New spysat acquisition policy

Yikes! A policy decision seems to have been made wrt spysats.


http://www.dodbuzz.com/2009/04/07/pr...ellite-system/

President Approves New Spy Satellites
By Colin Clark Tuesday, April 7th, 2009 6:46 pm
Posted in Intelligence, Policy, Space

After more than a decade of false starts by the intelligence
community, President Barack Obama approved a new constellation of
highly capable electro-optical surveillance satellites.

“When it comes to supporting our military forces and the safety of
Americans, we cannot afford any gaps in collection,” Director of
National Intelligence Dennis Blair said in a press statement. “We are
living with the consequences of past mistakes in acquisition strategy,
and we cannot afford to do so again. We’ve studied this issue, know
the right course, and need to move forward now.”

The National Reconnaissance Office will manage acquisition of the
system and operate the new constellation. Lockheed Martin will build
the systems. They will be roughly similar in capabilities to the
existing spy satellite constellation, a senior intelligence official
told reporters Tuesday evening. The new satellites should launch
within the next decade.

“We simply are not going to launch a program that is based on long
reach technology or unrealistic funding,” the official said. This is a
clear reference to the disastrous Future Imagery Architecture program
run by Boeing, perhaps the largest intelligence program ever
cancelled. The new program’s contract should be signed within months.

The intelligence official denied that discussions between the Pentagon
and intelligence community had been acrimonious – as several
participants have said over the last few weeks. Instead, he said that
the Defense Secretary and Director of National Intelligence were
joined at the hip on this program. President Obama personally approved
the program, which the intelligence official said was not uncommon for
such significant programs.

In a move that took some observers by surprise, the intelligence
community and Pentagon have decided to buy commercial satellite
imagery from GeoEye and DigitalGlobe. As of last week, there has been
no mention of such purchases and some industry observers were
extremely nervous about the direction of the talks.

“The decisions about exactly what arrangements will be made with the
two commercial providers have not been made,” the intelligence
official said. They should be worked out in the next few weeks. Both
the intelligence community and the Pentagon will buy imagery, as has
been the case for years.

As a GeoEye spokesman noted today, his company has already committed
more than $30 million dollars to the next generation satellite, known
as GeoEye 2, and ITT is already grinding its 1.1 meter mirror.

Ground resolution for pictures taken from this satellite would be a
remarkable 9.75 inches.

“We are really encouraged by this announcement and we think this move
is the right move not only for defense and intelligence customers, but
for the taxpayers as well,” said GeoEye spokesman Mark Brender.

Sen. Kit Bond, the top Republican on the Senate Select Committee on
Intelligence said in a March 16 letter to DNI Dennis Blair that a
joint CIA-National Reconnaissance Office report endorsed the use of
smaller, close-orbiting satellites, adding he thought the new
constellation was “a poor choice.”

“You are asking the taxpayers to pay more for a single article than we
paid for the last Nimitz-class aircraft carrier,” Bond wrote.

Asked whether the program could withstand the ]opposition of such a
senior lawmaker, the senior intelligence official said that “we and
the secretary of defense plan to support this program wholeheartedly
and, with the support of the White House, expect to get this through.”
A second official went straight to the bottom line and said the
intelligence community believed it had the votes in Congress to pass
the program.

Several Pentagon and intelligence community sources have said the new
system would cost roughly $10 billion, with an early injection of some
$3 billion to get it started. The senior intelligence official would
not discuss the program’s cost other than to confirm that the
intelligence community would provide the majority of the funding. That
means the Intelligence Community will possess acquisition authority
over the new program.

The senior intelligence official also rejected claims by Pentagon
officials that the new system was “exquisite” or, in the words of a
senior Pentagon official, “a Rolex.”

The senior intelligence official said that “if you start talking about
costs of these kinds of machines you really need to start with the
premise that our mission here is one of the most challenging we do.”
But in light of that, the government will not be “moving to another
plateau of performance. These systems that we are building will be the
functional equivalent to the ones we have been buying over the last
several years.”

The reason for that is two-fold. First, the disaster of FIA marked all
those associated with it. Second, as the intelligence official noted,
“the industrial base for these satellites is very narrow and very
thin” so the country does not want to push for more than it could
handle.

Following is today’s press release about the new constellation from
the Director of National Intelligence:

DNI Blair Announces Plan for the Next Generation of Electro-Optical
Satellites

Director of National Intelligence Dennis C. Blair announced today that
the Office of the DNI along with the Department of Defense (DoD) have
put together a plan to modernize the nation’s aging satellite-imagery
architecture by prudently evolving government-owned satellite designs
and enhancing use of U.S. commercial providers.

“Imagery is a core component of our national security that supports
our troops, foreign policy, homeland security and the needs of our
Intelligence Community,” Blair said. “Our proposal is an integrated,
sustainable approach based on cost, feasibility and timeliness that
meets the needs of our country now and puts in place a system to
ensure that we will not have imagery gaps in the future.

“When it comes to supporting our military forces and the safety of
Americans, we cannot afford any gaps in collection,” Blair added. “We
are living with the consequences of past mistakes in acquisition
strategy, and we cannot afford to do so again. We’ve studied this
issue, know the right course, and need to move forward now.”

The joint decision by the DNI and DoD was based on the results of
multiple government studies over the past several years, and on the
findings and recommendations of an independent panel of former defense
and intelligence experts convened by Blair to assess the U.S.
government’s review. The studies examined imagery needs, alternative
architectures, cost and affordability, technological risk and industry
readiness.

Key features of the final plan endorsed by both the DNI and the DoD
include:

Government-owned satellites would be developed, built and operated by
the National Reconnaissance Office. The unique capabilities of these
satellites, evolved from existing designs, would give the nation a
timely, and often decisive, information advantage.

The Department of Defense and the Intelligence Community would
increase the use of imagery available through U.S. commercial
providers. This additional capability would provide the government
with more flexibility to respond to unforeseen challenges. These less-
complex satellites, which are based on technologies already in
production by U.S. vendors, would be available sooner than the much
more capable NRO-developed and acquired systems – making them
especially useful as a near-term supplement and backup to the
government’s existing imagery architecture.

The National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency would continue to provide
the infrastructure that integrates capabilities as well as imagery
products – all of which would be available on a timely basis for
military, intelligence, foreign policy and civilian users.

Once Congress approves funding for the plan, implementation will begin
in the next several months. The commercial imagery elements of the
architecture would likely be operational in the next several years.
The overall architecture would be fully deployed before the end of the
next decade.

The Director of National Intelligence oversees 16 federal
organizations that make up the U.S. Intelligence Community.
Additionally, the DNI serves as the principal intelligence adviser to
the president, the National Security Council and senior policy makers.