Spy Satellites and Other Intelligence Technologies that Changed History

It is disappointing that this book does not cover the science of spy satellites and other intelligence technologies that changed history. It only reviews revolution of spy satellites and air reconnaissance technologies that monitor proliferation of nuclear weapons and weapons of mass destruction through various multilateral treaties. These "national technical means" also help U.S. to understand Soviet military forces and capabilities as well as guarantee a treaty's verifiability for United States. On the whole, the book is very informative.

This book is not about "Spy Satellites". The title is a bait-and-switch to get you to buy it.This book is about the effects that the "really fancy" spy satellites have had on the course of the now-defunct cold war and its eventual demise - which was great but the really juicy technical details are absent. It's all about the policies that could be implemented because of how good they are.The big take-away is that these satellites have great power and many deficiencies in our current era of asymetrical- and non-state-sponsored terrorism.It's kind of a bore but useful and entertaining for policy nerds.

JUST OK. ALMOST NO MENTION OF THE KH PROGRAMS. AUTHOR EITHER NOT PRIVY TO MUCH INFO OR DIDN'T DO MUCH HOMEWORK. VERY SUPERFICIAL COVERAGE. WHEN WE TALK SATELLITES, THE U-2 PROGRAM AND AIRCRAFT AREN'T IN THE LOOP.

Spy Satellites and Other Intelligence Technologies That Changed History Back in the deepest depths of the Cold War and the "bomber gap", and the infamous "missile gap", President Eisenhower proposed to to the Soviet Union after the death of Stalin the "open skies". But since the US is an open society it was easy for USSR attaches and agents to procure all the maps and guides, they wanted, while in the Soviet Union, in which its own citizens are subject to internal passport control of their movements, all foreigners were constantly tailed and subjected to movement restriction.Afte his proposal was summarily rejected by the paranoid Soviet leaders, Eisenhower authorized the construction of the U2 by the famous "Skunk Works" (c.f.)for the CIA. As a military commander he had made much good use of "all source" materials including the highest security ULTRA sigint. (The Bulge offensive had surprised everyone because the Germans used landlines for communication and the bad weather prevented recon aircraft from flying missions.)During the early 50s,there were peripheral flights for sigint and some brief penetration missions from the Baltic and weather and atmospheric sampling in the Far East which revealed the soviet atomic bomb tests.The U2 was successful but when Francis Gary Powers was shot down over the Soviet Union and survived, the world knew the truth. Though the U2 never overflew the USSR again it had a long and useful career, participating in the Cuban Missile Crisis.The principal agency for foreign mapping in 1963 for US forces was the Army Map Service, a sub-command of the Army Corps of Engineers. A late sixties issue of the National Geographic magazine discussed the Engineer's Discoverer program in detail. This eventually was absorbed into the "Deep Black" (c.f.) program and nothing more was heard of it until the existence of the National Reconnaissance Office and the Corona program were revealed in the 1970s. All that photo based material has long since lost any military value especially the Soviet Union collapsed.Today after the end of the Cold War, the space programs at Tyuratam, now in Kazakhistan, were opened to the market place, and vast stocks of once classified maps and charts and the imagery as well have been available for many years now on the open market.Ike though, bided his time, even though the German expatriate group headed by Wernher von Braun (c.f) could have launched a satelite earlier the US Navy program, untainted by any historical allegations, sat poised to launch. Kruschev made the first move and since the Sputnik was an orbital vehicle which passed over most of the globe in each day, Ike now saw the way clear to openly begin launches, and did not protest but stated the obvious, that the free passage of Sputnik was an acceptable fait de accompli.As it was the first Soviet space vehicles were litle more than stunts, useful pay loads and heavy lifts of reconnaissance and sigint sensors were lacking. Instead one carried an unfortunate monkey who died before he could be retrieved. So with the launch Kruschev had outfoxed himself.Other nations have since entered the imagery and sensor market, notably France and India (c.f.)Though geographers refer to all this material as remote sensing the public still thinks in terms of spying. Where the term "Green Door" comes in, is when I first came to work at the Army Map Service in 1963, there were two parts to the building complex where the analysis was done; the "open side" which was open to tours and visitors and was publicized in a routine matter. This work required only a secret clearance for most as most of the analysts (area specialists) were DPs from the WWII era and many had relatives in the soviet controlled portion of Europe and we had a few ex Nationalist Chinese as well.The Green Door was a Top Secret facility with special accesses needed. At first, the clearances were so severe, that even those with Canadian and other Commonwealth origin spouses were summarily refused just because of the expense involved in investigating them.One day I came to work and in the lobby was a model of the new building. Coming back it was no longer to be seen. In any case, the whole building was a photographic processing facility where the raw imagery from the U2 and then Corona was processed. It is no longer used for that at all. There in the basement was the famous "slab" a vibration and motion dampened chamber where stellar navigation techniques were used to locate the images' exact geographic position after the film had been processed, the entire upper story was labled on the elevator PH which I thought for many a year meant penthouse, on the other hand it contained huge vats of photographic chemicals for mass processing of the imagery to distribution to our and other agencies.the whole first floor and basement were clean rooms with the occupants wearing whites and the floors and walls tiled with rounded corners so to facilitate mopping. Remember the sensivitivy of the slab could be thrown off by miles by a spec of dust or soot. The building even had its own generators and central vacuum system. Plus a positive air pressure refrigeration air conditioning and no windows.The entry the green door at first required one to conceal one's AMS ID an wear a seperate one. By the mid 70s many of the foreign born analysts had retired and it was it was demed time to extend the clearances to all who could be within reason, issue one badge with color coded access flashes, and eliminate the polygraph( A poor system, only the un-guilty get nervous. A pro can suppress thir reactions.)So a glimpse into the past and fifty years on new innovation in digital remore sensing still to come.

Fast delivery but somewhat disappointed in book.

It is not what I had hoped it would be. I expected more technical details and not as much behind the scenes history

OK book, but NOT a technical history of the development of spy satellites. It's mainly about the influence these satellites had on the various arms control treaties negotiated during the 1960s through the 1980s. It was because of the development of such satellites that the US and USSR accepted the arms limitations; they could reliably verify each others' compliance without ending actual ground inspection and monitoring. It's an interesting subject, but I can't say I found it particularly thrilling (hence the three - star rating).