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Beyond the Atmosphere:
Early Years of Space Science
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- CHAPTER 9
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- DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE
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- [116] Congress
had shown great concern over how to ensure proper coordination
between the civilian and military space programs. Space science
was one of the areas of mutual interest between NASA and the
Defense Department. Sounding rocket research had been supported by
the military services during the 1940s and 1950s, and the services
had participated in the scientific satellite program of the
International Geophysical Year. The potential military
applications (p.
41) were adequate motivation for
such activity, and there was no reason to suppose that the
creation of a civilian space program would end military
interest.
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- Most of the space scientists who came to
NASA -in the fall of 1958 had been associated with the Army, Navy,
or Air Force rocket or satellite research programs. Their
long-standing personal associations with people in the Department
of Defense made coordinating the two programs relatively easy. The
Civilian-Military Liaison Committee was too far removed from the
day-to-day action to be as effective as informal personal contacts
were. These personal contacts gradually led to a more formal
arrangement. On 4 May 1959 a meeting on the subject was held in
the office of Herbert York, director of defense research and
engineering. Attending, in addition to York, were Samuel Clements
and John Macauley of Defense, and John Clark, N. Manos, and the
author from NASA. The participants agreed to set up a 10-man group
with 5 members from each organization and to
[117] meet
monthly to exchange information. Named the NASA-DoD Space Science
Committee, the coordinating group under the chairmanship of the
author held its first meeting at NASA Headquarters on 11 August
1959.2 A month later, when Defense and NASA established
the Aeronautics and Astronautics Coordinating Board, the Space
Science Committee was renamed the Unmanned Spacecraft Panel of
AACB.3
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- The deliberations of the Unmanned
Spacecraft Panel were anything but monotonous. The panel quickly
developed a mechanism for routinely tabulating, updating, and
exchanging a great deal of information on space projects in the
civilian and military programs.4 Since it was unnecessary to devote the time of the
panel meetings to routine coordination, attention could more
easily be given to special problems. The problems varied widely in
substance and seriousness. One of the first was the question of
how much space science the military would do. Many NASA members
felt that the military services should look to NASA for their
space science needs and devote themselves to researches
specifically related to military applications. With this position
the services violently disagreed, insisting that they had to be
working in science to make the most effective applications of the
science results. The author agreed with this position and had to
take a bit of flak from his own colleagues, because they feared
that arguments over duplication of effort might compromise the
NASA program. Dryden agreed that it was not reasonable to try to
stand in the way of a Defense Department space science program,
particularly because of the benefit to military applications. The
dispute was eventually turned in the direction of ensuring, by
careful coordination, that the military and civilian space science
work did not bring-in the jargon of the day-"wasteful
duplication."
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- More serious were the disputes over
questions of military classification. Such problems arose in
connection with accurate observations of the earth's surface and
in geodesy. Earth observations were directly related to military
interest in reconnaissance and surveillance, and intelligence
agencies were sensitive about revealing either their interest or
national capabilities in the field.5 Applications people ran into this problem first in
connection with weather pictures of rather gross resolution that
were obtained from the Tiros weather satellites. There was concern
over possible international sensitivity to U.S. satellite
photography of foreign territories-even at resolutions of no
better than 400 to 800 meters.6 Some feared that international reaction might
precipitate a confrontation that could compromise U.S. ability to
pursue legitimate defense interests in earth observations. This
controversy was heightened in the late 1960s when NASA and other
agencies began to push earth-resource surveys of much finer
resolution.7
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- The space scientists also had their bouts
with classification problems. The most knotty had to do with
geodesy, the science of measuring the earth. The accuracy with
which the gravitational field could be measured [118] and
analyzed into its various components-or harmonics, as they are
called-was important in determining the size and shape of the
earth, the distribution of mass in the earth's crust, and stresses
within the mantle below the crust. But such data were also
essential for accurate guidance of long-range missiles. To the
scientists the precise location of different points on the earth's
surface relative to each other was vital for checking newly
emerging theories about the movement of the earth's crust. But to
the military those data would determine the position of potential
military targets relative to missile launching areas. The conflict
was fundamental. The scientists needed such information for their
research and during the International Geophysical Year had entered
into worldwide, multi-national, cooperative programs for making
geodetic measurements from observations of IGY satellites. The IGY
program had naturally extended into the NASA program and along
with it went the tacit assumption that the scientific data
obtained would be available to all participants. Indeed, as with
all the IGY programs, the results were to be published in the open
literature.
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- This policy was painful to the military
people, who felt that data of such vital military significance
should be kept under wraps and potential enemies forced to expend
similar efforts to obtain the information. A muddle of exchanges
began between NASA and DoD on the subject. Geodetic scientists
complained about footdragging. At the March 1960 meeting of the
Space Science Board, George Woollard urged NASA to start at once
on the preparation of a satellite specifically for geodesy. A
little over half a year later, the Aeronautics and Astronautics
Coordinating Board was still discussing how NASA might obtain
geodetic data for the scientific community.8 On 14 November the Department of Defense announced
that the Army, Navy, NASA, and Air Force were jointly building a
geodetic satellite.9 In that same period Deputy Administrator Hugh
Dryden was seeking clarification from the Academy of Sciences as
to exactly what international commitments regarding open
publication of geodetic data the United States had entered into.
In reply he received a pile of paper three centimeters thick
showing that, internationally, there was a general understanding
that the United States would publish data from its IGY satellites
that could be used for geodetic studies, with the necessary
information on the precise location of tracking
stations.10
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- The joint satellite, which acquired the
name Anna from the initials of the cooperating agencies, did not
end the controversy over classification. The rumblings reached the
ears of Congressman Joseph Karth, chairman of the Space Science
and Applications Subcommittee of NASA's authorizing committee in
the House of Representatives. He plunged into a series of hearings
on the subject. The Karth hearings, and pressure the president's
science adviser received from the scientific community, forced a
decision very [119] much like apartheid. It was finally agreed
that the scientific geodetic program would continue, with open
publication of results on the NASA side. Likewise, the DoD program
would continue, and when appropriate the two agencies would
cooperate, as with the Anna satellite. But DoD would decide
unilaterally on the disposition of the data and results from its
part of the program. Because of the knotty problems in this area,
NASA, DoD, and the Department of Commerce-where the Coast and
Geodetic Survey was located-set up a special Geodetic Satellite
Policy Board for the difficult problem of
coordination.11
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- It would be unfair to leave the impression
that all the struggles with questions of classification were
caused by the military. Within NASA a pressure arose to classify
launch schedules. Some of the pressure came from the use of
military hardware and launching ranges, but much of the desire to
classify stemmed from the poor showing that NASA had made in its
early attempts and from an embarrassing tendency of schedules to
slip because of technical problems. One could not properly use
classification to avoid embarrassment to the agency, but the
argument was put forth that it was important to protect the
already damaged national reputation in space exploration from any
further damage.
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- After a year's experience Administrator
Glennan felt it unwise to publish schedules with specific launch
dates too far in advance. Past and imminent launches could be
given by date, but Glennan suggested that launches over the next
two years be announced only by quarter, and only by year
thereafter.12 In March 1960 the author wrote to Ira Abbott,
chairman of a committee dealing with matters of security
classification, citing numerous problems that would arise in the
space science area if blanket classification were applied to NASA
launch dates.13 It did not seem appropriate to classify sounding
rocket firings in which many universities participated-and for
which schedules had been unclassified for more than a decade of
the Rocket and Satellite Research Panel program. For planetary
shots the timing was specified by the celestial mechanics of the
solar system and, if the existence of the mission was known, its
date was more or less obvious. Even where nature did not reveal
the date of a prospective mission, NASA had other problems to work
out. A large part of the space science program was carried out by
researchers in the universities, who did not ordinarily have
security clearances. Also, the civilian, peaceful character of the
national space program would appear to be compromised if an effort
were made to operate under security restrictions. Baker-Nunn
optical tracking stations, operated by the Smithsonian
Astrophysical Observatory, would not be welcome in countries like
India and Japan, which opposed classified activities on their
soil. It would be difficult or impossible to work with volunteer
groups providing supporting observations of satellites if
schedules could not be issued in advance. The same problem would
arise [120] with groups assisting in telemetering
satellites and space probes-various universities and the Jodrell
Bank Radio Astronomy Observatory in England, for example.
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- Concern about this aspect of
classification continued through NASA's first two years, but
policy developed to meet the need. Those participating in a
mission were furnished the necessary information for planning and
meeting schedules; and, in space science missions, while
experimenters generally did not have to wrestle with problems of
security classification, they were expected to handle schedule
information discreetly.

