awtron@rose.waterloo.edu (Andrew Tron) (11/01/88)
A couple of notes on the new Soviet Space Shuttle: 1) According to a TV news report (carried on Channel 9 late news in Toronto, Fri. Oct 28, 1988), the Soviets apparently got a lot of technical information about the American Space Shuttle from some scientific institute in Vienna. The Soviets were partners in this institute, and the information they copied was UNCLASSIFIED. (I forgot the actual name of the institute.) Some American space scientists were interviewed, who were disgusted at the fact that so much information about the Shuttle was unclassified and lying about in an unsecure place. Naturally, the report attributed the apparent similarity between the two Shuttles to this fact. (The report didn't mention how much information was taken and how detailed this was. If I were the Soviet shuttle designer, I would be interested in details of the American design, even if I had my own ideas. So this news report seems to be breaking the law "Correlation does not imply causation". Now if they interviewed the designers, we might know, but there's a snowball's chance in a supernova of that. :-)) 2) Regarding the `no spysat images' problem: In the book ``Inside the Soviet Army'' by Victor Suvorov (ex-GRU defector), the author states that military bases are given schedules of American spysat overflights, and orders to do conceal their activities or show false activities. Any commander who forgets to follow the schedule is extremely likely to find his keester in the proverbial sling. It would be entirely within character for the BURAN test flights to be scheduled so that they would not be detected by American spysats. -- -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- "The opinions expressed in this book | Andrew Tron at University of Waterloo are not those of the author." | uucp!watmath!rose!awtron (UUCP) - Arthur C. Clarke in "Childhood's End" | awtron@rose.waterloo.edu (Internet)
henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer) (11/02/88)
In article <9395@watdragon.waterloo.edu> awtron@rose.waterloo.edu (Andrew Tron) writes: >... Some American space >scientists were interviewed, who were disgusted at the fact that so >much information about the Shuttle was unclassified and lying about >in an unsecure place... Perhaps they have forgotten (or never knew) that NASA is a civilian agency whose charter specifically requires openness and distribution of its technology. "We came in peace for all mankind", remember? -- The dream *IS* alive... | Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology but not at NASA. |uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu
ewiles@netxcom.UUCP (Edwin Wiles) (11/02/88)
In article <9395@watdragon.waterloo.edu> awtron@rose.waterloo.edu (Andrew Tron) writes: >A couple of notes on the new Soviet Space Shuttle: > >...the Soviets apparently got a lot >of technical information about the American Space Shuttle from >some scientific institute in Vienna. The Soviets were partners >in this institute, and the information they copied was UNCLASSIFIED. >(I forgot the actual name of the institute.) Some American space >scientists were interviewed, who were disgusted at the fact that so >much information about the Shuttle was unclassified and lying about >in an unsecure place. It is my understanding that NASA is *forbidden by it's charter* to have classified information. Which leads us to the silliness of the USAF having certain information classified 'top secret' and the very same information in NASA's files being totally unclassified. -- ...!hadron\ "Who?... Me?... WHAT opinions?!?" | Edwin Wiles ...!sundc\ Schedule: (n.) An ever changing | NetExpress Comm., Inc. ...!pyrdc\ nightmare. | 1953 Gallows Rd. Suite 300 ...!uunet!netxcom!ewiles | Vienna, VA 22180
tif@cpe.UUCP (11/04/88)
Written 8:24 pm Nov 1, 1988 by netxcom.UUCP!ewiles in cpe:sci.space.shuttle >It is my understanding that NASA is *forbidden by it's charter* to have >classified information. Okay, so tell me all about STS-27. Wouldn't that be considered classified? Paul Chamberlain Computer Product Engineering, Tandy Corp. bellcore!motown!sys1!cpe!tif
phil@titan.rice.edu (William LeFebvre) (11/05/88)
In article <6400018@cpe> tif@cpe.UUCP writes: > >netxcom.UUCP!ewiles in cpe:sci.space.shuttle: >>It is my understanding that NASA is *forbidden by it's charter* to have >>classified information. > >Okay, so tell me all about STS-27. Wouldn't that be considered classified? As I understand it, there was a big debate between NASA and the DoD over just how classified the classified shuttle flights would be. DoD wanted everything about them to be classified and NASA said "we just can't operate that way". The end result is this weird hodge-podge of classified and unclassified ("red" and "black" are so much easier to type) information. For example, the date of the launch is public but the exact time is classified. Once the launch happens, the exact time it was launched becomes unclassified, but the intended time (I believe) remains classified. We can know how many and which people make up the crew, but the inclination and duration are classified. And so on. William LeFebvre Department of Computer Science Rice University <phil@Rice.edu>