time window available before the "use it
or loose it" point would have shrunk to practically nothing.
Gregory L. Hansen
Dirk Bruere <art...@kbnet.co.uk> wrote:
>I think the US will discover the hard way that SDI is irrelevent if a
>nuke is carried as luggage on a passenger jet to NY.
Since the airline industries have become a bit paranoid about
conventional bombs, I somehow doubt they'd let a nuclear bomb slip
through. I think it would raise a few eyebrows when it goes through the
x-ray machine.
--
No electrons were harmed in the posting of this message.
Paul Tomblin
>In article <37FA334E...@kbnet.co.uk>,
>Dirk Bruere <art...@kbnet.co.uk> wrote:
>
>>I think the US will discover the hard way that SDI is irrelevent if a
>>nuke is carried as luggage on a passenger jet to NY.
>
>Since the airline industries have become a bit paranoid about
>conventional bombs, I somehow doubt they'd let a nuclear bomb slip
>through. I think it would raise a few eyebrows when it goes through the
>x-ray machine.
Ok then, substitute "tramp steamer", "private aircraft", or "U-Haul" for
"passenger jet". Since we can't keep any of those from bringing in illegal
aliens and/or drugs, why do you think we could keep out atomic weapons
smuggled in the same way?
--
Paul Tomblin, not speaking for anybody.
SETI@Home: Finally a *good* way to impress Jodie Foster
http://www.setiathome.ssl.berkeley.edu/
Russell Crook
>
> In article <37FA2594...@Sun.COM>, Russell Crook <russel...@Sun.COM> writes:
> >Harry H Conover wrote:
> >>
> >> capabilities, just to name a few things that might have disturbed the
> >> public just a bit. Just the notion of many nuclear devices in perpetual
> >> orbit and ready to rain down on every major U.S. target awaiting only
> >> a radio signal from Moscow? (Scares the Hell out of me even today.)
> >
> >"Never ascribe to malice what can be explained by incompetence."
> >
> >It may well have been that the military of the time simply didn't
> >understand the strategic value of these to be developed capabilities.
> >(the phrase "generals fighting the last war" comes to mind).
> >If it was that obvious, I would have expected far more work on
> >developing rockets, etc. in the pre-Sputnik era.
> >
> pre-Sputnik era.
Sorry, I should have been clearer on what I meant.
Virtually all the pre-Sputnik rocket work was devoted to better
missiles,
not pushing the other, related technologies for satellites. If
satellites had been one of the goals, the engineering and
technologies pursued would have been different.
After all, the U.S. satellite hopes for the IGY were predicated
on Vanguard, which used a mutated Viking (!) as the first stage, and was
notable mainly for being (at the time) the theoretical minimum rocket
to get anything provably into orbit (the Vanguard I "grapefruit",
less than 2 kilos of orbiting mass - just enough to have a detectably
powerful radio transmitter). This was a largely non-military project.
When that blew up on the pad in December 1957, Von Braun (was) committed
to launching a satellite in under 60 days, adapting a military
rocket (Redstone, renamed "Jupiter-C" for PR purposes) by gluing
on three more stages... the most amazing thing is that they
succeeded.
>
> >(Also, don't forget that much of the information value of space
> >wouldn't be apparent until intergrated circuits came into
> >existence later. Trying imagining building intelligence satellites
> >using only vacuum tubes and point-contact transistors for
> >processing :->).
> >
> Was done and worked.
Interesting... I presume you mean USSR satellites, as the US
rockets didn't have the throw weight necessary until such time
as the electronics become much lighter/less power hungry.
If not, please enlighten me. (And the Discovery series doesn't
count, they returned physical film :-> Well, at least the fourteenth
one did :->)
>
> Mati Meron | "When you argue with a fool,
> me...@cars.uchicago.edu | chances are he is doing just the same"
--
Russell Crook, Systems Engineer, Computer Systems
Sun Microsystems of Canada Inc. 100 Renfrew Drive
Markham, Ontario, Canada L3R 9R6 rmc...@Canada.Sun.com
Tel: +1-905-415-7950 Fax: +1-905-477-9969
Not speaking officially for Sun (or anyone else, for that matter).
Peter Deutsch
>
> In article <37FA334E...@kbnet.co.uk>,
> Dirk Bruere <art...@kbnet.co.uk> wrote:
>
> >I think the US will discover the hard way that SDI is irrelevent if a
> >nuke is carried as luggage on a passenger jet to NY.
>
> Since the airline industries have become a bit paranoid about
> conventional bombs, I somehow doubt they'd let a nuclear bomb slip
> through. I think it would raise a few eyebrows when it goes through the
> x-ray machine.
This is almost completely off topic, but Dave Barry has just come out
with his first novel, in which (amongst all the other hysteria) a couple
of panhanders manage to smuggle both a handgun *and* a small nuclear
weapon past the airport security checkpoint. I can't go into more detail
without spoiling the ending, but his scenario is fairly plausible.
I also have a friend who swears his brother smuggled a handgun past the
checkpoint on the way to meet him at the gate, just to show it can be
done.
- Peter "Anything to declare?" "Yup, I'm worried about the
situation in the Middle East" Deutsch
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Thomas Jefferson on DNS Administration...
No, my friend, the way to have good and safe government,
is not to trust it all to one, but to divide it among the
many, distributing to every one exactly the functions he
is competent to. It is by dividing and subdividing these
republics from the national one down through all its
subordinations, until it ends in the administration of
every man's farm by himself; by placing under every one
what his own eye may superintend, that all will be done
for the best.
-- Thomas Jefferson, to Joseph Cabell, 1816
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Russell Crook
>
> Having seen many replies, I'll try to collect my comments in a
> few places regardless of where they might actually fall in the
> entire thread. BTW, my main reason for posting this was that it
> shows how an urban legend could develop from statements that
> were known to be false by the people the spokescritters were
> speaking for at that time.
>
> Jim Carr (j...@ibms48.scri.fsu.edu) wrote:
> |
> | While checking the NYTimes today, I could not help but note that
> | their historic headline du jour was from 4 October 1957 when
> | Sputnik was launched. The article by William J. Jorden includes
> | the following (sadly unattributed) tidbits about Sputnik:
> |
> | " Military experts have said that the satellites would have no
> | practicable military application in the foreseeable future.
> In article <37f9...@news.iglou.com>
> joe...@iglou.com (Joe Fischer) writes:
> >
> > Sputnik was about the size of a softball,
> >and beeped, not really a lethal weapon. :-)
> Except that it was not that small. It was 22 inches (about 56 cm)
> in diameter and weighed 184 pounds (about 84 kg). You are thinking
> of the first US satellite.
Minor nit, the first U.S. satellite was not the softball (Vanguard I),
if was the larger (31 lb?) pointy Explorer I.
> Note that the ability to place an object
> of that mass in an orbit 560 miles (about 900 km) high indicated a
> _present_ capability to deliver a nuclear weapon to the US via a
> sub-orbital trajectory.
Yes, although not a capability to hit a given state (except possibly
Texas or Alaska). But I'd guess that wasn't well realized until much
later.
> | They said, however, that study of such satellites could
> | provide valuable information that might be applied to flight
> | studies for intercontinental ballistic missiles.
> > And a complete Atlas rocket was already assembled,
> >and the whole thing, except for the half stage, could have
> >been placed in LEO anytime.
Dubious, or it would have been done and then announced after the fact.
Given that the USSR had 500 kg satellites in orbit before
the U.S. orbited a total of 50 kg, it would would have been significant
propaganda to claim the empty Atlas mass as a satellite.
> If it had worked. What is amusing is the "could" and "might" when
> anyone with a clue (the readers of this newsgroup, had it existed)
> would know that tracking Sputnik would be use for exactly that
> purpose by us as well as them. More specifically, they knew it
> would be used by them to understand the ICBM used to launch the
> satellite -- and they also knew the launch was coming. ;-)
> | The satellites could not be used to drop atomic of hydrogen
> | bombs or anything else on the earth, scientists have said. Nor
> | could they be used in connection with the proposed plan for
> | aerial inspection of military forces around the world. "
> |
> | Sweet, eh?
> > Pretty accurate appraisal, it was 1957. Without
> >CCD imaging, it would essentially all still be true. :-)
> No, it was total disinformation making use of a standard propaganda
> technique that you see used quite often in newsgroup debates, the
> half-truth where selected true statements are used to convey the
> impression that a number of other things are true also.
As I said elsewhere, I wouldn't be surprised if ignorance were
part of that as well - a genuine inability to comprehend
what satellites could do. No doubt the disinformation part was real -
after all, if there *was* military value in satellites, and that
the other side could do it and the U.S. couldn't, it might be
perceived that there was a certain military incompetence in the U.S.
military ... couldn't have that, now could we :-<
> You could not "drop" a bomb from a satellite (it would just stay in
> orbit next to you), but you could fire a retro rocket and send the
> whole thing to earth. So all you need is the ability to make an
> atomic bomb that only weighs about 150 pounds (with higher mass
> possible for a lower orbit, and all assuming totally static rocket
> technology).
And ignoring the mass of the heat shield, the guidance system,
and a few other gew-gaws :-> Mind you, this point was rendered
moot by Sputnik III (500+ kg ...)
No doubt you could make a bomb come down in one piece, but it would
have a 100 Km CEP or so. A terror weapon, nonetheless.
> Note that they were also careful not to say that
> the _rocket_ could not be used to drop atomic bombs on the US.
> And I especially like "proposed plan" for "aerial inspection", given
> that the US had been flying U-2 spy planes over the USSR since April
> 1956. But since that "proposed plan" did exist, and probably made no
> mention of space rather than "aerial" observation, that statement was
> true as well. Yet 1957 is when planning for replacement of the U-2
> started [according to a talk by Wheelon at the Atlanta APS meeting]
Actually, it appears that other U-2 replacement work predates this,
the (in)famous CL-400/Suntan, to be fueled by liquid hydrogen, whose
design
was seriously worked upon in early 1956 (see
http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/SP-4404 for details).
It got as far as working turbojets designed and built to burn LH2.
> leading to creation of the SR-71 and Corona projects. The latter
> flew before the SR-71, and had its first success in August 1960,
> returning photographic film with 6' resolution.
At the time, this was touted as the (supposedly civilian) Discovery
series of satellites, was it not? (And, IIRC, it wasn't until
Discovery XIV or so that the desired film was actually retrieved as
desired.) More disinformation...
> You can see an example
> of this technology on display in the Smithsonian. Thus I see this
> last set of remarks directed at the Soviets, not Americans.
>
> That is why I found it such fascinating reading.
Yes, it is fascinating to reread what was said at the time, and
compare it with current recollections of the time. It is astonishing
how much the present affects the interpretation of the past,
due to information hiding/revealing, wishful thinking, and outright
deliberate deceit.
--
Russell Crook rmc...@interlog.com
james d. hunter
>
> Edward Green (e...@panix.com) wrote:
> : Harry H Conover <con...@tiac.net> wrote:
[...]
> Today, the most terrifying thought for me is that since there has not
> been a major global war in over 50 years, a majority of those alive
> today have only read about such things. Now you can learn a great
> deal about something by reading, but you can never share the essence
> of the first hand experience, which in this case is coming face to
> face with absolute terror. I beleive that this is why we haven't
> seen a major war in over 50-years, but now this situation is changing.
> The cowboys, lunatics, and greedy are once again starting to seize power,
> and once again history is likely to repeat. This, for me, is far more
> terrifying than any horror that science can possibly dish out!
That doesn't much sense. Many of the WWII generals and admirals were
veterans of at least three or four major wars. They're pretty much
the people who call the nuke shots. Today's generals are usually
screened for their religoidedness. So, there are safeguards in place.
Dirk Bruere
"Gregory L. Hansen" wrote:
>
> >I think the US will discover the hard way that SDI is irrelevent if a
> >nuke is carried as luggage on a passenger jet to NY.
> Since the airline industries have become a bit paranoid about
> conventional bombs, I somehow doubt they'd let a nuclear bomb slip
> through. I think it would raise a few eyebrows when it goes through the
> x-ray machine.
Maybe the authorities at the departure end in (say) the Middle East
won't be too fussy. Alternatively, get some technicians to build it into
the structure during servicing.
I don't envisage the plane actually getting to land in NY or wherever.
Dirk
me...@cars3.uchicago.edu
>me...@cars3.uchicago.edu wrote:
>>
>> In article <37FA2594...@Sun.COM>, Russell Crook <russel...@Sun.COM> writes:
>> >Harry H Conover wrote:
>> >>
>> >> capabilities, just to name a few things that might have disturbed the
>> >> public just a bit. Just the notion of many nuclear devices in perpetual
>> >> orbit and ready to rain down on every major U.S. target awaiting only
>> >> a radio signal from Moscow? (Scares the Hell out of me even today.)
>> >
>> >"Never ascribe to malice what can be explained by incompetence."
>> >
>> >It may well have been that the military of the time simply didn't
>> >understand the strategic value of these to be developed capabilities.
>> >(the phrase "generals fighting the last war" comes to mind).
>> >If it was that obvious, I would have expected far more work on
>> >developing rockets, etc. in the pre-Sputnik era.
>> >
>> pre-Sputnik era.
>
>Sorry, I should have been clearer on what I meant.
>Virtually all the pre-Sputnik rocket work was devoted to better
>missiles, not pushing the other, related technologies for satellites. If
>satellites had been one of the goals, the engineering and
>technologies pursued would have been different.
>
just the same. There is no essential difference between launching
something to few percent below orbital velocity (as you do with ICBMs)
or all the way to orbital velocity. About the only difference between
the two cases is that military designs demand fuel-oxidizer mixtures
which can be either stored on board the missile, indefinitely, or, at
least, allow for a very rapid refueling when needed. Satellite
launchers don't have this constraint.
>After all, the U.S. satellite hopes for the IGY were predicated
>on Vanguard, which used a mutated Viking (!) as the first stage, and was
>notable mainly for being (at the time) the theoretical minimum rocket
>to get anything provably into orbit (the Vanguard I "grapefruit",
>less than 2 kilos of orbiting mass - just enough to have a detectably
>powerful radio transmitter). This was a largely non-military project.
>
Indeed. But don't forget that Jupiter and Thor were already
operational by then and Atlas and Titan were under intense
development. Thes projects were not started in the wake of the
Sputnik but independently of it. The decision to base the satellite
program on an independently developed "civilian" rocket instead of on
one of the military ones was political, AFAIK, having nothing to do
with technological considerations.
>>
>> >(Also, don't forget that much of the information value of space
>> >wouldn't be apparent until intergrated circuits came into
>> >existence later. Trying imagining building intelligence satellites
>> >using only vacuum tubes and point-contact transistors for
>> >processing :->).
>> >
>> Was done and worked.
>
>Interesting... I presume you mean USSR satellites, as the US
>rockets didn't have the throw weight necessary until such time
>as the electronics become much lighter/less power hungry.
>
No, just the opposite. Do you really think that there was no
technology in existance before the invention of the microprocessor?:-)
Sounds like the people who say about this or other country "they can't
develope nuclear weapons, their technology isn't advanced enough" not
realizing that the first nuclear weapons were built using 40s
technology.
Granted, modern electronics allows you to do things faster, cheaper
and (important) lighter than before. But lots of stuff could've and
was done using older technology. Throw weight for satellites was
already few tons at the beginning of the 60s, quite enough to put in
quality optics and enough electronics to do something useful.
>If not, please enlighten me. (And the Discovery series doesn't
>count, they returned physical film :-> Well, at least the fourteenth
>one did :->)
>
Physical film still has a better resolution than a CCD. And you use
what's available. If you can send the image, you do it, if you need
to drop physical film, you'll do this too. What counts is that the
info gets where it needs to get to.
Marvin
news:37f9...@news.iglou.com...
> Jim Carr (j...@ibms48.scri.fsu.edu) wrote:
<snip>
> : The satellites could not be used to drop atomic of hydrogen
> : bombs or anything else on the earth, scientists have said. Nor
> : could they be used in connection with the proposed plan for
> : aerial inspection of military forces around the world. "
> :
> : Sweet, eh?
>
> Pretty accurate appraisal, it was 1957. Without
> CCD imaging, it would essentially all still be true. :-)
>
Much better with CCD cameras, but satellite imagery was used for military
purposes before that. One method even used photographic film, which was
parachuted from the satellite after the pictures weresnapped. The parachute
with film package was either caught in mid-air (a pretty tricky opertaion)
or recovered from the ocean where it landed.
me...@cars3.uchicago.edu
>Jim Carr wrote:
>>
>> You could not "drop" a bomb from a satellite (it would just stay in
>> orbit next to you), but you could fire a retro rocket and send the
>> whole thing to earth. So all you need is the ability to make an
>> atomic bomb that only weighs about 150 pounds (with higher mass
>> possible for a lower orbit, and all assuming totally static rocket
>> technology).
>
>And ignoring the mass of the heat shield, the guidance system,
>and a few other gew-gaws :->
Not different than for an ICBM launched warhead.
>No doubt you could make a bomb come down in one piece, but it would
>have a 100 Km CEP or so. A terror weapon, nonetheless.
>
Why? What makes you think such a bomb should be any less accurate
than one launched by an ICBM.
Harry H Conover
:
: Interesting... I presume you mean USSR satellites, as the US
: rockets didn't have the throw weight necessary until such time
: as the electronics become much lighter/less power hungry.
Sorry, this isn't true. What you describe as microelectronics
didn't even begin to play a major role until well into the third
or fourth generation of U.S. photo recon satelites. These employed
conventional electronics for communications, combined with latching
magnetic relay logic (because it could be powered down without loss
of information).
Is is a misnomer to believe that the U.S. didn't have the throw
power early on to orbit these birds, although not in 1957.
In fact, all of the early U.S. recon birds returned physical
film, usually 9" type SO-xxx (likely still sensitive), and they
were both large and heavy, with Casegranian optics.
By 1966, Titan and Titan III boosters with Agena second stages
were probably the norm.
: If not, please enlighten me. (And the Discovery series doesn't
: count, they returned physical film :-> Well, at least the fourteenth
: one did :->)
I worked in the field at the time, and frankly have never heard of
the Discoverery Series. All of the photographic birds of the era
were the result of projects whose names (because of project security)
remain classified (even today). Names that have been declassified
are simply 'R' and 'K', and today's KH-11 is a high tech second
cousin to the original 'K'.
Keep in mind that the press, lacking insight into classified programs,
like to invent stuff to fill space. Once exception to this rule has
historically been 'Space and Aviation Week' who, to put it mildly,
who have in the past revealed some rather remarkable things.
Harry C.
Jim Carr
}
} Russell Crook <russel...@Sun.COM> writes:
} >It may well have been that the military of the time simply didn't
} >understand the strategic value of these to be developed capabilities.
} >(the phrase "generals fighting the last war" comes to mind).
} >If it was that obvious, I would have expected far more work on
} >developing rockets, etc. in the pre-Sputnik era.
}
} pre-Sputnik era.
In article <37FA4D94...@Sun.COM>
Russell Crook <russel...@Sun.COM> writes:
>
>Sorry, I should have been clearer on what I meant.
>Virtually all the pre-Sputnik rocket work was devoted to better
>missiles, not pushing the other, related technologies for satellites.
This is not true. There were separate military and civilian programs.
>If satellites had been one of the goals, the engineering and
>technologies pursued would have been different.
Do you think that there is an essential difference between the
Titan used as an ICBM and a Titan used to orbit a satellite? Or,
to be even more concrete, between a Thor used for whatever it was
developed for (anti-missle?) and its use to launch the Agena that
carried the Corona payload?
>After all, the U.S. satellite hopes for the IGY were predicated
>on Vanguard, which used a mutated Viking (!) as the first stage, and was
>notable mainly for being (at the time) the theoretical minimum rocket
>to get anything provably into orbit (the Vanguard I "grapefruit",
>less than 2 kilos of orbiting mass - just enough to have a detectably
>powerful radio transmitter). This was a largely non-military project.
Your last sentence is what explains everything else. The U.S.
made a conscious, very political, decision to develop a rocket
entirely on the "civilian" side for scientific research such as
that centered around the IGY. [Aren't we overdue for another?]
This was not a necessary decision, as you note.
>When that blew up on the pad in December 1957, Von Braun (was) committed
>to launching a satellite in under 60 days, adapting a military
>rocket (Redstone, renamed "Jupiter-C" for PR purposes) by gluing
>on three more stages... the most amazing thing is that they
>succeeded.
Not at all. They knew a lot about the rockets they used. Once
the division between Army/AirForce rockets and civilian rockets
was eliminated, much progress took place immediately. Similar
things happened when a civilian program needed a big laser.
} >(Also, don't forget that much of the information value of space
} >wouldn't be apparent until intergrated circuits came into
} >existence later. Trying imagining building intelligence satellites
} >using only vacuum tubes and point-contact transistors for
} >processing :->).
}
} Was done and worked.
>Interesting... I presume you mean USSR satellites, as the US
>rockets didn't have the throw weight necessary until such time
>as the electronics become much lighter/less power hungry.
Reconsider the history that was not published at the time. It
turns out that the satellite was the "second stage" and the
"satellite" was just to send some things back home.
>If not, please enlighten me. (And the Discovery series doesn't
>count, they returned physical film :-> Well, at least the fourteenth
>one did :->)
Discovery? Oh, you mean Corona. ;-)
What an awesome cover story that was, eh? That the President
could pose with the canister that returned spy satellite photos ....
And the pointing and navigation and control systems were based
on what, do you think?
Jim Carr
Russell Crook <russel...@Sun.COM> writes:
}
} Jim Carr wrote:
} > orbit next to you), but you could fire a retro rocket and send the
...
}
} No doubt you could make a bomb come down in one piece, but it would
} have a 100 Km CEP or so. A terror weapon, nonetheless.
In article <V6uK3.175$F3.1578@uchinews>
me...@cars3.uchicago.edu writes:
>
>Why? What makes you think such a bomb should be any less accurate
>than one launched by an ICBM.
I think his point was that guidance systems were not too good
at that time, and neither was our (and their) knowledge of how
such an object would reenter the atmosphere. We had our share
of manned missions where the CEP was about that, so the point
is valid. Still does not change the 'right but not relevant'
nature of the statements attributed to the military experts,
which were purely for public and foreign consumption.
danny burstein
>>count, they returned physical film :-> Well, at least the fourteenth
>>one did :->)
>>
>what's available. If you can send the image, you do it, if you need
>to drop physical film, you'll do this too.
While the earlier spy sats used film, this carried the risk that the
'other side' might manage to snatch the film after it returned to Earth.
This was dangerous for a bunch of reasons. The key one was that it would
show the 'other side' exactly what teh capabilities of the spy sats were,
and would give them a very good leg up in cameflouge and other methods of
trying to hide their stuff.
There was a bit of a secondary concern as well, since the photos could
include facilities (silos, ships, bases, etc.) of the launching nation.
Anyway, there was a _lot_ of care taken in choosing flight plans, with
special concern about where the satellites (or, more specifically, the
film pods) were supposed to come down. The US tended to bring them down
over teh Pacific, where it had lots of aircraft carriers and and had very
good aerial grab capability (snatching the cans in midair). The Russkies
tended more towards land. But these were generalities... Both the
Americans and the Russians had lots of "fishing trawlers" and "weather
ships" in some pretty curious locations...
A _major_ push forward in R&D for remote imagery occurred in 1968 after a
Russian satellite came down near a joint American-British "weather
research station" in the arctic circle. Although the specific details were
never publicly released, there are indications that a pretty nasty
encounter took place at that "drift station" (so named because it was on a
floating ice shelf) and involved both naval and air force units pointing
guns at each other.
There's certainly a case to be made that military research into small, hi
density, imaging elements, gave a major push to the entire video industry.
(Keep in mind that earlier video systems required large and fragile
sensing tubes, and the resolution maxed out at about 300 lines/field. Oh,
and they required lots and lots of power which pretty much limited them to
use inside broadcast studios). While the first CCD units were horrendously
expensive, the prices quickly dropped.
--
_____________________________________________________
Knowledge may be power, but communications is the key
dan...@panix.com
[to foil spammers, my address has been double rot-13 encoded]
me...@cars3.uchicago.edu
>In article <37FA5860...@Sun.COM>,
>Russell Crook <russel...@Sun.COM> writes:
>}
>} Jim Carr wrote:
>} > orbit next to you), but you could fire a retro rocket and send the
> ...
>}
>} No doubt you could make a bomb come down in one piece, but it would
>} have a 100 Km CEP or so. A terror weapon, nonetheless.
>
>me...@cars3.uchicago.edu writes:
>>
>>Why? What makes you think such a bomb should be any less accurate
>>than one launched by an ICBM.
>
> I think his point was that guidance systems were not too good
> at that time, and neither was our (and their) knowledge of how
> such an object would reenter the atmosphere.
Agreed, but said knowledge was accumulating rapidly and the issue was
just the same as for the reentry vehicles on ICBMs. After all the
reentry speeds of ICBM warheads are just few hundred m/s below
orbital.
> We had our share
> of manned missions where the CEP was about that, so the point
> is valid. Still does not change the 'right but not relevant'
> nature of the statements attributed to the military experts,
> which were purely for public and foreign consumption.
Of course.
me...@cars3.uchicago.edu
>>>If not, please enlighten me. (And the Discovery series doesn't
>>>count, they returned physical film :-> Well, at least the fourteenth
>>>one did :->)
>>>
>>Physical film still has a better resolution than a CCD. And you use
>>what's available. If you can send the image, you do it, if you need
>>to drop physical film, you'll do this too.
>
>While the earlier spy sats used film, this carried the risk that the
>'other side' might manage to snatch the film after it returned to Earth.
>
is fine for images of permanent installations, but when you need real
time imaging (as you sometimes do) waiting for the film to be dropped,
caught, delivered, developed, all this takes quite a while.
...
>
> There's certainly a case to be made that military research into small, hi
>density, imaging elements, gave a major push to the entire video industry.
Yes, most definitely so.
>(Keep in mind that earlier video systems required large and fragile
>sensing tubes, and the resolution maxed out at about 300 lines/field. Oh,
>and they required lots and lots of power which pretty much limited them to
>use inside broadcast studios). While the first CCD units were horrendously
>expensive, the prices quickly dropped.
>--
Most of the public is still unaware how much of the technology they
enjoy is a military spinoff.
Paul Tomblin
>like to invent stuff to fill space. Once exception to this rule has
>historically been 'Space and Aviation Week' who, to put it mildly,
>who have in the past revealed some rather remarkable things.
I believe you're talking about "Aviation Week and Space Technology". My
father was a subscriber, as were Henry Kissinger and the Shah of Iran (both of
whom wrote letters to the editor back when I used to read it when my dad was
done with it).
And along with AW&ST, there was "Jane's Defence Weekly", which also had a
similar reputation for leaking far more than the defence industry would like.
Paul Tomblin
>never publicly released, there are indications that a pretty nasty
>encounter took place at that "drift station" (so named because it was on a
>floating ice shelf) and involved both naval and air force units pointing
>guns at each other.
"Ice Station Zebra", perhaps?
jmfb...@aol.com
In article <37FA5DAA...@jhuapl.edu>,
Let me get this straight. You think that no experience is a
safeguard?
/BAH
Subtract a hundred and four for e-mail.
Gregory L. Hansen
Places in the U.S. have been bombed before, so it's possible. On the
other hand, a lot of drugs and illegal aliens get caught at the border, so
our borders aren't exactly an arbitrarily large leak. And I think any
bomb that's smuggled in will be tactical, not strategic. Nukes can be
made small enough to fit onto artillery shells, but those aren't the ones
that can vaporize a city. And they're still pretty big and heavy. It's
not like you could stick it in a coat pocket and walk.
There's also a general political context here. If we find reason to
believe that "terrorist" countries have developed nukes that are small
enough to smuggle into our borders, and we think they might try it, we'll
make some changes to how our borders are protected to try to prevent it.
Maybe every checkpoint will have geiger counters, I dunno.
Paul Tomblin
>made small enough to fit onto artillery shells, but those aren't the ones
>that can vaporize a city. And they're still pretty big and heavy. It's
>not like you could stick it in a coat pocket and walk.
The warhead on a cruise missile weighs about as much as an illegal immigrant,
and we haven't done a bang up job of keeping those out of the country. And
that warhead, walked or trucked or flown in a light plane into the general
vicinity of the Capitol Building or the White House lawn, or the parking
garage of a federal building, could do a hell of a lot more damage than a
squadron of Timothy McVeighs.
Gregory L. Hansen
Paul Tomblin <ptom...@xcski.com> wrote:
>In a previous article, glha...@steel.ucs.indiana.edu (Gregory L. Hansen) said:
>>bomb that's smuggled in will be tactical, not strategic. Nukes can be
>>made small enough to fit onto artillery shells, but those aren't the ones
>>that can vaporize a city. And they're still pretty big and heavy. It's
>>not like you could stick it in a coat pocket and walk.
>
>The warhead on a cruise missile weighs about as much as an illegal immigrant,
>and we haven't done a bang up job of keeping those out of the country. And
>that warhead, walked or trucked or flown in a light plane into the general
>vicinity of the Capitol Building or the White House lawn, or the parking
>garage of a federal building, could do a hell of a lot more damage than a
>squadron of Timothy McVeighs.
I don't know what the ratio of caught/uncaught illegal immigrants is, but
it's greater than zero. And they start at home, while a nuke would have
to be smuggled into Mexico before it can take that route into the U.S.
They can also move under their own power, and the route to illegal
immigration often involves a long hike and hiding from the Border Patrol.
I'm not saying a nuke can't be smuggled in. But doing it is kind of dicey
and risky, even today, and more so if The Powers That Be decide it's
really a problem.
Does the warhead on a cruise missile really was about as much as an
illegal immigrant? Cruise missiles are fatter than a typical person, I
think, and they're filled with metal peices.
Paul Tomblin
>I don't know what the ratio of caught/uncaught illegal immigrants is, but
>it's greater than zero. And they start at home, while a nuke would have
>to be smuggled into Mexico before it can take that route into the U.S.
>They can also move under their own power, and the route to illegal
>immigration often involves a long hike and hiding from the Border Patrol.
You're making a totally unwarranted assumption that all illegal immigrants
come from Mexico, on foot. Many illegal immigrants come from Asia, in boats
that unload in remote and desolate areas of the US or Canadian coast. Many
others come the same way illegal drugs come, in a Cessna 210 or Piper Aztruck
at a remote dirt road or grass field. All it requires is one guy on the
ground with a pickup truck and a tarp.
>Does the warhead on a cruise missile really was about as much as an
>illegal immigrant? Cruise missiles are fatter than a typical person, I
>think, and they're filled with metal peices.
A cruise missile is not a warhead. A cruise missile has a jet engine, wings,
guidance and a bunch of other things that add considerable weight and size.
According to a Scientific American article many years ago about the problems
that nuclear cruise missiles add to strategic arms limitation treaties, the
warhead on an air launched cruise missle is approximately 120 pounds.
james d. hunter
No, I didn't say that today's generals don't have any combat
experience.
I said that they are usually screened for their religoidedness.
Jim Carr
jim.h...@spam.free.jhuapl.edu. writes:
>
> > > ... Many of the WWII generals and admirals were
> > > veterans of at least three or four major wars. They're pretty much
> > > the people who call the nuke shots. Today's generals are usually
> > > screened for their religoidedness. So, there are safeguards in place.
> I said that they are usually screened for their religoidedness.
OK, skipping over the fairly basic error that it is the military
leaders who "call the nuke shots" [unless you meant they are the
umpires who call fair or foul on each one], or that LeMay was an
atomic dove because of his WW II experiences, what the heck do you
mean by "religoidedness"?
Ones who only drink distilled water to maintain the purity of
their precious bodily fluids?
james d. hunter
>
> In article <37FB8E91...@jhuapl.edu>
> jim.h...@spam.free.jhuapl.edu. writes:
> >
> > > > ... Many of the WWII generals and admirals were
> > > > veterans of at least three or four major wars. They're pretty much
> > > > the people who call the nuke shots. Today's generals are usually
> > > > screened for their religoidedness. So, there are safeguards in place.
>
> > I said that they are usually screened for their religoidedness.
>
> OK, skipping over the fairly basic error that it is the military
> leaders who "call the nuke shots" [unless you meant they are the
> umpires who call fair or foul on each one], or that LeMay was an
> atomic dove because of his WW II experiences, what the heck do you
> mean by "religoidedness"?
How many military line officers have you personally met "on the job"?
If you had met any, you would know I mean by "religoidness".
If you think it is a basic error that Generals don't call the
shots, you need some military training.
Dirk Bruere
"Gregory L. Hansen" wrote:
>
> our borders aren't exactly an arbitrarily large leak. And I think any
> bomb that's smuggled in will be tactical, not strategic. Nukes can be
> made small enough to fit onto artillery shells, but those aren't the ones
> that can vaporize a city. And they're still pretty big and heavy. It's
> not like you could stick it in a coat pocket and walk.
The thousand acres around Wall St are valued at a trillion dollars or
thereabouts. How big does a bomb have to be to destroy an economy?
> There's also a general political context here. If we find reason to
> believe that "terrorist" countries have developed nukes that are small
> enough to smuggle into our borders, and we think they might try it, we'll
> make some changes to how our borders are protected to try to prevent it.
> Maybe every checkpoint will have geiger counters, I dunno.
As Russian Gen Lebed confided in one of the SALT talks, some 80 of their
suitcase bombs have gone missing. Care to bet that at least one has
ended up in 'unfriendly' hands?
Dirk
Steve Caskey
>In a previous article, dan...@panix.com (danny burstein) said:
>>never publicly released, there are indications that a pretty nasty
>>encounter took place at that "drift station" (so named because it was on a
>>floating ice shelf) and involved both naval and air force units pointing
>>guns at each other.
>
>"Ice Station Zebra", perhaps?
Reading this I just assume that was where Alistair Maclean got his inspiration
from. At first I though Danny might have been trolling, but the "naval and air
force units pointing guns" detail diverges too far from the book.
Steve "Howard Hughes' favourite film" Caskey
--
Just another mindless public servant who does not speak for his employer
"The recipe for good sleep is a bed and a clear conscience.
Either ingredient can be replaced by gin." -- Joe Bennett
See the alt.folklore.urban FAQ and archive at http://www.urbanlegends.com
Frank O'Donnell
>
>I believe you're talking about "Aviation Week and Space Technology". My
>father was a subscriber, as were Henry Kissinger and the Shah of Iran (both of
>whom wrote letters to the editor back when I used to read it when my dad was
>done with it).
>
>And along with AW&ST, there was "Jane's Defence Weekly", which also had a
>similar reputation for leaking far more than the defence industry would like.
Re: magazines:
I always felt that Time leaked Top Secret stuff, Aviation Week leaked
Secret, and Popular Mechanics leaked Confidential.
Rusty "Dunno about FOUO (For Official Use Only), Congressional Record
maybe?" O'Donnell
--
Husband: "You've got to look down deep into your ego and work it out with
your id."
Wife: "Oh, stop using big words."--Peter Devries
Peter Deutsch
Paul Tomblin wrote:
. . .
> You're making a totally unwarranted assumption that all illegal immigrants
> come from Mexico, on foot. Many illegal immigrants come from Asia, in boats
> that unload in remote and desolate areas of the US or Canadian coast. Many
> others come the same way illegal drugs come, in a Cessna 210 or Piper Aztruck
> at a remote dirt road or grass field. All it requires is one guy on the
> ground with a pickup truck and a tarp.
Heck, you can get from Canada to the U.S. in a car with almost zero
chance of a search, all it takes is a driver with a French Canadian
accent. The border guard will ask "where yah going?", you reply "to get
some cheap gas". They'll ask "where do you live?" and you say
"Montreal", and they'll say "Have a nice day". Happens about 80 times an
hour on any one of dozens of small rural crossing points along the
Quebec border. Don't do anything to surprise them (like carrying massive
amounts of luggage when going for gas) and your chances of a search are
close to zero.
Of course, I suspect having obviously non-local appearance will get you
pulled over, but I've crossed with my family many times over the past 20
years and have only ever been searched once, and they told me afterwards
that was because my wife (a francophone) had a citizenship card as ID
and we had a car full of luggage, and the card is usually only carried
by immigrants. Once we convinced them we really were going back, they
lightened right up and even got chatty.
- Peter "Oh, and I have this small thermonuclear device" Deutsch
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Thomas Jefferson on DNS Administration...
No, my friend, the way to have good and safe government,
is not to trust it all to one, but to divide it among the
many, distributing to every one exactly the functions he
is competent to. It is by dividing and subdividing these
republics from the national one down through all its
subordinations, until it ends in the administration of
every man's farm by himself; by placing under every one
what his own eye may superintend, that all will be done
for the best.
-- Thomas Jefferson, to Joseph Cabell, 1816
----------------------------------------------------------------------
james d. hunter
>
> On 6 Oct 1999 02:50:13 GMT, Paul Tomblin <ptom...@xcski.com> wrote:
> >
> >I believe you're talking about "Aviation Week and Space Technology". My
> >father was a subscriber, as were Henry Kissinger and the Shah of Iran (both of
> >whom wrote letters to the editor back when I used to read it when my dad was
> >done with it).
> >
> >And along with AW&ST, there was "Jane's Defence Weekly", which also had a
> >similar reputation for leaking far more than the defence industry would like.
>
> Re: magazines:
>
> I always felt that Time leaked Top Secret stuff, Aviation Week leaked
> Secret, and Popular Mechanics leaked Confidential.
Time Magazine is the National Enquirer of Technology.
Jane's isn't far behind.
Randy Poe
> Keep in mind that the press, lacking insight into classified programs,
> historically been 'Space and Aviation Week' who, to put it mildly,
> who have in the past revealed some rather remarkable things.
I remember the editor of _Aviation & Space Weekly_ once
saying "You should see the stuff I don't print".
Always used to wonder if I could be jailed for passing
on something I read in a newspaper or magazine. Advice
from the security officers was: "Yes". But I could hardly
expect them to say any different.
Randy "will neither confirm nor deny that a publication
called _Aviation & Space Weekly_ exists" Poe
james d. hunter
>
> Jim Carr wrote:
> |
> | In article <37FB8E91...@jhuapl.edu>
> | jim.h...@spam.free.jhuapl.edu. writes:
> | >
> | >>> ... Many of the WWII generals and admirals were
> | >>> veterans of at least three or four major wars. They're pretty
much
> | >>> the people who call the nuke shots. Today's generals are
usually
> | >>> screened for their religoidedness. So, there are safeguards in
place.
> | >
> | > I said that they are usually screened for their religoidedness.
> |
> | OK, skipping over the fairly basic error that it is the military
> | leaders who "call the nuke shots" [unless you meant they are the
> | umpires who call fair or foul on each one], or that LeMay was an
> | atomic dove because of his WW II experiences, what the heck do you
> | mean by "religoidedness"?
>
> jim.h...@spam.free.jhuapl.edu. writes:
> >
> > How many military line officers have you personally met "on the
job"?
> > If you had met any, you would know I mean by "religoidness".
>
> share in other circumstances. However, as my example above was
> intended to indicate, one does not have to know one personally to
> know how _he_ thought or what he did and tried to do.
> Your rhetorical question is not an answer. Please answer and
> explain how it applies to LeMay and the general issue of security.
> If you cannot define a term of your own creation, don't use it.
Well, considering all the jargon that scientists and mathematicians
use and don't define, engineers feel entitled to a reciprocity
relationship.
LeMay was a standard general for the Vietnam era. I suppose
he picked up his attitude from Teller, since Teller was obviously
not up to doing the job himself.
> > If you think it is a basic error that Generals don't call the
> > shots, you need some military training.
>
> My late uncle was in one of the first nuclear capable tactical
> units as well as being in a unit that would have led the attack
> on Cuba in 1962. I know he understood very well who gave the
> orders to the people who gave him orders where those sorts of
> actions were concerned.
>
> That this seemed less clear to LeMay makes me wonder exactly
> what you mean above about "call the shots" and why you think
> that whatever attitude you are talking about constitutes a
> "safeguard". Personally, I'm glad the US had PALs.
It is obviously that there plenty of safequards when the
safequarding is against the usual political/diplomatic crap
being thrown back and forth. I don't think any of the
military commanders really care too much about it. It's
the everyday bullshit. I suppose they're most likely thinking
about what they're going to do if the shit really does appear
like it's going to hit the fan.
Jim Carr
|
| In article <37FB8E91...@jhuapl.edu>
| jim.h...@spam.free.jhuapl.edu. writes:
| >
| >>> ... Many of the WWII generals and admirals were
| >>> veterans of at least three or four major wars. They're pretty much
| >>> the people who call the nuke shots. Today's generals are usually
| >>> screened for their religoidedness. So, there are safeguards in place.
| >
| > I said that they are usually screened for their religoidedness.
|
| OK, skipping over the fairly basic error that it is the military
| leaders who "call the nuke shots" [unless you meant they are the
| umpires who call fair or foul on each one], or that LeMay was an
| atomic dove because of his WW II experiences, what the heck do you
| mean by "religoidedness"?
In article <37FBA4CE...@jhuapl.edu>
jim.h...@spam.free.jhuapl.edu. writes:
>
> How many military line officers have you personally met "on the job"?
> If you had met any, you would know I mean by "religoidness".
I have never met a general officer "on the job", but have met my
share in other circumstances. However, as my example above was
intended to indicate, one does not have to know one personally to
know how _he_ thought or what he did and tried to do.
Your rhetorical question is not an answer. Please answer and
explain how it applies to LeMay and the general issue of security.
If you cannot define a term of your own creation, don't use it.
> If you think it is a basic error that Generals don't call the
> shots, you need some military training.
My late uncle was in one of the first nuclear capable tactical
units as well as being in a unit that would have led the attack
on Cuba in 1962. I know he understood very well who gave the
orders to the people who gave him orders where those sorts of
actions were concerned.
That this seemed less clear to LeMay makes me wonder exactly
what you mean above about "call the shots" and why you think
that whatever attitude you are talking about constitutes a
"safeguard". Personally, I'm glad the US had PALs.
--
Randy Poe
> A _major_ push forward in R&D for remote imagery occurred in 1968 after a
> Russian satellite came down near a joint American-British "weather
> research station" in the arctic circle. Although the specific details were
> encounter took place at that "drift station" (so named because it was on a
> floating ice shelf) and involved both naval and air force units pointing
> guns at each other.
Yes, I believe Rock Hudson was captain of the sub, and
Patrick McGoohan was the spook sent to steal the satellite
before the Russians could retrieve it. Peter Lorre was
a double agent.
Oh wait... you mean in real life, don't you.
Randy "never mind" Poe
Steven B. Harris
>>>--
>Most of the public is still unaware how much of the technology they
>enjoy is a military spinoff.
Which is not, of course, in an of itself much of a reason for more
military spending. Research, ala Los Alamos, gets done by more or less
private instilations full of non-military people, just fine, if they
have the funding. The CIA, you'll remember, went around the
conventional military (which they wanted no part of) by simply dumping
some money on Lockheed, and saying "build us neat spy planes that
aren't military planes". Thus the entirely private Skunk Works and the
U2, SR71, Stealth this and that, and so on. If you have the money to
spend on neat high tech research, for God's sake, spend it on the
research. If it's secret research, keep only enough military for
security.
me...@cars3.uchicago.edu
>In <NuyK3.195$F3.1958@uchinews> me...@cars3.uchicago.edu writes:
>>>>--
>>Most of the public is still unaware how much of the technology they
>>enjoy is a military spinoff.
>
> Which is not, of course, in an of itself much of a reason for more
>military spending.
Of course.
>Research, ala Los Alamos, gets done by more or less private instilations
>full of non-military people, just fine, if they have the funding.
Sure. Given sufficient resources and good people (who'll come, once
you've the resources) stuff happens.
joh...@spamcop.net
>
> danny burstein wrote:
> > A _major_ push forward in R&D for remote imagery occurred in 1968 after a
> > Russian satellite came down near a joint American-British "weather
> > research station" in the arctic circle. Although the specific details were
> > never publicly released,
> Patrick McGoohan was the spook sent to steal the satellite
> before the Russians could retrieve it. Peter Lorre was
> a double agent.
>
> Oh wait... you mean in real life, don't you.
>
> Randy "never mind" Poe
double agent. Based On Alistair Mac Lean's Adventure Novel.
Harry H Conover
: Harry H Conover wrote:
: > Keep in mind that the press, lacking insight into classified programs,
: > like to invent stuff to fill space. Once exception to this rule has
: > historically been 'Space and Aviation Week' who, to put it mildly,
: > who have in the past revealed some rather remarkable things.
:
: I remember the editor of _Aviation & Space Weekly_ once
: saying "You should see the stuff I don't print".
:
: Always used to wonder if I could be jailed for passing
: on something I read in a newspaper or magazine. Advice
: from the security officers was: "Yes". But I could hardly
: expect them to say any different.
The answer is yes, only if you signed a security agreement and you
knew that the information you read in the press was actually subject
to security restrictions. If you are subject to a security agreement,
without which you cannot hold a clearance, and repeat information that
you know to be classified, it is a serious violation regarless of
how you actually obtained the information.
The basis for this is that when you hold a security clearance, it is
presumed that when you pass on classified information that you saw
pushlished in the unclassified press, your passing it along lends
credibility to the leaked info.
If you read your security agreement carefully, you should notice
that the prohibition against communicating classified information
to uncleared undividuals is not predicated on how you obtained the
information, only that you know it to be of a classified nature.
There are of course ways of getting yourself convicted of espionage
without having ever held a clearance or signed a security agreement,
but these cases (spies) are prosecuted using a different legal
mechanism.
Passing along information that one obtained by reading a newspaper
or magazine is very unlikely to get an average citizen prosecuted,
but of course that depends on precisely who you are supplying the
information to, and why.
Harry C.
Jim Carr
>
>The CIA, you'll remember, went around the
>conventional military (which they wanted no part of) by simply dumping
>some money on Lockheed, and saying "build us neat spy planes that
>aren't military planes". Thus the entirely private Skunk Works and the
Stealth may have been a spinoff of the CIA work. ;-) Anyway,
according to Wheelon (who ran the SR71 project) when he spoke
to the APS, the degree to which the U-2 project was decoupled
from the USAF may have reflected the opposition of the USAF to
any aircraft that did not also have a military purpose. It
had been opposed by the AF for that reason, who felt its use
of the RB-47 and the like was just fine (despite losing on the
order of 100 MIA/KIA). Eisenhower stepped in and overrode those
objections after an RB-47 was in extended combat during a 1954
recon mission that could have grown into a larger conflict.
[The RB-47 was, of course, externally the same as the B-47 that
could deliver thermonuclear weapons. This made it very credible
as a decoy to draw anti-aircraft radar so it could monitor the
response of the Soviets. It also made it credible as a real
threat that might trigger a military response. Whether this is
what LeMay wanted is always an interesting question give other
actions on into the 60s. Whether on-going efforts of this type
contributed to the Korean airliner being shot down is another.]
Earle Jones
>"Gregory L. Hansen" wrote:
>>
>> our borders aren't exactly an arbitrarily large leak. And I think any
>> bomb that's smuggled in will be tactical, not strategic. Nukes can be
>> made small enough to fit onto artillery shells, but those aren't the ones
>> that can vaporize a city. And they're still pretty big and heavy. It's
>> not like you could stick it in a coat pocket and walk.
>
>The thousand acres around Wall St are valued at a trillion dollars or
>thereabouts. How big does a bomb have to be to destroy an economy?
*
It was once conjectured that three atomic bombs would solve almost all the
world's problems: One on Moscow -- two on Washington.
I have also heard that one on Miami would solve the Social Security problem.
earle
*
Earle Jones
ru...@adams.patriot.net (Frank O'Donnell) wrote:
>On 6 Oct 1999 02:50:13 GMT, Paul Tomblin <ptom...@xcski.com> wrote:
>Re: magazines:
>
>I always felt that Time leaked Top Secret stuff, Aviation Week leaked
>Secret, and Popular Mechanics leaked Confidential.
>
>Rusty "Dunno about FOUO (For Official Use Only), Congressional Record
>maybe?" O'Donnell
*
My favorite intelligence classification was "BBR".
That is, "Burn Before Reading".
earle
*
jmfb...@aol.com
In article <aW6L3.311$F3.2821@uchinews>, me...@cars3.uchicago.edu wrote:
>In article <7tiqja$n...@dfw-ixnews10.ix.netcom.com>,
sbha...@ix.netcom.com(Steven B. Harris) writes:
>>In <NuyK3.195$F3.1958@uchinews> me...@cars3.uchicago.edu writes:
>>>>>--
>>>Most of the public is still unaware how much of the technology they
>>>enjoy is a military spinoff.
>>
>> Which is not, of course, in an of itself much of a reason for more
>>military spending.
>
>Of course.
>
>>Research, ala Los Alamos, gets done by more or less private instilations
>>full of non-military people, just fine, if they have the funding.
>
>Sure. Given sufficient resources and good people (who'll come, once
>you've the resources) stuff happens.
Some of the people who facinate me are those who arrange this
stuff. When I was a kid, I could sit for hours and watch
an assembly line, wondering how all that machinery and equipment
got built to work like clockwork. And then I would wonder
about the people behind it who managed to get everything
working so smoothly.
A similar thing is container shipping. Just getting the right
stuff in the right container delivered to the right place
at the right time is an amazing trick.
/BAH
Jim Carr
>>thereabouts. How big does a bomb have to be to destroy an economy?
Aside: the truck bombing of the World Trade Center was a wake-up
call, so now most companies do a better job of mirroring their
critical information.
In article <ejones12-071...@ts009d30.sto-ca.concentric.net>
ejon...@concentric.net (Earle Jones) writes:
>
>It was once conjectured that three atomic bombs would solve almost all the
>world's problems: One on Moscow -- two on Washington.
Sounds like an Urban Legend. It only takes one large nuclear
weapon to destroy the surface monuments to the US government
in Washington, as with Moscow, but even two weapons will not
suffice to deal with the shadow governments each have/had
hidden away.
>I have also heard that one on Miami would solve the Social Security problem.
Definitely an Urban Legend. Miami has not been a mecca for retirees
for many decades now. As a group they have prudently made themselves
a distributed target across the state and nation (AZ).
Randy Poe
> The movie was "Ice Station Zebra" and Ernest Bornine was the
> double agent. Based On Alistair Mac Lean's Adventure Novel.
OK all you "Ice Station Zebra" fans. I occasionally try
unsuccessfully to remember the line about "our German
rocket scientists and their German rocket scientists"
(spoken by McGoohan, I think), and also involving
stuff we stole from them and stuff they stole from
us. Anybody know it?
- Randy
Edward Rice
ptom...@piper.xcski.com (Paul Tomblin) wrote:
> A cruise missile is not a warhead. A cruise missile has a jet engine,
wings,
> guidance and a bunch of other things that add considerable weight and
size.
> According to a Scientific American article many years ago about the
problems
> that nuclear cruise missiles add to strategic arms limitation treaties,
the
> warhead on an air launched cruise missle is approximately 120 pounds.
Paul, when we were using Tomahawks and ALCMs against Bosnia (or was it
Iraq? or was it Serbia? or was it Iraq the second time?), the figures
were published and the poundage is actually pretty high. I vaguely recall
that the ALCM warhead was about 200# heavier than a Tomahawk warhead, and
each was at least an order of magnitude above your "approximately 120
pounds."
How come Andrea hasn't checked in on this? It's not classified and I'm
sure she knows.
According to FAS, the Tomahawk warhead can exceed 1,000 pounds, and the
Harpoon (Stand-off Land Attack Missile, SLAM) carries about 500 pounds.
The original CALCM carried 1,500 pounds of warhead, while the newer ones
carry 3,000 pounds.
Start browsing here:
Andrea Jones
Edward Rice wrote in message ...
<snip>
>How come Andrea hasn't checked in on this? It's not classified and I'm
>sure she knows.
in. Not sure about anything but Tomahawks, really, as FC A school covered
about three missiles: RAM, Sea Sparrow, and Tomahawk. Harpoons were lightly
covered as something that we might be required to shoot down some day, but
not as something we'd really launch.
For Navy relevant T-hawk info, check out
http://www.chinfo.navy.mil/navpalib/factfile/missiles/wep-toma.html
Warheads are listed there at 1,000 pounds, for a blast/fragmentary unitary
warhead or "conventional submunitions dispenser with combined effect
bomblets." This second one refers to a T-hawk's interesting ability to drop
the "bomblets" on (we were taught) up to three auxiliary targets before
heading for the main one.
Andrea "But then, my favorite system is CIWS.. or as FC1 French said, 'Smack
my butt, I'm a gun tech" Jones
Paul Tomblin
>In article <7tfmhp$f5c$1...@piper.xcski.com>,
>ptom...@piper.xcski.com (Paul Tomblin) wrote:
> > that nuclear cruise missiles add to strategic arms limitation treaties,
>the
> > warhead on an air launched cruise missle is approximately 120 pounds.
>
>Paul, when we were using Tomahawks and ALCMs against Bosnia (or was it
>Iraq? or was it Serbia? or was it Iraq the second time?), the figures
>were published and the poundage is actually pretty high. I vaguely recall
>that the ALCM warhead was about 200# heavier than a Tomahawk warhead, and
>each was at least an order of magnitude above your "approximately 120
>pounds."
Well, maybe I'm wrong about that, or maybe I'm not. The Security
Classification Guide says that the characteristics of the warhead on an ALCM
are "S-RD", which I presume is something above what I can find on the web.
However, there are "backpack" nukes - the Russians have already admitted that
they've lost track of several. So the danger is there.
me...@cars3.uchicago.edu
>In article <7tfmhp$f5c$1...@piper.xcski.com>,
>ptom...@piper.xcski.com (Paul Tomblin) wrote:
>
>wings,
> > guidance and a bunch of other things that add considerable weight and
>size.
> > According to a Scientific American article many years ago about the
>problems
>the
> > warhead on an air launched cruise missle is approximately 120 pounds.
>
>Paul, when we were using Tomahawks and ALCMs against Bosnia (or was it
>Iraq? or was it Serbia? or was it Iraq the second time?), the figures
>were published and the poundage is actually pretty high. I vaguely recall
>that the ALCM warhead was about 200# heavier than a Tomahawk warhead, and
>each was at least an order of magnitude above your "approximately 120
>pounds."
>
send a cruise missile few hundred miles to deliver 120 pounds of
conventional explosive. Would've been downright silly.
Harry H Conover
: Of course. These were conventional warheads. You're not going to
: send a cruise missile few hundred miles to deliver 120 pounds of
: conventional explosive. Would've been downright silly.
Agree. The Tomahawk TLAM SLCM, as original deployed had several types
of warheads available, most common of which were the 1,000-lb Bullpup
conventional warhead and the W-80 Nuclear (which if I recall correctly
tipped the scales at about 1,100-lbs). The Tomahawk anti-ship variant
was always equipped with the 1,000-lb Bullpup.
Other warhead variants existed (mostly cluster bombs with anti-personnel
and runway buster variants), but were not widely deployed at the time
that I left the progam (1993).
For what it's worth, SLCM Tomahawks and Harpoons are generally
deployed as a 'certified round' (as is the Patriot ground-to air
missile), which means that it never leaves its factory installed
container. The missile, container and all, is inserted into the
lauch tubes (generally a dockside operation). Launching of
the SLCM Tomakawk is today done (at least on all Aegis class
cruisers and Spruance class destroyers) from what is called the
Vertical Launch System (VLS), a box launcher inside the ship beneath
the foredeck that contains 64 independently controlled missile launch
tubes. [You can see the 64 individual doors on the foredeck when you
tour any ship in these classes.] The VLS can be loaded with any
desired mix of missiles and warhead types, however, the 'certified
round' concept means that until it is fired, the ships crew have
no hands-on interface with the missile itself.
I'm not familiar with the warheads on the ALCM variant of Tomahawk,
and the version used by subs is still something else.
Just for the record, none of the above information is of a classified
nature. In fact, 'Janes' likely published more current data.
Harry C.
Harry H Conover
: me...@cars3.uchicago.edu wrote:
:
: : Of course. These were conventional warheads. You're not going to
: : send a cruise missile few hundred miles to deliver 120 pounds of
: : conventional explosive. Would've been downright silly.
:
: Agree. The Tomahawk TLAM SLCM, as original deployed had several types
: of warheads available, most common of which were the 1,000-lb Bullpup
: conventional warhead and the W-80 Nuclear (which if I recall correctly
: tipped the scales at about 1,100-lbs). The Tomahawk anti-ship variant
: was always equipped with the 1,000-lb Bullpup.
Caution sci.physics posters!
My newsreader just made me aware that this thread is being cross-posted
to alt.urban.folklore, and by now most of us who have been on the net for
some years know what perils lurk there!
In fact, I've already had a few bizarre emails, which of course I
immediately trash-canned. I now know why I received them.
Safe to say that sci.physics and alt.urban.folklore are at opposite
poles of the intellectual and personality spectrum. 'Nuff said!
Harry C.
Uncle Al
Harry H Conover wrote:
[snip]
> For what it's worth, SLCM Tomahawks and Harpoons are generally
> deployed as a 'certified round' (as is the Patriot ground-to air
> missile), which means that it never leaves its factory installed
> container. The missile, container and all, is inserted into the
> lauch tubes (generally a dockside operation). Launching of
> the SLCM Tomakawk is today done (at least on all Aegis class
> cruisers and Spruance class destroyers) from what is called the
> Vertical Launch System (VLS), a box launcher inside the ship beneath
> the foredeck that contains 64 independently controlled missile launch
> tubes. [You can see the 64 individual doors on the foredeck when you
> tour any ship in these classes.] The VLS can be loaded with any
> desired mix of missiles and warhead types, however, the 'certified
> round' concept means that until it is fired, the ships crew have
> no hands-on interface with the missile itself.
[snip]
PJ O'Rourke describes an Aegis launch sequence as "Hell's own
hard-on." There are people who cannot be reasoned with given
temperate discourse. One therefore occasionally needs to shout to
rescale their expectations.
--
Uncle Al
http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/
http://www.ultra.net.au/~wisby/uncleal/
http://www.guyy.demon.co.uk/uncleal/
(Toxic URLs! Unsafe for children and most mammals)
"Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?" The Net!
Harry H Conover
:
: PJ O'Rourke describes an Aegis launch sequence as "Hell's own
: hard-on." There are people who cannot be reasoned with given
: temperate discourse. One therefore occasionally needs to shout to
: rescale their expectations.
I'm not familiar with PJ O'Rourke's experience with weapon systems,
but I'd have to say his description, colorful as it is, contains more
than a bit of hyperbole.
Having been there an seen it, I'd rank the things you don't want to
experience in this order:
1. Being above deck during the firing of a broadside salvo from
16-inch naval battery. (Instant suntan) [This is an experience
that no sane individual will ever want to repeat.]
2. From a 1-mile distance, the lift-off of a Saturn V with full
moonshot payload.
3. From a 100-foot distance, the ripple firing of Tomahawks from
a VLS pack.
4. A 1-second burst from a Vulcan AA-gun, when standing next to the
gunner. [This sucker fires 37-mm amunition at 3,600
rounds per minite.] It you've ever experienced the roar of a lion
close up it a zoo, magnify the intensity of that sound by about
1,000 times and you can identify with the experience.
I guess what I'm saying is that O'Rourke's description has many faces,
and is equally apt for many situations. Still, let's not lose sight
of the fact that as dramatic as any of these weapons are on the
launch end, they are many orders of magnitude worse on the
receiving end. That's where people die from experiencing their
application. That's where the Hell really exists.
Harry C.
Paul Tomblin
>Agree. The Tomahawk TLAM SLCM, as original deployed had several types
>of warheads available, most common of which were the 1,000-lb Bullpup
>conventional warhead and the W-80 Nuclear (which if I recall correctly
>I'm not familiar with the warheads on the ALCM variant of Tomahawk,
>and the version used by subs is still something else.
Don't know about the ALCM variant of the Tomahawk (was that ever developed?)
but the AGM-86B ALCM used the same W-80 nuclear warhead.
Harry H Conover
: In a previous article, con...@tiac.net (Harry H Conover) said:
: >Agree. The Tomahawk TLAM SLCM, as original deployed had several types
: >of warheads available, most common of which were the 1,000-lb Bullpup
: >conventional warhead and the W-80 Nuclear (which if I recall correctly
:
: >I'm not familiar with the warheads on the ALCM variant of Tomahawk,
: >and the version used by subs is still something else.
:
: Don't know about the ALCM variant of the Tomahawk (was that ever developed?)
: but the AGM-86B ALCM used the same W-80 nuclear warhead.
Paul, I heard talk that an ALCM variant of the Tomahawk had been developed,
but in all honesty I don't know if it ever reached the deployment stage.
Consider any of my references to ALCM strictly speculation, since my
total involvement with Tomahawk was SLCM.
Harry C.
p.s. Ever hear the phrase "Nuke 'em till they glow"?
Paul Tomblin
>Paul, I heard talk that an ALCM variant of the Tomahawk had been developed,
>but in all honesty I don't know if it ever reached the deployment stage.
I think (this is old memory, so suspect) that the contractor for the Tomohawk
(GD?) proposed and possibly tested an airlaunched version, but I don't know if
the government ever bought one.
>p.s. Ever hear the phrase "Nuke 'em till they glow"?
Yeah, ever heard "We could have won in Vietnam if we'd turned it into a
parking lot"?
me...@cars3.uchicago.edu
>
>I guess what I'm saying is that O'Rourke's description has many faces,
>and is equally apt for many situations. Still, let's not lose sight
>of the fact that as dramatic as any of these weapons are on the
>launch end, they are many orders of magnitude worse on the
>receiving end. That's where people die from experiencing their
>application. That's where the Hell really exists.
>
Andrea Jones
Paul Tomblin wrote in message <7trg45$3f5$1...@piper.xcski.com>...
>In a previous article, con...@tiac.net (Harry H Conover) said:
>>Paul, I heard talk that an ALCM variant of the Tomahawk had been
developed,
>>but in all honesty I don't know if it ever reached the deployment stage.
>
>I think (this is old memory, so suspect) that the contractor for the
Tomohawk
>(GD?) proposed and possibly tested an airlaunched version, but I don't know
if
>the government ever bought one.
>
Company. Same guys who make my beloved Phalanx, actually. I'm reasonably
certain as well that the Navy, at least, hasn't got any air launched
T-hawks, but will check in with my source in aviation to be certain.
Andrea "once again, my familiarity with aircraft is as targets" Jones
Randy Poe
> Well, maybe I'm wrong about that, or maybe I'm not. The Security
> Classification Guide says that the characteristics of the warhead on an ALCM
> are "S-RD",
Secret - Restricted Data
which means nuke.
- Randy
Andrea Jones
Randy Poe wrote in message <3801CA56...@dgsys.com>...
There are spaces on ship where the door is locked to all but specific
personnel, and music is playing outside the door so that you can't hear what
they might say inside. Are they dealing with nukes? Nope, not always.
Just cool shit that isn't for general knowledge.
Andrea "Ask me about the best way to annoy a radioman[1]." Jones
[1] They deal with communications on ship and shore. One of the few
ratings in which it is possible to avoid ever going out to sea.
Jim Carr
}
} Paul Tomblin wrote:
} > Well, maybe I'm wrong about that, or maybe I'm not. The Security
} > Classification Guide says that the characteristics of the warhead on
} > an ALCM are "S-RD",
}
} Secret - Restricted Data
}
} which means nuke.
In article <OzQDZz9E$GA.239@cpmsnbbsa03>
"Andrea Jones" <aegi...@email.msn.com> writes:
>
>Which means, actually, "Don't Go Blathering This Crap All Over The Place."
Yes, but it does mean that the Crap is qualitatively different
Crap from the other things you are expected not to Blather about.
Restricted Data refers explictly to information that concerns the
design, means of manufacture, method of operation, properties,
and strategic or tactical use of nuclear weapons. Since they
include operational/deployment aspects of those weapons as well
as how to build them, those laws apply to which (if any) nuclear
warhead might be on a particular delivery vehicle.
As a result of the various SALT treaties, which made some of the
characteristics of both US and fUSSR weapons systems public (altho
I have heard rumors that parts of the treaty are classified) and
decisions by the DOE have opened up a lot more, including lists of
tests whose existence and/or purpose had been classified as Restricted
Data. And don't say that they were formerly Restricted Data, since
Formerly Restricted Data is a category of material that is still
classified. ;-) Bureaucratic/legal lingo at its best.
Thus it might be clear from treaties that a particular warhead can
be deployed on an ALCM, and Carey's collection of test data and
other treaty or test disclosures might tell you the rough mass and
possible yield of that warhead, yet it can still be secret what
warhead is on any particular ALCM.
>There are spaces on ship where the door is locked to all but specific
>personnel, and music is playing outside the door so that you can't hear what
>they might say inside. Are they dealing with nukes? Nope, not always.
>Just cool shit that isn't for general knowledge.
>
>Andrea "Ask me about the best way to annoy a radioman[1]." Jones
>
>[1] They deal with communications on ship and shore. One of the few
>ratings in which it is possible to avoid ever going out to sea.
Also one that is close to the people who hold rather high clearances
since they not only work with encryption and decryption methods but
also might see messages whose content could fall under a number of
different kinds of classification.
Jim Carr
} ptom...@piper.xcski.com (Paul Tomblin) wrote:
} >that nuclear cruise missiles add to strategic arms limitation treaties,
} >the warhead on an air launched cruise missle is approximately 120 pounds.
}
} Paul, when we were using Tomahawks and ALCMs against Bosnia (or was it
} Iraq? or was it Serbia? or was it Iraq the second time?), the figures
} were published and the poundage is actually pretty high. I vaguely recall
} that the ALCM warhead was about 200# heavier than a Tomahawk warhead, and
} each was at least an order of magnitude above your "approximately 120
} pounds."
In article <7tq5jq$gcu$1...@piper.xcski.com>
ptom...@xcski.com (Paul Tomblin) writes:
>
>Well, maybe I'm wrong about that, or maybe I'm not. The Security
>Classification Guide says that the characteristics of the warhead on an ALCM
>are "S-RD", which I presume is something above what I can find on the web.
Sorry, but claiming you cannot discuss a topic because it is PARD
after already making an authoriative statement about that topic
strikes me as rather odd.
As for the web, you should know about Carey Sublette's wonderful effort
that is at http://www.fas.org/nuke/hew/ and includes such information as
can be culled from public sources (all documented). For example, the
scrapping of the GLCM with the W-84 warhead resulted from the INF treaty,
which allows the ALCM with the W-80 warhead (model 1) that reportedly
weighs 290 pounds -- with the same weight (and other properties) on the
SLCM version now "stored ashore".
It would not surprise me if the amount of modern high explosive required
to produce a "1000 pound bomb" is on the order of 290 pounds.
>However, there are "backpack" nukes - the Russians have already admitted that
>they've lost track of several. So the danger is there.
A Russian said this. How reliable his statement is, and whether it
reflects a bookkeeping problem akin to all the weapons grade Pu that
is "missing" in the US or is a real problem, remains unknown. Is there
an offical Russian government statement on this?
Mark Folsom
Harry H Conover <con...@tiac.net> wrote in message
news:7tr884$d...@news-central.tiac.net...
>...
> 4. A 1-second burst from a Vulcan AA-gun, when standing next to the
> gunner. [This sucker fires 37-mm amunition at 3,600
> rounds per minite.] It you've ever experienced the roar of a lion
> close up it a zoo, magnify the intensity of that sound by about
> 1,000 times and you can identify with the experience.
A Vulcan is a 20 mm cannon and some of them fire at 6000 shots per minute.
Mark Folsom
Paul Tomblin
>} In article <7tfmhp$f5c$1...@piper.xcski.com>,
>} ptom...@piper.xcski.com (Paul Tomblin) wrote:
>} >that nuclear cruise missiles add to strategic arms limitation treaties,
>} >the warhead on an air launched cruise missle is approximately 120 pounds.
>ptom...@xcski.com (Paul Tomblin) writes:
>>
>>Well, maybe I'm wrong about that, or maybe I'm not. The Security
>>Classification Guide says that the characteristics of the warhead on an ALCM
>>are "S-RD", which I presume is something above what I can find on the web.
>
> Sorry, but claiming you cannot discuss a topic because it is PARD
> after already making an authoriative statement about that topic
> strikes me as rather odd.
Note how you very carefully snipped the first part of that sentence in the
first article, where I said " According to a Scientific American article many
years ago about the problems". So how is my quoting a barely remembered Sci
Am article "making an authoriative(sic) statement"? The fact that it's S-RD
means it's not going to be easy for me to authoratively confirm or deny that
figure.
Or are you just an asshole trying to stir up trouble?
Paul Tomblin
>In a previous article, j...@ibms48.scri.fsu.edu (Jim Carr) said:
>>} In article <7tfmhp$f5c$1...@piper.xcski.com>,
>>} ptom...@piper.xcski.com (Paul Tomblin) wrote:
>>} >that nuclear cruise missiles add to strategic arms limitation treaties,
>>} >the warhead on an air launched cruise missle is approximately 120 pounds.
>
>first article, where I said " According to a Scientific American article many
My apologies, it wasn't you who snipped off the sentence, but somebody before
you in the thread. But that does illustrate why you should read the ORIGINAL
of a post, rather than somebody else's quoting of it, before flaming the
poster.
Harry H Conover
:
: Harry H Conover <con...@tiac.net> wrote in message
That's a more contemporary version of the original device, which was/is
a hydraulic servo driven, radar tracked, ground based, AA gun shooting
37-mm electrically fired ammunition. It used the conventional rotating
Gattling Gun barrel configuration, but unlike modern weapons of this
gendre, had deliberately misaligned barrels so that it would throw a
spread, much like the pattern from a shotgun. It's mission was to
shoot down fast, low flying jets operating below then current missile
targeting altitudes.
Back around 1959, I witnessed a demonstration of one at the Army's
Aberdeen, MD proving grounds (during an ROTC field trip to be specific).
The demo's that day began with a 3.5" rocket launcher (it makes a very
big bang when fired, which bears no similarity to what is depicted in
the motion pictures. This was followed by demonstration of "tank killing"
using a very fast cross between a jeep and RV firing a weapon very similar
to today's TOW (damn tank didn't have even a chance to return fire).
Next came demos of the 105 howitzer and then a 155. Still, none of these
even compared with the impact of seeing this big rotating barrel thing
do it's stuff!
First of all, the original Vulcan AA gun was big! From memory, I'd
say when fully elevated it stood about 18' tall, and it required
considerable Hp to servo it (provided by a hydraulic power unit that
was trailer mounted and contained what appeared to be two large
diesel engines.) Before firing, it's azimuth and elevation agility
were demonstrated, and I've never seen anything so large move so fast
even to this day. (For the demo, they have it spin 360-degrees
several times, and it could do this in under a second. Its elevation
servo seemed so fast that the barrel appeared to snap from one
elevation to another without any intermediate position.
The firing demonstration consisted of three approximately one
second bursts, with the barrel elevated to about 60-degrees.
As I indicated in the previous post, what a sound! Still, what I
recall the mosts is the the expended brass (close to a truckload
from each firing burst) didn't begin to even hit the ground until
a second or so after the gun had ceased firing. This you had to
see to appreciate! Picture a moment of silence, then expended brass
(actually steel in this case) suddenly raining down to form a pile
at least 3-ft tall from each burst! [The expended brass from a
37-mm AA shell is not insignificant, and we were allowed to keep
one each -- as an enticement for us to sign up for advanced core
ROTC and a career in the Army, but that's another story.]
About 8-seconds later, closed circuit television showed the shells
impacting something like 5-miles downrange, which made me glad that
I was on the transmitting end and not on the receiving end of
this demo, because that place instantly became Hell on Earth!
Memories fade with time, but I am reasonably sure that the name of
that original device was called Vulcan, although very similar but smaller
aircraft mounted devices, like those on the A10, carry similar
names. Fortunately, this confusion has not carried over to the Navy,
where small, equivalent systems are called Phalanx, Goal Keeper, etc.
depending largely on the whims of the firm that produces them and
the nation that uses them.
Harry C.
Harry H Conover
: Paul Tomblin wrote:
: > Well, maybe I'm wrong about that, or maybe I'm not. The Security
: > Classification Guide says that the characteristics of the warhead on an ALCM
: > are "S-RD",
: Secret - Restricted Data
:
: which means nuke.
Yes and no. It pays never to assume.
I'll be honest, although I worked in military weapon and C3I systems
(mostly classified) for a total of over 15-years, I have absolutely
no clue what "S-RD" denotes.
Also, I have never heard of "The Security Classification Guide" to which
Paul refers. Of course, I may have missed something important. (It
sounds like one of the manuals that may be given to company security
officers, in which case there would be a great deal omitted.)
Likely, its a some kind of shorthand used in that particular publication,
in which case there should be some sort of appendix explaining it so it can
be translated to conventional security terminology.
In general, the recognized terms (those whose violation can get you
convicted of espionage) are Confidential, Secret, Top Secret and some
SCI unique modifiers that don't detract from the legal significance
of the first three. (You see many military tech manuals labeled as
'Restricted', yet the term has little legal significance alone.)
For example, right now I am looking at an original TM9-1981 Department
of the Army Technical manual with the title "Military Pyrotechnics"
that is labeled 'Restricted'. So far as I know, the 'Restricted'
label has no security of legal consequences of any kind. In fact,
I purchased it from a military suplus dealer, just as I did my copy
of a 'Davy Crockett' tactical nuke technical manual that is also
labled 'Restricted'. [This is quite a read. Picture a tactical
nuke that is fired on any enemy position from what is essentially
a recoil-less rifle configuration. The operating instructions are
a gas, and include instructions on how to dig a hole in the ground,
climb into it, and then fire the weapon using a long lanyard!
Seriously, I kid you not!] For what it's worth, throughout the
manual, it refers to the actual device as 'Special', not atomic or
nuclear, which I thought to be a nice touch particularly if you're
the guy in the foxhole with lanyard in hand! ;-)
Harry C.
Paul Tomblin
>Paul refers. Of course, I may have missed something important. (It
>sounds like one of the manuals that may be given to company security
>officers, in which case there would be a great deal omitted.)
http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/usa/bomber/alcm_scg.htm
Granted, this isn't on an official military web site, but it purports to come
from
"OKLAHOMA CITY AIR LOGISTICS CENTER
TINKER AIR FORCE BASE OK 73145-3021
CRUISE MISSILE DIVISION"
And the next paragraph says
"DISTRIBUTION IS LIMITED TO US GOVERNMENT AGENCIES AND THEIR CONTRACTORS.
OTHER REQUESTS FOR THIS DOCUMENT MUST BE REFERRED TO OC-ALC/LAM, TINKER AFB,
OKLAHOMA. 73145-3021. GUIDES ARE EXEMPT FROM DISTRIBUTION TO THE PUBLIC UNDER
THE FREEDOM OF INFORMATION ACT, AFI 37-131, PARA 10B, AND 5 USC 552(B)(2).
CLASSIFIED PORTIONS ARE EXEMPT BY AFR 12-30, PARA. 10A AND 5 USC 552(B)(1).
DESTROY BY PULVERIZING, SHREDDING OR BURNING.
(LOCAL REPRODUCTION AUTHORIZED)"
Jim Carr
...
>I purchased it from a military suplus dealer, just as I did my copy
>of a 'Davy Crockett' tactical nuke technical manual that is also
>labled 'Restricted'. [This is quite a read. Picture a tactical
>nuke that is fired on any enemy position from what is essentially
That must be some surplus shop you go to. ;-)
The pictures can be seen at
http://www.fas.org/nuke/hew/Usa/Weapons/W54davy1.jpg
http://www.fas.org/nuke/hew/Usa/Weapons/W54davy2.jpg
with descriptions provided by Carey stating that this 50-55 pound
weapon had either a 10 or 20 ton yield and "very light, compact
spherical implosion plutonium warhead" designed mainly by Ted
Taylor. Apparently 400 of the Mk-54 were produced. Note that the
yield makes that little puppy a 40,000 pound bomb.....
One from the category of 'we tried just about everything' and
built most of them in quantity.
> ... The operating instructions are
>a gas, and include instructions on how to dig a hole in the ground,
>climb into it, and then fire the weapon using a long lanyard!
>Seriously, I kid you not!] For what it's worth, throughout the
>manual, it refers to the actual device as 'Special', not atomic or
>nuclear, which I thought to be a nice touch particularly if you're
>the guy in the foxhole with lanyard in hand! ;-)
That would be a job for Cpl. Alfred E. "What, me worry?" Neuman.
Jim Carr
:
: In a previous article, j...@ibms48.scri.fsu.edu (Jim Carr) said:
: >} In article <7tfmhp$f5c$1...@piper.xcski.com>,
: >} ptom...@piper.xcski.com (Paul Tomblin) wrote:
: >} >that nuclear cruise missiles add to strategic arms limitation treaties,
: >} >the warhead on an air launched cruise missle is approximately 120 pounds.
:
: Note how you very carefully snipped the first part of that sentence in the
: first article, where I said " According to a Scientific American article many
In article <7tt41o$qa2$1...@piper.xcski.com>
ptom...@xcski.com (Paul Tomblin) writes:
>
>My apologies, it wasn't you who snipped off the sentence, but somebody before
>you in the thread. But that does illustrate why you should read the ORIGINAL
>of a post, rather than somebody else's quoting of it, before flaming the
>poster.
No problem, even though a quick check with dejanews at the sequence
http://www.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=534934757&fmt=text
http://www.deja.com/getdoc.xp?AN=535006541&fmt=text
shows that it was *you* who snipped off the sentence, not the
person who quoted you.
If you had just repeated that you were working from memory of a public
source and that definitive numbers are probably classified as Restricted
Data, I would have just pointed out that there are sources available
that are likely to be more reliable than your memory, or even SciAm.
Harry H Conover
: In a previous article, con...@tiac.net (Harry H Conover) said:
: >Also, I have never heard of "The Security Classification Guide" to which
: >Paul refers. Of course, I may have missed something important. (It
: >sounds like one of the manuals that may be given to company security
: >officers, in which case there would be a great deal omitted.)
:
: http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/usa/bomber/alcm_scg.htm
:
: Granted, this isn't on an official military web site, but it purports to come
: from
: "OKLAHOMA CITY AIR LOGISTICS CENTER
:
: TINKER AIR FORCE BASE OK 73145-3021
:
: CRUISE MISSILE DIVISION"
:
: And the next paragraph says
: "DISTRIBUTION IS LIMITED TO US GOVERNMENT AGENCIES AND THEIR CONTRACTORS.
: OTHER REQUESTS FOR THIS DOCUMENT MUST BE REFERRED TO OC-ALC/LAM, TINKER AFB,
: OKLAHOMA. 73145-3021. GUIDES ARE EXEMPT FROM DISTRIBUTION TO THE PUBLIC UNDER
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Paul, I for one miss your point in posting this. Care to clarify?
Harry C.
james d. hunter
>
> Randy Poe (q...@dgsys.com) wrote:
> : Paul Tomblin wrote:
> : > Well, maybe I'm wrong about that, or maybe I'm not. The Security
> : > Classification Guide says that the characteristics of the warhead on an ALCM
> : > are "S-RD",
> :
> : Secret - Restricted Data
> :
> : which means nuke.
>
> Yes and no. It pays never to assume.
>
> I'll be honest, although I worked in military weapon and C3I systems
> (mostly classified) for a total of over 15-years, I have absolutely
> no clue what "S-RD" denotes.
I think the main difference between secrets and secret data
is that people who steal secret data, whether military or civilian,
have a stronger propensity to show up dead rather than alive.
Harry H Conover
: In article <7tt9qi$s...@news-central.tiac.net>
: >
: ...
: >I purchased it from a military suplus dealer, just as I did my copy
: >of a 'Davy Crockett' tactical nuke technical manual that is also
: >labled 'Restricted'. [This is quite a read. Picture a tactical
: >nuke that is fired on any enemy position from what is essentially
: >a recoil-less rifle configuration. ...
:
: That must be some surplus shop you go to. ;-)
Indeed it was, until they were shut down by by govenment for some
questionable activities of an international nature unrelated to my
post.
If it helps, they were located directly adjacient to the Monroe
County airport in Rochester, New York. For some readers, considering
that the time period involved was 1968-1975, this particular location
may ring some bells.
For me at the time, this was just another of many surplus junk shops,
although their inventory seemed a bit pecular in that it included things
like half-track vehicles, and many airborne weapon system components,
and although I never actually saw anything close to a gun or missile on
open display there. Rumor has it that their closing was the result of
some involvement in a military arcraft export schems that involved
refueling stop-overs at the Monroe Country airport before proceeding
overseas by clandestine, fully armed military aircraft. Rumor has it
that 'The Farm' was involved, but who knows.
Rochester had another fantastic surplus dealer, whose facilities were
located in the tunnels beneath the then razed Rochester, NY railway
station. The place actually had stalactites growing down from the
ceiling, but contained an absolutely amazine variety of project surplus
merchandise from Kodak, Bauch & Lomb, and others. This was the place
for physicists, and I still own a CVC 3-inch oil diffusion pump and
high-vacuum gate valve that I purchased there for something like $10,
plus a Sorensen 30-amp regulated d.c. power supply for $12! Touring
the tunnels I recognized the ground reconstructin electronics for
Lunar Orbiter, and even two complete Lunar Orbiter 'Pigs', plus a
collection of optics surplus from various surveilance satelite
programs. Not fast sellers, but still neat stuff!
Fact is, I consider Rochester, N.Y. to be the surplus capital of the
world -- not that they want this label. It was a kind of distributed
thing. For example, Wards held semianual weekend sales of the
microscopes that they had taken in trade from medical schools.
This is where I purchased my B&L turret 100, 480, and 960X microscope
for $15. They even threw in a kit to make Gram (sp?) positive or
negative bacteria determinations.
I moved from Rochester to the Boston area something like 20 years ago,
and while Rochester was absolutely dead in comparison with Boston, I
stll miss it. (Sadly, Rochester has no ocean front properties or trees,
and Lake Ontario don't quite cut it!) ;-)
Harry C.
Mark Folsom
> ...
> Memories fade with time, but I am reasonably sure that the name of
> that original device was called Vulcan, although very similar but smaller
> aircraft mounted devices, like those on the A10, carry similar
> names. Fortunately, this confusion has not carried over to the Navy,
> where small, equivalent systems are called Phalanx, Goal Keeper, etc.
> depending largely on the whims of the firm that produces them and
> the nation that uses them.
The gun on the A10 is the GAU-8A, a seven-barrel 30mm gatling gun that fires
4200 shots per minute. Phalanx is a 20mm firing at 3000 spm (when I last
knew) and the turret and controls were designed and built by General
Dynamics. The gun used to be made by General Electric, but they sold that
division to General Dynamics. The Phalanx cannon is basically the same one
that was used on the modern Vulcan Air Defense Systems. I think Goal Keeper
is an adaptation of the GAU-8A.
Mark Folsom
Andrea Jones
Mark Folsom wrote in message ...
<xnip>
>The gun on the A10 is the GAU-8A, a seven-barrel 30mm gatling gun that
fires
>4200 shots per minute. Phalanx is a 20mm firing at 3000 spm (when I last
>knew) and the turret and controls were designed and built by General
>Dynamics. The gun used to be made by General Electric, but they sold that
>division to General Dynamics. The Phalanx cannon is basically the same one
>that was used on the modern Vulcan Air Defense Systems. I think Goal
Keeper
>is an adaptation of the GAU-8A.
gun drive for Phalanx CIWS, the rate of fire went from 3,000 rounds per
minute to 4,500 rounds per minute. 1988 also saw the change from a depleted
uranium penetrator to a tungsten penetrator. These changes were part of the
move from Block 0 to what is now designated block 1A. Block 1B, deployed
just this year on the USS Underwood, sees no improvement in rate of fire but
does incorporate what is charmingly named "the Enhanced Lethality Cartridge"
with a heavier penetrator. Phalanx Block 0 has a magazine of 989 rounds,
Blocks 1A&B magazines of 1,550 rounds.
The most intriguing development, set to supersede even Block 1B, is SEA RAM,
which uses the target detection capabilities of Phalanx Block 1B, but
replaces the 20mm Gatling gun with an 11 missile launcher containing RAM
block 1 missiles.
Andrea "And it's so _cute_" Jones
james d. hunter
>
> Harry H Conover wrote:
> }
> } Randy Poe (q...@dgsys.com) wrote:
> } :
> } : Paul Tomblin wrote:
> } : > are "S-RD",
> } :
> } : Secret - Restricted Data
> } : which means nuke.
> }
> } Yes and no. It pays never to assume.
>
>
> http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/usa/bomber/alcm_scg.htm
>
> to answer this "yes-and-no" implied question of yours.
>
> } I'll be honest, although I worked in military weapon and C3I systems
> } (mostly classified) for a total of over 15-years, I have absolutely
> } no clue what "S-RD" denotes.
>
> jim.h...@spam.free.jhuapl.edu. writes:
> >
> > I think the main difference between secrets and secret data
> > is that people who steal secret data, whether military or civilian,
> > have a stronger propensity to show up dead rather than alive.
>
> Restricted Data" are terms defined in US law that describe specific
> categories of information that are classified because they involve
> nuclear weapons in one way or another. That law includes the 'born
> secret' philosophy that made clever guessing a crime. In contrast,
> guessing at something that is just plain classified (e.g. Ultra) is
> treated differently.
No, I didn't know that "Restricted Data" was actually a legal term.
I was trying to explain the philosophy of classifications, and
why they are like that rather than the legalese of it.
>
> I found it interesting that they did not classify some things as
> Restricted Data that are covered by the Atomic Energy Act, but that
> may be so that they can be revealed to persons who do not otherewise
> need the clearance to know Restricted Data. They only applied that
> classification level to the warhead and its production numbers.
It's hard to say. Classification systems for military and civilian
manufacturing is a trade off. The facility maintainence and security
people at military bases usually know just about everything going
on,
but they also hardly ever have a technical "need to know".
---
Jim
Randy Poe
> : > Classification Guide says that the characteristics of the warhead on an ALCM
> :
> : Secret - Restricted Data
> :
> : which means nuke.
>
> Yes and no. It pays never to assume.
I'm not assuming. S-RD is Secret - Restricted Data. Jim Carr
has a full explanation of not only RD but FRD (Formerly
Restricted Data). When listing documents in short form,
such as a bibliography, short codes for the security
restrictions are used: U, C, S, TS for Unclassified,
Confidential, Secret and Top Secret. There are also
various special restricted classes, of which RD is one.
You can have a Secret clearance and still not be
cleared for one of these special categories.
That's "special," not to be confused with the word
"Special" with a capital S which has a very, um,
special meaning in this particular bureaucracy.
> I'll be honest, although I worked in military weapon and C3I systems
> (mostly classified) for a total of over 15-years, I have absolutely
> no clue what "S-RD" denotes.
Well, you likely didn't run across any nuclear data. Another
nuke-related stamp is CNWDI (critical nuclear weapons
something).
> Also, I have never heard of "The Security Classification Guide" to which
> Paul refers.
I've never seen a single document called "The Security
Classification Guide", but there were individual Classification
Guides (called DD-9s, IIRC) for separate contracts, which
could be consulted for deciding the classification of
particular pieces of info. Although as contractors, we
technically didn't have the power to make classification
decisions, the practical requirements of day-to-day work
mean that you have to make a reasonable guess so you know
which safe to throw your report in at the end of the day.
> In general, the recognized terms (those whose violation can get you
> convicted of espionage) are Confidential, Secret, Top Secret and some
> SCI unique modifiers that don't detract from the legal significance
> of the first three.
The party line is that "there is nothing higher than Top
Secret." Additional restrictions such as SCI and Crypto
are, according to security folks, just "need to know"
restrictions. Sort of sideways slices of the levels of
classification.
Surely you saw the above-mentioned (U), (C), (S), (TS) on
paragraphs, titles, and in bibliographies. If you are
reading a classified document, practically everything
but the page numbers carries a separate marking.
My favorite, from a table of contents, was something like
"Although every chapter in this document is Unclassified,
the document in its entirety is to be handled as Secret."
> (You see many military tech manuals labeled as
> 'Restricted', yet the term has little legal significance alone.)
You also see FOUO (For Official Use Only) which, I believe,
does carry legal significance.
- Randy
Andrea Jones
Harry H Conover wrote in message <7tueea$h...@news-central.tiac.net>...
<snip>
>It also represented rather early and hence rather dated technology. With
>the availability of SKINC devices, Davy Crockett got old fast. For what
>it's worth, this technology was largely a Navy effort which seems to say
>'Thou shalt no nuke a fellow ship into vaporization, but it's alright to
>do so to civilians and land based targets.' (My interpretation.) Hence,
>none of the anti-ship versions of Tomahawk are nuclear tipped, the the
>land attack versions can be. You go figure the logic and morality
>communicated by this policy.
<snip>
I don't see that there's a need to nuke an enemy ship when you can just sink
the sucker, then go back when things have calmed down and take a look at
what tech might be left on board afterward. There might be something
interesting on board, so why melt it down if you can recover it later and
add a little intelligence and tech to your own arsenal? It's not a
justification of being willing to nuke land targets, but it is a possible
explanation for not nuking an enemy ship.
Andrea
Paul Tomblin
>Paul Tomblin (ptom...@xcski.com) wrote:
>: In a previous article, con...@tiac.net (Harry H Conover) said:
>: >Also, I have never heard of "The Security Classification Guide" to which
>: >Paul refers. Of course, I may have missed something important. (It
>:
>
>Paul, I for one miss your point in posting this. Care to clarify?
You said you'd never heard of "The Security Classification Guide". I showed
you where I got it. What's so hard to understand?
Jim Carr
}
} Randy Poe (q...@dgsys.com) wrote:
} :
} : Paul Tomblin wrote:
} : > are "S-RD",
} :
} : Secret - Restricted Data
} : which means nuke.
}
} Yes and no. It pays never to assume.
Harry, Paul posted
http://www.fas.org/nuke/guide/usa/bomber/alcm_scg.htm
to answer this "yes-and-no" implied question of yours.
} I'll be honest, although I worked in military weapon and C3I systems
} (mostly classified) for a total of over 15-years, I have absolutely
} no clue what "S-RD" denotes.
In article <38024F5C...@jhuapl.edu>
jim.h...@spam.free.jhuapl.edu. writes:
>
> I think the main difference between secrets and secret data
> is that people who steal secret data, whether military or civilian,
> have a stronger propensity to show up dead rather than alive.
Apparently neither of you know that "Restricted Data" and "Formerly
Restricted Data" are terms defined in US law that describe specific
categories of information that are classified because they involve
nuclear weapons in one way or another. That law includes the 'born
secret' philosophy that made clever guessing a crime. In contrast,
guessing at something that is just plain classified (e.g. Ultra) is
treated differently.
I found it interesting that they did not classify some things as
Restricted Data that are covered by the Atomic Energy Act, but that
may be so that they can be revealed to persons who do not otherewise
need the clearance to know Restricted Data. They only applied that
classification level to the warhead and its production numbers.
--