ISS - doing Russian military recon work?

Allen Thomson wrote:
http://eol.jsc.nasa.gov/scripts/sseo...=E&frame=36011


That is mighty detailed.
Certainly detailed enough to be militarily useful.

Pat

Alan Erskine wrote:
"Allen Thomson" wrote in message
...

http://eol.jsc.nasa.gov/scripts/sseo...=E&frame=36011


Not of military significance. It would have to show details not otherwise
obtainable. As has been pointed out, ISS is too high to be of any real use
for military reconaisance purposes.


I think that it is militarily useful, as you could see new construction
with it, or make damage assessments to large scale areas.
For instance, the image of the airport shown in the photo is large
enough to show cratering to the runways that would make them unusable.
The advantage is that it's very recent photography, and while reconsats
can get that also, the more photography the better from a military
intelligence point of view.

Pat

Pat Flannery wrote:

I think that it is militarily useful, as you could see new
construction with it, or make damage assessments to large scale areas.
For instance, the image of the airport shown in the photo is large
enough to show cratering to the runways that would make them unusable.

I note also that the image on the webpage is only the low-resolution
browse version, and that there's a higher resolution version available.
Also, that image has another that overlaps it, allowing a 3D stereo
version to be constructed via computer - which would allow objects to be
easily seen in regards to height.

Pat

On Aug 23, 12:45*pm, Pat Flannery wrote:

I think that it is militarily useful, as you could see new construction
with it, or make damage assessments to large scale areas.

I'd agree. It's not real-time license-plate reading, but it does show
useful things. Perhaps NIIRS-2ish quality: http://www.fas.org/irp/imint/niirs.htm

Allen Thomson wrote:

I'd agree. It's not real-time license-plate reading, but it does show
useful things. Perhaps NIIRS-2ish quality: http://www.fas.org/irp/imint/niirs.htm


I forwarded that link to both NASA Watch and James Oberg; I credited
you with finding it of course.

Pat

"Pat Flannery" wrote in message
dakotatelephone...
I think that it is militarily useful, as you could see new construction
with it, or make damage assessments to large scale areas.
For instance, the image of the airport shown in the photo is large enough
to show cratering to the runways that would make them unusable.
The advantage is that it's very recent photography, and while reconsats
can get that also, the more photography the better from a military
intelligence point of view.

Yeah, but Pat; you can get the same thing from Google Maps. If you go to
one of the commercial image providers, they can take a much more detailed
image within a day or two of the order. The government can then decide if
it's worth a closer look; if that is warranted, they can use one of their
own recon sats and then determine if the craters are real or simply added
for effect (remember the Argentinians did that to Stanley Airport in 1982).

Alan Erskine wrote:
Yeah, but Pat; you can get the same thing from Google Maps. If you go to
one of the commercial image providers, they can take a much more detailed
image within a day or two of the order.

Do they do that in the middle of a war for either of the combatants though?
That could cause trouble for them.

Pat

"Pat Flannery" wrote in message
dakotatelephone...


Alan Erskine wrote:
Yeah, but Pat; you can get the same thing from Google Maps. If you go to
one of the commercial image providers, they can take a much more detailed
image within a day or two of the order.

Do they do that in the middle of a war for either of the combatants
though?
That could cause trouble for them.

Pat

I seem to remember that when the Coalition invaded Afghanistan, the U.S.
'bought' all the close-up images of that country to stop anyone from seeing
what was going on.

Pat Flannery wrote:
http://www.nasawatch.com/archives/20...the_iss_t.html


The bigger question is why would NASA bother including this in its
status report.

While it is clear (from outside the USA) that the USA has done many
things to stirr things up against Russia, I would have hoped that NASA
would have remained neutral and not contributed to the current USA
policy of smearing Russia.

The information released by NASA may be factual, but what NASA selects
to publish is editorial.

Allen Thomson wrote:

OTOH, what restrictions are there on ISSonauts wrt receiving requests
from their government to take pictures of whatever?

The agreements binding the ISS members together prohibit military work
aboard the ISS. Although I *think* that the USA has a few exceptions to
this, but they are still very limited.

Taking pictures with a handheld camera would not be considered military
work, probably not even close in terms of value of the pictures.

For a picture to have value to the military, it need to be accompanied
with precise position, time, attitude and altitude. satellites do that.
Handheld cameras don't.