Ten years hence, when the U. S. Naval Institute is a century old, what impact will rapidly accelerating space operations and technology have on the U. S. Navy? What can and should our Navy do in space? What can national space operations do for our Navy? What can Soviet space operations do against it? How can seapower enrich our national space programs?
Let us focus our examination on the 1970- 1980 period and let us subdivide our examination into these areas: communications, command and control, meteorology, antisatellite operations and space surveillance, navigation and geodesy, and the basing of space facilities at sea.
Before beginning, however, let us define that part of space which concerns the U. S. Navy of the 1970’s. The region of space which is of principal interest to the Navy is cislunar space—the region this side of the moon’s orbit. The minimum altitude at which the atmospheric drag on satellites is negligible is 150 to 300 nautical miles above the earth’s surface.
In a satellite orbit of 6.6 earth radii (about 26,000 miles), the period of revolution of the satellite is 24 hours, the same as that of the earth. Thus an equatorial satellite at this altitude appears to hover above a fixed point on the earth.
The inner region of cislunar space between 1.05 and 6.6 earth radii, 200 miles to 26,000 miles above the earth’s surface, is the region wherein communication and weather satellites will operate. It is in this inner region of cislunar space that satellites can most effectively support or affect earthbound or sea- based operations.
Communications
In 1962 we had a glimpse of what opportunities will be available to the 1973 Navy in the field of space communications. Telstar is but a preview of what is coming. In the 1970 decade, communication satellites will offer the Navy an enormous opportunity to improve existing communication systems which are now overloaded and vulnerable. New frequencies and microwave techniques with satellites will provide highly reliable, jam- resistant, long-distance circuits. Jamming has long been a favorite Communist technique. It is well known, for example, that the Communists go to great effort and expense to jam Voice of America and Radio Free Europe broadcasts.
This same technique can be used on military communications in time of war. Moreover, high altitude nuclear detonations and ionospheric disturbances caused by changes in solar and sunspot activity can cause communication blackouts. Enemy action, or possibly sabotage, could destroy fixed communications sites including their large antennas. Communication satellites promise to bypass some of these problems, and in addition, will provide an abundance of new circuits.
In another decade, furthermore, a variety of sophisticated satellites—meteorological, communications, navigation—will be orbiting, and ships and fleets at sea will need to be able to talk to and through these satellites. It is apparent that more and more naval ships will need the equipment to make use of space communications.
As the nation’s space programs grow and more communication satellites are orbited, there will be a great need for relay and readout stations on the earth’s surface. Some of these stations can be located on U. S. soil. Others must be located either at sea or overseas. Special ships used for some of these stations could perform, in addition to their communications satellite duties, other more conventional military functions. For example, they might be used as command ships. These readout and relay ships would be mobile, secure, and free of foreign influence and base rights problems.
The Communication Moon Relay System (CMR) has operated between Washington, D.C. and Hawaii since 1956. The moon, a natural satellite, has been used to reflect radio teletype, continuous wave, voice, and facsimile signals. In many instances, the present system has been the only usable system during blackouts caused by solar and ionospheric disturbances.
Moreover, the CMR system has provided an abundance of scientific data on the nature of propagation and reflection of radio energy in the long reaches of space. This information has proved invaluable in establishing the concepts and design of follow-on active communication satellite programs, which, in the 1970 decade, will be in use.
Command and Control
In the command and control field, as the number and capability of communication satellites increases in the 1970-1980 period, a radically new opportunity will be available to the U. S. Navy for the wide dispersion of ships and forces, without sacrificing the advantages of centralized command, will be available to the Navy.
Already the Navy has a budding command and control system, built around the computer. It includes operations control centers (OpConCen) for the principal fleet commanders, a command ship, a transportable OpConCen for Joint Task Commanders and four tactical control systems—Navy Tactical Data System, Marine Tactical Data System, Air Tactical Data System and Small Ship Combat Data System. In addition, there are national systems for the Joint Chiefs of Staff and Continental Air Defense, Air Force and Army Command and Control systems. Communication satellites will be able to interconnect all these systems.
Obviously, the Navy’s command and control program will have to be correlated with those of other services and with the national control systems. A computer in a U. S. Navy Command and Control system will have to be able to talk to an Army or Air Force control system computer, and all of them will need to be responsive to the demands of the national command and control system.
Imagine, if you will, a potential conflict situation developing on the other side of the world from the United States in the area which includes Southeast Asia, the Indian Ocean and the Middle East. This remote area is the Achilles heel of U. S. military communications. Fixed shore communications facilities adequate to support even a minor war effort do not exist. Mobile command and communication ships with electronic data processing (EDP) and advanced communications equipment using satellite relay could play a major role, integrating the combatant forces into the national command and control system.
In any case, the 1970-1980 decade will almost certainly see increased numbers of both kinds of ships—command ships, having large information processing capability, and communication ships.
Meteorology
One of the most important areas of space operations affecting the future Navy is meteorology. As long as our Navy operates at sea it will always be helpful—and frequently vital—to be able to forecast sea state, sea temperature gradient, wind direction, cloud cover, the presence of ice or fog, and the existence and movement of hurricanes and typhoons. Weather forecasts in an amphibious landing area, for example, will continue to be of extreme importance to fleet commanders.
In the 1970’s weather satellites will be able to provide this information far more accurately, completely and quickly than has been possible heretofore. For example, the Tiros weather satellites now in use—the “Model T’s” of those to come—have already given indications of what future weather satellites can do. Hurricane Esther was first discovered by Tiros III. On a single day Tiros III photographed three hurricanes and two typhoons. Tropical storms were spotted on more than 50 occasions. Polar weather conditions were observed and reported, to the benefit of Antarctic resupply operations.
This sort of capability is but the promise of what can and will be done with weather satellites in the next ten years. Not only will future weather satellites give more complete data, but also they will furnish it faster.
Today, the weather map of a large area is about six hours old before it can be used, because the raw data must be assembled, sorted, analyzed, and finally sent to the user. In the 1970’s, this delay will be reduced almost to zero by using satellites and computers. In addition to the information now obtained, weather satellites will be able to determine cloud heights, obtain knowledge about the formation of thunderstorms, collect information on wind force and sea state, and take and transmit pictures of weather over large areas of the earth.
Our ignorance of tropical weather will be dispelled by meteorological satellites in the 1970’s. This use of weather satellites will be particularly beneficial to the Navy. The tropics (roughly that belt lying between 30 degrees North and 30 degrees South latitude) are the earth’s boilers. The tropics gain more heat from the sun than they lose by radiation, and conversely, the higher latitudes lose more heat to space than they receive from the sun. Enormous quantities of heat flow from the tropics to the higher latitudes. This vast exchange of heat is the energy which drives the earth’s atmosphere.
Thus, to understand the earth’s weather at high latitudes, and to understand the origin and cause of hurricanes and typhoons, an understanding of the meteorology of the tropics is required. Weather changes which take place in the tropics do so subtly and slowly, and the best way of knowing, analyzing, and predicting tropical weather is by pictures of the earth’s surface.
The number of reporting weather stations in the tropics are few. Yet, in this 60-degree belt lies half the earth’s surface, and 80 per cent of it is ocean. In this belt, moreover, lie the majority of the potential trouble spots of future naval interest—the Middle East, Africa, Latin America, Southeast Asia and the Indian Ocean.
What is needed, therefore, is a meteorological satellite which will orbit the earth at the equator. The easiest way to place a weather satellite in an equatorial orbit is by launching from the ocean at zero latitude. A weather rocket can be fired from Cape Canaveral which can be designed to make a preset, dog-leg turn at the equator and then orbit above the equator, but the booster would need to be far bigger, more expensive, and more complex than that used for an equatorial, ocean launching.
A weather satellite flying around the earth at the equator at an altitude of 2,000 nautical miles would provide effective coverage of the tropical belt. For example, the Seventh Fleet could receive a photograph of the weather every three hours (or every hour if three equally spaced satellites were in orbit) of an area which would include Midway, the Fijis, most of Australia, all of Indonesia, the Philippines, Formosa, Okinawa and much of Southeast Asia, from Chungking on the north to India on the west.
To take advantage of this sort of capability, the Navy of 1973 will need to have weather satellites and meteorologists trained to make effective use of them.
Navigation
Space technology will have a major impact on the systems of navigation to be used by the 1973 Navy. Navigating the oceans, using satellite fixes, will make feasible highly precise and secure navigation on both a global and local basis. Already, navigation by the artificial satellite, Transit, has been accomplished with errors of less than one mile. Consider the impact on the Navy if accurate navigation to within 100 to 200 feet were possible! The 1973 sailor would find the problems of threading a channel or a minefield, keeping station in a large formation, or approaching a beachhead a great deal simpler and easier.
Anti-satellite Operations
Several kinds of space operations which will have great impact on the Navy of 1973 have already been mentioned—communications, command and control, weather and navigation. The 1963 models of satellites now in orbit—the Tiros, the Transits, the Telstars —are but baby steps into the space age. We are no more advanced in space technology today than naval aviation was advanced in 1915.
Any examination of what the Navy might be doing in anti-satellite operations in the 1970’s must be hypothetical, for avowed American policy is to reserve space for peaceful purposes. The President has often stressed this point. “We hope that space will be used for peaceful purposes,” he said. “That is the policy of the United States Government. But we should be prepared if it does [is] not.”
So, let us look at the implications of possible naval interest in anti-satellite operations in a hypothetical way. Let us first assume that the Soviets and the United States cannot and do not agree on keeping space disarmed. What, then, are the possibilities?
It has already been shown that some missions can be accomplished best by using space technology and space operations; knowing the weather, navigating more accurately and communicating more reliably are examples. The President has noted that our efforts in the peaceful exploration of space—our booster program, capsule control and rendezvous techniques—also have military usefulness.
Some scientists think bombardment satellites are already technologically feasible. In August last year, Dr. Ivan A. Getting, President of the Aerospace Corporation, a nonprofit organization supporting the U. S. Air Force testified before a Congressional committee as follows:
“There is absolutely no question from a technical viewpoint that a nuclear bomb could be put into space. There is no question that technically it is conceivable to bring the bomb down—and hit a target with reasonable accuracy.”
Deputy Defense Secretary Roswell L. Gilpatric agreed on the capability, but objected to the rationale. “Today, there is no doubt,” he stated in a 5 September 1962 speech, “that either the United States or the Soviet Union could place thermonuclear weapons in orbit, but such an action is just not a rational military strategy for either side in the foreseeable future.”
The probability of weapons in space, or of the use of manned satellites as weapons is not great in the 1970 decade. Our present ICBM and Polaris weapons systems are more sensible and effective, and far less costly than weapons in space. Orbital bombing systems seem to be difficult and expensive ways of doing what we can now do more efficiently from the earth’s surface.
Assuming, however, that space could be militarily useful, and hypothesizing that the Soviets might decide so to use space, how would this situation affect the 1973 Navy? As the President indicated, we should be prepared.
One must consider confusing, neutralizing, or destroying an enemy’s space vehicles in wartime—the problem of “space denial.” And if such hostile vehicles must be confused, neutralized, or destroyed, it is inevitable that the Navy will have responsibility for an important share of the task.
There are two parts to the anti-satellite task, the passive and the active. First, one must know the presence and location (the orbital flight path) of space objects. Next, one must know the purpose for which the object is in orbit. This is the passive task. Presently, an important part of this job of knowing what is in space and where space objects are (but not why they are in space) is already a naval job, being done by the Navy’s Space Surveillance (SpaSur) network This “silent satellite fence,” stretching across the southern part of the United States, consists of a fanlike radio beam extending in an east-west direction. A satellite passing over the fence is detected, because some of the radio energy is reflected back to earth and picked up by large arrays of sensitive antennas.
In the active part of an anti-satellite operation, the 1973 Navy might have a key role to play. As we know, three-fourths of the earth’s surface is salt water. To deceive, destroy, or neutralize a hostile space object, we must, in my opinion, take advantage of the oceans. For it is patent that the destruction or neutralization of a space object is far easier if one shoots from the orbital plane of the space object, approximately under the satellite, even in the case of a maneuverable satellite.
The same is true for destroying an enemy ICBM; shooting from the ocean in the approximate orbital plane is the easy, simple way. Dr. Glenn T. Seaborg, Chairman of the Atomic Energy Commission, has said that the destruction of an approaching enemy ICBM does not depend on our missile making physical contact with the enemy missile, but on the nuclear explosion of our warhead, which can have an influence on the order of miles. It does not take much imagination to visualize the 1973 Navy using Polaris-type missiles in any given anti-missile missile role.
Whether or not space becomes a battleground is not known. We hope it does not. We only know that history teaches us that man has fought in every element he can live in. If there is hostility in space, the U. S. Navy will inevitably be involved from the oceans of the earth.
Sea Basing
Another aspect of space technology and space operations most likely to have dramatic impact on the 1973 Navy is that of sea basing —using the oceans for the launching, range support, and recovery of space vehicles.
Already, our national space program is having growing pains, and more trouble in the future is clearly foreseeable. For example, the boosters of the 1970 decade will be several times larger than those we are using in 1963— and there will be many, many more of them. These tremendous boosters will be dangerously noisy for human ears; people will be kept almost four miles away from their exhausts to avoid injury. The larger boosters can also pose explosive and toxic exhaust hazards. And if these boosters use nuclear power, which is technically feasible, there will be radiation, and contamination hazards.
Such problems indicate how our expanding and accelerating space programs using land- basing may become prohibitive for reasons of safety and the shortage of real estate. Sea basing of the larger more dangerous rockets may become imperative.
The Navy has already shown it is capable of launching large rockets at sea—Polaris missiles from submarines, of course, as well as surface ship missiles from such ships as USS Observation Island (EAG-154). The launching of free-floating rockets from the ocean, using the “Hydra” or coke-bottle technique, appears very practical and increasingly necessary to many rocket and space engineers.
Sea basing offers several bonus assets of interest to the Navy, for example, privacy of operations and fewer launching restrictions. Launching from our two present ranges, the Atlantic Missile Range at Cape Canaveral and the Pacific Missile Range at Pt. Arguello, Vandenburg, California, places severe limits on the azimuth angle at which our space rockets may be launched. Present operations must be conducted in the fierce glare of the TV cameras. The premature explosion of an Atlas booster in 1961, which sprayed pieces over Cuba, supposedly killing a cow, is an example of the potential hazard. If the upper stages of our future missiles should ever be nuclear powered, the danger of booster failure, and hence, possible fallout would add to the risk involved.
Another penalty caused by land-launching is booster energy loss. As mentioned, an equatorial orbit is possible from Cape Canaveral, but to achieve the same orbit from the sea at the equator would require a much smaller and less expensive booster than the one that would have to be used in the Cape Canaveral launching.
The Fleet Commander of 1973 will probably need a high-altitude, tactical probe capability, for local sea surveillance, emergency communications, and the collection of information on local weather. This probe could be a small, expendable, rocket-launched package, which would be used for a one-shot, data-gathering mission, and would not go into orbit. It would, of course, be sea based.
Thus, the 1973 Navy undoubtedly will be involved in the sea launching of certain types of the larger, more dangerous rockets. It might be required to launch anti-satellite rockets, or anti-missile missiles from the sea. The 1973 Navy will probably include new types of astronautics ships, ships able to transport, test, launch, and command large rockets and missiles.
Summary
If one examines the last century of our naval history, seven developments over shadow all others:
★ The transition from sail to steam, from wooden ships to steel hulls.
★ The development of the airplane and the submarine.
★ The impact of electronics (radar, communications, sonar).
★ The transition from conventional to nuclear munitions.
★ The shift from guns to missiles.
★ The shift from chemical to atomic fuel.
★ The impact of computers.
As one looks at the future, it is an inescapable conclusion that space operations and space technology in the 1970’s will radically and significantly alter the U. S. Navy. Space technology and space operations will have as great an impact, if not greater, on the U. S. Navy than will any of the above developments.
It is not an exaggeration to say that unless the Navy vigorously continues to adopt space technology and energetically to adapt itself to space operations, its contribution to national security will decline. Contrariwise, by continuing its exploitation and use of space, the U. S. Navy can increase immeasurably its value and effectiveness for defense in future decades.
