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Classification is a double-edged sword. It may prevent your enemy from learning what you plan to do and what you are capable of doing. But it can have the same effect on your own forces, slowing their ability to design and build weapons and share needed data on the battlefield.
Worried that the long-term costs of classification outweighed the benefits, the National Reconnaissance Office, maker and operator of America’s spy satellites, declassified the existence of its super secret radar satellites, specifically those using Synthetic Aperture Radar. I heard about the declassification from a former intelligence official and called the NRO’s public affairs man, Rick Oborn, to confirm it. Oborn, regarded by many reporters as Dr. No Comment, belied his reputation and spoke on the record.
“We have declassified the fact that we have SAR systems,” Oborn said. The decision became public — sort of — on June 9 though it had actually been made several weeks before. The NRO did not publicize the decision and, as far as Oborn knew, there were no public notices. I asked him why the decision was taken.
“The reason was a practical one. Number one, it was one of those not so secret secrets. Anyone who has paid attention to what we do at all knows we have radar satellites. Let’s just quit trying to protect this information and wasting whatever resources get spent doing that,” he said. But there was a more practical, urgent need. The Air Force and NRO could not exchange information needed to move ahead on the troubled efforts to design and build a new generation of radar satellites, known as Space Radar.
For those who don’t follow the spy satellite world too closely, Space Radar was supposed to have been a joint effort between the Pentagon and the NRO to build a satellite that could both monitor moving targets such as trucks or tanks for the military and provide the strategic intelligence needed by the intelligence community and White House. Those requirements were extremely difficult to reconcile and the program ended up being cancelled earlier this year. A plan for a new Space Radar was ordered by Congress. It has not been completed. Now back to the practical reasons for declassifying SAR.
“There are lots of discussions between ourselves and the Air Force in particular, and other combat commands and other entities [about Space Radar],” Oborn said, adding that “It just got too hard to get into a room and talk about all this stuff.” NRO officials often possessed Sensitive Compartmented Information clearances, while their Air Force colleagues did not. That meant the NRO people could not even say what system they were in the room to discuss, Oborn explained: “It became one of those decisions — we have lots of business to do here, and let’s just get rid of this impediment so people can get down to business.”
http://www.dodbuzz.com/2008/07/03/spy-radar-satellites-declassified/
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"Korea has not been the only battle ground since the end of the Second World War. Men have fought and died in Malaya, in Greece, in the Philippines, in Algeria and Cuba, and Cyprus and almost continuously on the Indo-Chinese Peninsula. No nuclear weapons have been fired. No massive nuclear retaliation has been considered appropriate. This is another type of war, new in its intensity, ancient in its origin--war by guerrillas, subversives, insurgents, assassins, war by ambush instead of by combat; by infiltration, instead of aggression, seeking victory by eroding and exhausting the enemy instead of engaging him. It is a form of warfare uniquely adapted to what has been strangely called 'wars of liberation,' to undermine the efforts of new and poor countries to maintain the freedom that they have finally achieved. It preys on economic unrest and ethnic conflicts. It requires in those situations where we must counter it, and these are the kinds of challenges that will be before us in the next decade if freedom is to be saved, a whole new kind of strategy, a wholly different kind of force, and therefore a new and wholly different kind of military training."-President Kennedy's Address at Graduation Exercises of the U.S. Military Academy, 1962
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"The reason I'll be released is the same reason you think I'll be convicted. I do rub shoulders with some of the most vile, sadistic men calling themselves leaders today. But some of these men are the enemies of your enemies. And while the biggest arms dealer in the world is your boss - the President of the United States, who ships more merchandise in a day than I do in a year - sometimes it's embarrassing to have his fingerprints on the guns. Sometimes he needs a freelancer like me to supply forces he can't be seen supplying. So. You call me evil, but unfortunately for you, I'm a necessary evil."-Yuri Orlov, Lord of War
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"Of all the weapons in the vast soviet arsenal, nothing was more profitable than Avtomat Kalashnikova model of 1947. More commonly known as the AK-47, or Kalashnikov. It's the world's most popular assault rifle. A weapon all fighters love. An elegantly simple 9 pound amalgamation of forged steel and plywood. It doesn't break, jam, or overheat. It'll shoot whether it's covered in mud or filled with sand. It's so easy, even a child can use it; and they do. The Soviets put the gun on a coin. Mozambique put it on their flag. Since the end of the Cold War, the Kalashnikov has become the Russian people's greatest export. After that comes vodka, caviar, and suicidal novelists. One thing is for sure, no one was lining up to buy their cars."-Yuri Orlov, Lord of War
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