Planetary Defence

[uk 75]

One of the odder moments of the Reagan Gorbachev relationship which seems to be true is that both men were concerned by reports of unidentified flying objects and took them seriously enough to exchange what they knew. I dont know how true these stories are.

Given the advanced state of the US and Soviet space programmes in 1989 it is fun to speculate on what might have happened if Reagan and Gorbachev had took their fears a step further and agreed to pool their resources to set up a global planetary defence system.

Reagan of course had already set in hand various SDI Star Wars programmes while Russia had its Energija big lifter and various other plans.

Put this in the bar but if anyone likes the idea it could move to Alternate History.

France might have put in its Hermes programme and Britain its Hotol spaceplane.

The TV series from the 90s Stargate SG1 had a take on this but there was scope for much more.

 

[edwest4]

UFO reports have existed since 1947. However, no public disclosure as to their origin has occurred, and is unlikely to occur.

 

[Kat Tsun]

The best Reagan-Gorby UFO story IMO is one time they met at Geneva in '85 and Reagan just out of the blue asks Gorby if America got attacked by ayys from outer space if the USSR would help. Gorby said yeah and Reagan was all same fam ong. Very wholesome tag team.

Larry Niven's Footfall was published six months earlier but how did he know.