Mi amigo, estas en lo cierto, pero no del todo... El SR-71, que en realidad era el RS-71 (Strike and Reconnaissance, no Strategic Reconnaissance como algunos creen), y cuyas siglas fueron confundidas por Lyndon Johnson en 1964, cuando lo anuncio al publico, poseia originariamente la posibilidad de cargar y lanzar al drone supersonico D-21, cuyo payload podia ser indistintamente camaras o una warhead nuclear de 100 kilotones.
Solo se contruyeron 38 D-21, pero le daba al SR-71 (mas grande y de mayor alcance que el A-12), una temible capacidad de ataque.
Abrazo!
SR 71 Blackbird.
SR 72 Darkbird, que hasta el día de hoy es secreto.
Senator, I know there are many taxpayers that are wondering about the SR-72 Darkbird, and its secretive missions. I'll leave it up to you to decide what information to release to them, but I'll give you a little history of the plane. I'll follow this with a briefing about the type of top-secret missions we CIA pilots performed, and conclude with our recommendations about the bill that has come before the Senate.
You may know about that other aircraft called the SR-71. It was a fast plane - with speeds around Mach 3.3. With the SR-72, the original objective was to fly even faster, and to be in the air longer without having to perform mid-air refueling.
The SR-72 was designed the a CIA front company called Apogee Components. The development of the black program was hidden quite easily in the CIA's budget. Until recently, you might not even have known it existed. The first flights of the aircraft took place in the early 70's over sparsely populated island chains in the Pacific Ocean. To this day the airplane's top speed is considered a national secret. But let's say it is well over Mach 4.4.
Suffice it to say, it is very difficult to reach these speeds without the assistance of rocket power. That is why the core module of the SR-72 houses the powerful and ultra-efficient J7 rocket engine. It is a remarkable engine, as it is able to use atmospheric oxygen that is ducted in from the two outboard engine cowlings. This saves a lot of weight, since separate oxidizer is not needed for the rocket power portion of the flight. This allows the plane to carry much more fuel, giving it the loiter time over the target that is required for many of its missions.
As you know Senator, the old SR-71 did not carry armaments, whereas, the SR-72 is a CIA airplane, it does. The primary weapon is a large Bolaero/Z Air-to-Space missile. Because of the high launch speeds of the SR-72, the missile can reach targets that may be in geosynchronous orbit.
Initially, early missions of the plane where to take out "ORANGE Country's" space launchers. You probably remember that the success rate of those launches appeared to be dismal. Most people thought that the "ORANGE Country's" space program was run by a lot of incompetent engineers. But in actuality, we took out the launchers with air-to-space missiles fired from the SR-72 Darkbird.
That's why the need for extra speed was critical. We'd loiter over the mountains
for a rocket launch. If everything went right, we pilots would get a message from CIA headquarters about the countdown. As you know, it was part of the CIA's job to have intelligence agents on the ground monitoring all their launches.
If the launch looked imminent, we'd ignite the J7 rocket engine to full thrust. It was a real kick in the butt as I'd burn through the upper layers of the atmosphere and try to be in a position to launch my own air-to-space missile. Our objective was to get a good run on the rocket just as it cleared 30,000 feet. The faster we went, the greater the possibility of a successful termination, since the window of opportunity was so very short.
We SR-72 pilots weren't successful every time, but we hit enough of the rockets in the first few months of operation to make their space program very expensive. Because of this, they had to divert money from other military programs. It was a double bonus for our side.
Did "Orange Country" know what we were up to? You bet. Once we ignited the J7 engine, we were very easy to track. But by that time we were already chasing their rocket. And yes; they did all types of things to try to circumvent our plans. Launching decoy rockets worked for a while, so did having a fake countdown. But a lot of times, we knew they had limited launch windows for their rockets, so those missions were a bit more successful.
We never went after manned vehicles; and they knew it. It would have drawn too much attention to their space program. People would have demanded answers, and we might have ended up exposing our own SR-72 aircraft.
They couldn't protest against our flights publicly; probably because they couldn't face their population with the news that we had a plane capable of such performance. They took great pride in their aviation industry, and they just couldn't admit they weren't able to create a plane with similar capabilities.
Also, until 1994, it was a federal crime to take any photographs of the SR-72, so the "Orange Country" had no idea what the plane looked like, nor how big it actually was. While the SR-72 has a similar shape to the SR-71, it is a much bigger aircraft. It is almost twice the size!
It was a very stealthy aircraft while operating under normal scram-jet power; although it is a bit noisy. But flying up above most of the atmosphere muffled the ground noise to a significant extent. But once we ignited the J7, we were very easy to spot on radar, and with infrared tracking systems.
By around late 1974, the "Orange Country" had developed significant countermeasures that made our missions nearly impractical. They figured out how to stage their rockets at critical times in the flight, which would present multiple targets to the missile we fired at them. This would confuse the missile's guidance system, and it usually went after the large portion of the rocket. Obviously, that was the wrong part as far as we were concerned.
Senator, now I'll get to the part about the aliens.
On April 1, 1975 an Air Force F4 Phantom jet mysteriously exploded while operating a routine training flight over Colorado. That is what the news reports said anyway. But another F4 flying in formation witnessed what happened. A Unidentified Flying Object swooped down on the first F4, and launched some type of hi-speed projectile. After that plane was destroyed, it came after the second F4. It was also hit by a projectile, but the pilot was able to eject successfully.
To this day, we don't know where the UFO came from. But this was a far bigger national security threat to us than "Orange Country." We are dealing with an advisory that is much more technologically advanced than we are. So we ceased SR-72 missions to destroy "Orange Country's" space launchers.
Heck, Senator, we knew that our entire planet was at risk. So we devised a plan to get the assistance of "Orange Country" to aid us in defending humanity.
Do you recall that link-up of astronauts in space in 1975? It was the only way we could think of to share information with "Orange Country" about the threat from the aliens. To our knowledge, they hadn't yet encountered the aliens; so we needed proof that they existed.
Some crazy scientist at Apogee Components figured out that the aliens would be monitoring that space link-up mission. And sure enough, they did show up. It was profound evidence, and we were able to convince "Orange Country" that the threat from the aliens was real. That day was the beginning of the end of Cold War.
Senator, it was pure luck that we did have the SR-72 Darkbird in our arsenal at the time. It gave us some limited defense against the aliens when they flew down into our atmosphere. It was fast and maneuverable enough to chase away the alien UFOs. We haven't been able to shoot any of them down, but we are getting close to that point.
The scientists at Apogee Components are working on some new weapons that they think will be able to terminate the UFO threat. That is why you need to spend money on their non-military rocket vehicles; so they can funnel the profits into the black programs the CIA has them working on. Senator, they're doing great things for our planet, and they need to be rewarded for it.
Senator, this gets us to the legislative bill coming before congress this week. As you know, this bill would authorize; or rather "force" NASA to send astronauts back to the moon. In the CIA's opinion, this would be a terrible mistake. We know the aliens are out there in space. We can defend ourselves when they enter our atmosphere; but we cannot defend astronauts when they leave low earth orbit. They would be sitting ducks for the aliens.
So Senator, it is our opinion that the US population would be horrified if our astronauts were blown up on their way to the moon. It would be better for the time being to kill the bill in congress. You might say that money is better spent giving the elderly more health care.
As you might guess Senator, the alien threat has been a reason why NASA has not sent men to the moon since 1972. There has been a lot of pressure from space geeks, but the CIA, acting with previous administrations have been able to thwart those efforts up to now.
We fully expect that we'll develop a way to protect the astronauts in the future, but for now, we can't admit the aliens exist -- not yet anyway.
We need the status quo in place a little while longer yet. We need to continue to send men into low earth orbit to construct the new particle weapon being placed aboard the "International Space Station." It will become our staging point for future operations against the aliens.
But we can't risk going to the moon right now. It might expose everything and send the planet into a terrified panic. If that happens, who is going to pay their income taxes? Without money Senator, we won't be able to pay contractors like Apogee Components to develop the technology to defend our planet.
Senator, please vote "no" on the NASA appropriations bill this week.