The X-37B

[Juan_Bottom]

Really? Pictures? Because I have never ever seen pictures that were faked, so if you have pictures, then they must be factual.

The pics are actually NASA provided artistic renderings. Never-EVER believe anything that you read in Popular Science anyway. The editor for the magazine was busted out by loose change live on radio for doctoring photos.

You seem to have blithely overlooked my point about disinformation. You don't believe it might be in our military's interest to put this sort of information out into the public sphere?

The MDA has to budget, and it's through their funds requests that we are able to learn what they are working on. But that brings us to the ??? about the Pentagon's Black budget. In '05 or '04 I can't remember offhand, the Air Force received $45 billion for space based weapons through black budget funding. We know this because the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments acts as a watch group for this invisible money. Almost everything NASA works on is available to the public so long as you file a FOIA request... until the Air Force takes over that is. People like Major General Darnell have spoken to and been quoted in the Washington Post and other publications. He's the only one here who I could see working on disinformation. Other projects, like the "Rods from the Gods" program, will often become public knowledge once they are abandoned.

[Woodruff]

You seem to have blithely overlooked my point about disinformation. You don't believe it might be in our military's interest to put this sort of information out into the public sphere?

The MDA has to budget, and it's through their funds requests that we are able to learn what they are working on. But that brings us to the ??? about the Pentagon's Black budget. In '05 or '04 I can't remember offhand, the Air Force received $45 billion for space based weapons through black budget funding. We know this because the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments acts as a watch group for this invisible money. Almost everything NASA works on is available to the public so long as you file a FOIA request... until the Air Force takes over that is. People like Major General Darnell have spoken to and been quoted in the Washington Post and other publications. He's the only one here who I could see working on disinformation. Other projects, like the "Rods from the Gods" program, will often become public knowledge once they are abandoned.

Well...I guess I would suggest that any disinformation being put out there wouldn't be very effective if "regular folks like you and I" could figure it out. Which leads me to believe it's not nearly that easy.

[GabonX]

There's no need to get bogged down in theories here. We're already looking at something pretty interesting..

.. Would it come as a huge shock if this X-37B was the rumored special forces transport vehicle for space??

[BigBallinStalin]

There's no need to get bogged down in theories here. We're already looking at something pretty interesting..

.. Would it come as a huge shock if this X-37B was the rumored special forces transport vehicle for space??

Yeah, and maybe those Special Forces can look like this guy:

[GabonX]

That would be sweet..

[Juan_Bottom]

Well...I guess I would suggest that any disinformation being put out there wouldn't be very effective if "regular folks like you and I" could figure it out. Which leads me to believe it's not nearly that easy.

The point here is that it is. The project was a taxpayer funded NASA program. The information on the spacecraft was available to the public UNTIL the Air Force took it over. At that point it became black. The Air Force can't go back in time to create disinformation. So we know a lot about the craft. Electrical systems, propulsion, even potential load out.
Again, the information was publicly available until a little while ago. Without the "black" label it still would be.
Once the black label went on it, the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments has watched over it following the $$$ trail for every American.

Never-EVER believe anything that you read in Popular Science

It was featured in Popular Mechanics for May! oops

Because the program did not start as classified, many of its design details can be gleaned from documents drafted before the program went dark.

This isn't the article in this month's issue but:
http://www.popularmechanics.com/science ... pace-plane

[b.k. barunt]

Well...I guess I would suggest that any disinformation being put out there wouldn't be very effective if "regular folks like you and I" could figure it out. Which leads me to believe it's not nearly that easy.

The point here is that it is. The project was a taxpayer funded NASA program. The information on the spacecraft was available to the public UNTIL the Air Force took it over. At that point it became black. The Air Force can't go back in time to create disinformation. So we know a lot about the craft. Electrical systems, propulsion, even potential load out.
Again, the information was publicly available until a little while ago. Without the "black" label it still would be.
Once the black label went on it, the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments has watched over it following the $$$ trail for every American.

Never-EVER believe anything that you read in Popular Science

It was featured in Popular Mechanics for May! oops

Because the program did not start as classified, many of its design details can be gleaned from documents drafted before the program went dark.

This isn't the article in this month's issue but:
http://www.popularmechanics.com/science ... pace-plane

The most profound and concise defining statement about "blackness" that i ever heard was from my commanding officer in a conversation we were having about patriotism. I had questioned the emphasis on secrecy about something that our enemies were already well aware of. His reply to me was that "national security requires keeping secrets from 'civilians' more so than from our enemies".

Grok on that one.


Honibaz

[Juan_Bottom]

The most profound and concise defining statement about "blackness" that i ever heard was from my commanding officer in a conversation we were having about patriotism. I had questioned the emphasis on secrecy about something that our enemies were already well aware of. His reply to me was that "national security requires keeping secrets from 'civilians' more so than from our enemies".

Grok on that one.

Honestly, I think that is the big deal for our Pentagon. Our military likes their toys, even if some don't work at all. By keeping projects black, they keep their failures black, and the amount of money they throw into the projects stays hidden too.

[bedub1]

Well...I guess I would suggest that any disinformation being put out there wouldn't be very effective if "regular folks like you and I" could figure it out. Which leads me to believe it's not nearly that easy.

The point here is that it is. The project was a taxpayer funded NASA program. The information on the spacecraft was available to the public UNTIL the Air Force took it over. At that point it became black. The Air Force can't go back in time to create disinformation. So we know a lot about the craft. Electrical systems, propulsion, even potential load out.
Again, the information was publicly available until a little while ago. Without the "black" label it still would be.
Once the black label went on it, the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments has watched over it following the $$$ trail for every American.

Never-EVER believe anything that you read in Popular Science

It was featured in Popular Mechanics for May! oops

Because the program did not start as classified, many of its design details can be gleaned from documents drafted before the program went dark.

This isn't the article in this month's issue but:
http://www.popularmechanics.com/science ... pace-plane

The most profound and concise defining statement about "blackness" that i ever heard was from my commanding officer in a conversation we were having about patriotism. I had questioned the emphasis on secrecy about something that our enemies were already well aware of. His reply to me was that "national security requires keeping secrets from 'civilians' more so than from our enemies".

Grok on that one.


Honibaz

I Grok. I drink deeply with this one.

[GabonX]

Very interesting indeed..

I recently got a job with the Census and even though there's really nothing that strikes me as being particularly sensitive, aside from people's info which I would not discuss, I'm barred from speaking to the media...

[Woodruff]

Well...I guess I would suggest that any disinformation being put out there wouldn't be very effective if "regular folks like you and I" could figure it out. Which leads me to believe it's not nearly that easy.

The point here is that it is. The project was a taxpayer funded NASA program. The information on the spacecraft was available to the public UNTIL the Air Force took it over. At that point it became black. The Air Force can't go back in time to create disinformation. So we know a lot about the craft. Electrical systems, propulsion, even potential load out.

You don't think that sort of thing could be altered once the Air Force took over?
I'm not saying your wrong...what I AM saying is that you're not necessarily right, and you really don't have any way of knowing if you're right or not (nor do I).

The most profound and concise defining statement about "blackness" that i ever heard was from my commanding officer in a conversation we were having about patriotism. I had questioned the emphasis on secrecy about something that our enemies were already well aware of. His reply to me was that "national security requires keeping secrets from 'civilians' more so than from our enemies".

Grok on that one.

Honestly, I think that is the big deal for our Pentagon. Our military likes their toys, even if some don't work at all. By keeping projects black, they keep their failures black, and the amount of money they throw into the projects stays hidden too.

I would say there's a lot of truth potential to that.

[Juan_Bottom]

You don't think that sort of thing could be altered once the Air Force took over?
I'm not saying your wrong...what I AM saying is that you're not necessarily right, and you really don't have any way of knowing if you're right or not (nor do I).

I do, it's been a few years now. Since about '02 when the Air Force took over?
But at the same time, this is cutting edge technology so there's only so much they can do. The original craft for example, had ceramic tiles on the front-outside hull for atmospheric re-entry protection. I don't think that could be touched for many years.
I mean, we know what they started working with at least. We'll have to see if we can catch a glimpse of it when it launches. I'm not sure if the '02 pictures are the actual craft or not.