MIDAS
Military satellite projects were added to the mission of the Western
Development Division in the mid-1950’s and came to play an
increasingly important role in the activities of the division’s successors.
The first satellite program was known as the Military Satellite System
(WS 117L), and the division was given responsibility for it in February
1956. WS 117L was to be a family of separate subsystems that could
carry out different missions, including photo reconnaissance and
missile warning. By the end of 1959, WS 117L had evolved into three
separate programs — the Discoverer Program, the Satellite and
Missile Observation System, and the Missile Detection Alarm System.
Discoverer and SAMOS were to carry out the photo reconnaissance
mission, and MIDAS was to carry out the missile warning mission.
The MIDAS program — the third offshoot of WS 117L — aimed at
developing a satellite that would carry an infrared sensor to detect
hostile ICBM launches. The first MIDAS satellite, launched in
February 1960, failed to achieve orbit. MIDAS II, launched in May
1960, did achieve orbit, but its telemetry system failed two days after
launch. MIDAS III, successfully launched in July 1961, also achieved
orbit and was the heaviest U.S. satellite launched up to that time. As
was the case with SAMOS, a veil of secrecy was drawn across the
MIDAS program in 1962. However, the MIDAS program eventually
evolved into the Defense Support Program, and the DSP mission was
declassified following the Persian Gulf war. Today, the satellites,
ground stations, and mobile ground terminals of DSP perform
MIDAS’s original mission of detecting and reporting on hostile missile
launches.
Sources
http://www.fas.org/spp/military/program/warning/midas.htm
Implemented by Charles P. Vick, Sara D. Berman, and
Christina Lindborg, 1997 Scoville Fellow
Maintained by Robert Sherman
Originally created by John Pike
Updated Saturday, September 09, 2000, 01:45:00 PM