The NRO designs, builds and operates the nation’s reconnaissance satellites. NRO products, provided to an expanding list of customers like the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the Department of Defense (DoD), can warn of potential trouble spots around the world, help plan military operations, and monitor the environment. Although it remained secret for decades, the NRO is now an officially aknowledged organization. BUT, many of it’s inner workings are still classified. Below, you will find the directives for the NRO that have been declassified. NRO Directives List Index Released in September 2014 [ 7 Pages, 0.5MB ] NRO Directives List Index Released in…
Author: John Greenewald
According to Wikipedia, “The Air Force Special Projects Production Facility was a top-secret facility operational at Westover Air Force Base from 1961 to 1976. It was responsible for developing film from the Corona satellite program and other film projects that were top secret. The facility was co-located with the 8th Reconnaissance Technical Squadron and developed the film used during the Cuban Missile Crisis. It was also the primary production facility for the National Reconnaissance Program during this time.” Below, you will find records relating to the Air Force Special Projects Production Facility, and it’s history. National Reconnaissance Office (NRO)…
Background Corona was the name of a series of the U.S. military reconnaissance satellites operated under a CIA program run by the Directorate of Science & Technology with substantial assistance from the US Air Force, used for photographic surveillance of the Soviet Union, China and other areas from June 1959 until May 1972. The project name is sometimes given as CORONA, but it is a codeword, not an acronym. The secret spy satellite was dubbed Corona by the CIA. To disguise its true purpose, it was given the cover name Discoverer and described as a scientific research program. Document Archive…
Carl Edward Sagan (November 9, 1934 – December 20, 1996) was an American astronomer, astrophysicist, author, and highly successful popularizer of astronomy, astrophysics and other natural sciences. He pioneered exobiology and promoted the Search for Extra-Terrestrial Intelligence (SETI). Below are papers obtained through the FOIA authored by Carl Sagan. The Radiation Balance of Venus, 15 September 1960 [30 Pages, 4.65mb]
This is a volume consisting of scholarship on the current state of the discipline of space history presented in a joint NASA and NASM conference in 2005. The essays presented in the book explore such issues as the motivations for spaceflight, and relative merits of human and robotic space exploration. Critical Issues in the History of Spaceflight. (NASA SP-2006-4702)