High Frontier (SDI)

[Triton]

Published on Sep 27, 2012

High Frontier was a private company that promoted space-based strategic defense against nuclear ICBMs. It was founded by Daniel O. Graham, a retired lieutenant general in the U.S. Army who is often called the "father of SDI". This film promotes Graham's initiative: a kinetic-energy weapon that could take out Soviet ICBMs as they flew towards the USA. It seemed plausible enough, but eventually the SDI plan diverged from High Frontier. The final SDI plan as put forward by Reagan's team relied on directed energy technologies such as lasers and particle beams to achieve shoot-downs, and even then it proved so challenging as to never be deployed.

https://youtu.be/B3KZiW589nI

 

[bobbymike]

Still is an organization

http://highfrontier.org/#sthash.O4qGJaIj.dpbs

Love these videos from the 80's pure nostalgia on my part. Nukes rolling off the assembly line, MX, D5, Pershing II, GLCM/SLCM/ALCM, Ohio, SDI, 3rd generation nukes, massive lasers in space, particle beam weapons.

Those were the good old days!

While I am being facetious they were interesting times.

 

[marauder2048]

Still is an organization

http://highfrontier.org/#sthash.O4qGJaIj.dpbs

Love these videos from the 80's pure nostalgia on my part. Nukes rolling off the assembly line, MX, D5, Pershing II, GLCM/SLCM/ALCM, Ohio, SDI, 3rd generation nukes, massive lasers in space, particle beam weapons.

Those were the good old days!

While I am being facetious they were interesting times.

What strikes me most of all is just how much better equipped the media and the public were for seriously debating defense matters.
If you look at the public debates over MX, for example, the opposition had some pretty incisive critiques of the MPS basing mode.
Debates over Rail garrison vs. dense pack vs. MPS vs. SICBM were informed and for the most part sincere and devoid of ulterior motives
Now it's all: OMFG <the latest defense program> is teh sux which is often just a cover for promoting a competing system/program.

 

[bobbymike]

Still is an organization

http://highfrontier.org/#sthash.O4qGJaIj.dpbs

Love these videos from the 80's pure nostalgia on my part. Nukes rolling off the assembly line, MX, D5, Pershing II, GLCM/SLCM/ALCM, Ohio, SDI, 3rd generation nukes, massive lasers in space, particle beam weapons.

Those were the good old days!

While I am being facetious they were interesting times.

What strikes me most of all is just how much better equipped the media and the public were for seriously debating defense matters.
If you look at the public debates over MX, for example, the opposition had some pretty incisive critiques of the MPS basing mode.
Debates over Rail garrison vs. dense pack vs. MPS vs. SICBM were informed and for the most part sincere and devoid of ulterior motives
Now it's all: OMFG <the latest defense program> is teh sux which is often just a cover for promoting a competing system/program.

Your absolutely right. I remember informed debates about force levels, weapons choices, MIRVS, SSBN numbers, MX v. Midgetman, B2s, etc.

Now you have someone mention 'nuclear' weapons (or nuclear anything) and you're drowned out by screams of 'you're stuck in the Cold War' or 'you're a crazy nuke warmonger'.

I put a lot of the blame on the arms control at any cost proponents who fill peoples heads with misinformation and sometimes outright obfuscation. How many articles still talk about Cold War force levels or we need to cut Cold War levels of nukes. How about the shouts of "ONE TRILLION for nuke modernization over next 30 years, we will bankrupt the nation on useless weapons"

Never do the articles mention the 90% reduction in strategic deployed warheads since 1991 or that the $1 Trillion for nukes represents 4-5% of DOD spending and only 16/100ths of 1% of projected federal government spending over that same timeframe.

 

[fredymac]

That's strange. I have worked my adult life in aerospace (yes, including a lot of SDI related) and I don't remember those kinds of arguments. It was still kill this program because:


-it is warmongering
-it violates the ABM treaty
-it won't work because SCIENCE says so


I remember George McGovern's explanation (I'm paraphrasing) that if you spend $1billion on defense one year and next year you spend $1, you haven't cut defense spending. You have increased it by $1. I think it was him but it could have been a whole raft of others.


On the other hand, I am trying to remember any instance where one military program aggressively campaigned to shut down another in order to get the funds. There is the 1950's Navy vs Air Force battle but that was more like inter-service feuding. I wouldn't doubt that there were unseen battles behind closed doors between advocates for competing projects. However, a serious public campaign to kill the F-15 in order to fund the B-1 or say today of killing the F-35 to fund a REAL alternative weapon system (not a concept or study or piece of paper) at 100% transfer of funds levels is something I have missed. There are political ploys along those lines (kill your program today for a promise to fund some other tomorrow) but I just don't see a vigorous effort to boost Railguns (or some other technology) to $XX Billions/year via canceling the F-35. Then you would indeed see technical arguments being proffered for competing ideas. Advocates of cancellation usually just want to cut military spending per se.

 

[fredymac]

PS
I have a 1985 vintage "SDI" video by Aviation Week back when it was still regarded as an advocate for aerospace. I have never seen it on Youtube but it is an excellent documentary with no politics. I have been tempted to upload it but I fear the gods of copyright. It's strange that nobody else has done so.

 

[blackstar]

Published on Sep 27, 2012

High Frontier was a private company that promoted space-based strategic defense against nuclear ICBMs. It was founded by Daniel O. Graham, a retired lieutenant general in the U.S. Army who is often called the "father of SDI". This film promotes Graham's initiative: a kinetic-energy weapon that could take out Soviet ICBMs as they flew towards the USA. It seemed plausible enough, but eventually the SDI plan diverged from High Frontier. The final SDI plan as put forward by Reagan's team relied on directed energy technologies such as lasers and particle beams to achieve shoot-downs, and even then it proved so challenging as to never be deployed.

To be precise: High Frontier was not a "company" but a private organization.

And there was no real "final SDI plan." Remember Brilliant Pebbles? That followed the lasers and particle beams approach because a lot of people concluded that the lasers and particle beams just would not work. So they turned to kinetic interceptors (Brilliant Pebbles). Eventually that fell out of favor too and when Clinton took office he redirected missile defense towards a much more limited ground-based missile system.

SDI was always a very very ambitious program. All of the technologies proposed to deal with the missile threat had major limitations. Kinetic interceptors had to be launched into space in very large numbers and then they all had to be controlled. Considering that at the time simply maintaining a constellation of a couple of dozen GPS satellites was a major task, maintaining command and control of thousands of space-based interceptors was essentially impossible.

 

[Orionblamblam]

What the world needed was giant orbital electromagnetic launchers, like the "Have Sting."

 

[sublight_]

What the world needed was giant orbital electromagnetic launchers, like the "Have Sting."

How was this thing going to get around Newtons third law without having a stadium sized fuel tank?

 

[Orionblamblam]

Simple: by being *insanely* more massive than the projectiles.

 

[blackstar]

PS
I have a 1985 vintage "SDI" video by Aviation Week back when it was still regarded as an advocate for aerospace. I have never seen it on Youtube but it is an excellent documentary with no politics. I have been tempted to upload it but I fear the gods of copyright. It's strange that nobody else has done so.

Would violating the gods of copyright get you banned from YouTube, or would it just get the thing taken down?

 

[Mat Parry]

PS
I have a 1985 vintage "SDI" video by Aviation Week back when it was still regarded as an advocate for aerospace. I have never seen it on Youtube but it is an excellent documentary with no politics. I have been tempted to upload it but I fear the gods of copyright. It's strange that nobody else has done so.

Would violating the gods of copyright get you banned from YouTube, or would it just get the thing taken down?

ah go on, upload it! If you do Mrs Doyle might bake you a cake

https://youtu.be/oBJ_PwpoIvs

 

[sublight_]

PS
I have a 1985 vintage "SDI" video by Aviation Week back when it was still regarded as an advocate for aerospace. I have never seen it on Youtube but it is an excellent documentary with no politics. I have been tempted to upload it but I fear the gods of copyright. It's strange that nobody else has done so.

Just dump it on drop box or me.ga and one of us will upload it to youtube.

 

[Dragon029]

Uploading copyright material to YouTube won't get your shut down unless you do it repeatedly and consistently.

 

[fredymac]

Very well. I will convert to an electronic format (it is a Beta format video tape and yes I still have a Beta format video player).

 

[blackstar]

Back on topic, it's always been interesting to me that the SDI debate focused on weapons efficacy and not on the logistics of a spaced-based constellation. Sensors and DE/projectile weapons would have required an enormous logistical structure for launch, support, and decommissioning, almost like a fourth military department in terms of scale and cost. As with anything, the real expense when viewed in the long term is not in implementation, but sustainment.

It's like the old saying that amateurs study tactics and professionals study logistics. The big cost is in all the stuff that is not obvious, particularly to those on the outside (like us members of the public). Software, for instance, would have been a killer. Imagine the command and control and tracking problem for a full on nuclear defense.

A few years ago I was talking to a retired USAF general who was still involved in space stuff. He was consulting on one of the more recent military comsat constellation programs. He said that what nobody outside of a few people involved in the program, and at DoD budget/accounting levels understand is that the ground system is enormously expensive, far more than the fleet of satellites that they launched.

 

[Dragon029]

Courtesy of fredymac:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tPO8HU9ASBk

The footage was a bit damaged, so the footage has been cropped a little and there's been some minor colour correction done. It clears up a bit after the first few minutes.

 

[fredymac]

Another ancient video dating to before SDI. I remember watching this when it aired although my memory was of a Nova documentary rather than a British one. I couldn't find part 2 except as an audio track with some slides to go along with it.

Particle beams would be far more destructive than lasers since their energy is deposited deep inside a target material. The technical problems in keeping the particles from interacting with each other was a major problem and made long range propagation impractical. I don't know if accelerator technology has improved to the point where this issue can be mitigated. Funding basically died out by the late 80's. The Soviets probably ran into the same problem but pushed their research much further into the prototype stage.

part 1
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ma7x-paZtA

part 2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OspgastvtAk

 

[bobbymike]

https://www.defensenews.com/digital-show-dailies/smd/2018/08/14/space-based-laser-weapons-could-ultimately-take-out-missile-threats-in-boost-phase/

HUNTSVILLE, Ala. — The Pentagon is eyeing space-based laser weapons technology as the ultimate solution to defeat a missile threat in its boost phase of flight, but the Defense Department is not yet at a point where it has determined the best possible solution.

“Waiting until an adversary is in midcourse [phase of flight] is giving the adversary a free pass to launch,” Michael Griffin, the undersecretary of defense for research and engineering, told reporters during a media roundtable at the Space and Missile Defense Symposium.

Advocating for getting after defeating missile threats in their earliest phase of flight, he said: “Until we’ve studied the problem, I don’t know what the best long-term solution is. … The best solution may be with directed energy.

“It’s too soon to pick a winner,” Griffin said.

 

[fredymac]

I would have thought all the analysis done under SDI regarding space based vs ground based lasers would have left some legacy preference within corporate memory. Even with the greatly improved efficiency of todays electric lasers, ground based FEL lasers still satisfy more of the "ilities" (maintainability, defendability, adaptability, etc). All your heavy, expensive hardware is on the ground and accessible for support, upgrades, and so on. At a minimum, they need to restart the 100KW FEL development program. I'm surprised it hasn't already been resurrected with the recent reinvigoration of HEL research.

 

[Archibald]

I wondered what had happened to Mike Griffin, of NASA fame... well now I have my answer.

 

[Graham]

PS
I have a 1985 vintage "SDI" video by Aviation Week back when it was still regarded as an advocate for aerospace. I have never seen it on Youtube but it is an excellent documentary with no politics. I have been tempted to upload it but I fear the gods of copyright. It's strange that nobody else has done so.

I wish you would. Would love to see that video!

 

[blackstar]

PS
I have a 1985 vintage "SDI" video by Aviation Week back when it was still regarded as an advocate for aerospace. I have never seen it on Youtube but it is an excellent documentary with no politics. I have been tempted to upload it but I fear the gods of copyright. It's strange that nobody else has done so.

I wish you would. Would love to see that video!

Read the rest of the thread.

Also, it is always a good idea to look at the dates of posts. You are responding to something written six and a half years ago.

 

[publiusr]

The interceptor lined drum that was to be shuttle deployed was “Project New Concept” and was shown during THE DAY AFTER as was a Paul Newman treaty idea or something

 

[Maury Markowitz]

I'm replying to a necrothread here, but it comes up in Google so here goes...

High Frontier failed the Nitze Criterion. This was the "holy writ" of SDI. Failing it meant it was not going to happen. Of course "not" has a habit of changing with the political winds...

The HF concept was originally studied in the 1960s as BAMBI. Basically just a slightly larger heat-seeking missile with thrusters instead of fins. The "garage" was responsible for early detection, comms with the ground and other orbital assets (don't want everyone attacking the same ICBM) and feeding initial queuing to the missiles.

The problem was simple: the soviets could expend one conventionally armed ASA on the station itself. This did not even have to mechanically damage it much, all it had to do is kill the comms or optics, and all the missiles inside were rendered useless. Considering the size and complexity, that ASAT would be dramatically simpler and cheaper, and thus the USSR would win any resulting arms race many times over.

The Nitze Criterion basically said "don't build anything they can afford to counter". Let us contrast this with something like Excalibur, which could shoot down dozens of missiles. In that case, if the Soviets would have to add multiple missiles or ASATs to counter it. So the money was on the US's side.

Additionally the Air Force had repeatedly pointed out since the BAMBI era that the amount of lift capacity needed was orders of magnitude beyond their wildest dreams. By the 80s, the only vehicle that could lift the garage was the Shuttle, which was launching every two months or so, meaning it would take about a century to launch the required number of garages. They would die of old age faster than they could be launched. When the HF published their book on the topic, the Air Force publicly dismissed it as "worth no consideration".

I see many statements above that claim this was all due to politics among the hoi polloi, but in this case its hard to believe the system is useful when the very force that would be given the money to run it doesn't even want it.

Of course only two years later it was dusted off and presented as SDI. By this time all of the other systems had failed and the DOD was desperate to do SOMETHING. So they said this was going to be phase 1 of the eventual system, but that quickly degenerated into the level of a joke as the costs ballooned into about 1/3rd of the entire DOD. Try and get that past the Navy. It then became Brilliant Pebbles which solved basically none of the problems, and then disappeared in 1993.

 

[Maury Markowitz]

-it won't work because SCIENCE says so

This is a statement of fact.

The APS's panel, which included the Nobel-winner for inventing the laser, along with the inventor of the CO2 laser and many other high-end scientists with awards lists as long as this page, studied the field in depth. Their conclusions are available in PDF form.

I'll summarize: "none of this crap is remotely close to working, and some of it clearly doesn't work at all even in theory (looking at YOU Teller). it will be decades before we know if any of these will even reach the fundamental minimum requirements, let alone make an actual weapon out of it."

Decades later we still don't have a system remotely capable of the task, so it seems "science says so" is in fact a really strong argument.

 

[Scott Kenny]

I would have thought all the analysis done under SDI regarding space based vs ground based lasers would have left some legacy preference within corporate memory. Even with the greatly improved efficiency of todays electric lasers, ground based FEL lasers still satisfy more of the "ilities" (maintainability, defendability, adaptability, etc). All your heavy, expensive hardware is on the ground and accessible for support, upgrades, and so on. At a minimum, they need to restart the 100KW FEL development program. I'm surprised it hasn't already been resurrected with the recent reinvigoration of HEL research.

Not to make anyone feel old, but the 1980s was 40 years ago.

If there's anyone still left in government service that worked on SDI, they were a very junior staffer back then and are ready to retire now.

 

[publiusr]

Class of 85...I remember when MTV had music

 

[Scott Kenny]

Class of 85...I remember when MTV had music

Crud, I remember when Nickelodeon had music!

 

[Byeman]

Not to make anyone feel old, but the 1980s was 40 years ago.

If there's anyone still left in government service that worked on SDI, they were a very junior staffer back then and are ready to retire now.

That applies to me.