6 Bases during the Cold War

for instance in the cases of large strategic radars or air bases used to stageBases during the Cold War 119Table 7 Interconnections between ACE HIGH and DCSDCSACE HIGHMormond Hill (U.K.)Mormond Hill (U.K.)Cold Blow Lane (U.K.)Maidstone (U.K.)SHAPE (Belgium)Costeau (Belgium)Bonn (FRG)Kindsbach (FRG)Aviano (Italy)Aviano (Italy)Naples (Bagnoli, Italy)Bagnoli (Italy)Izmir (TurkeyIzmir (Turkey)Incirlik (Turkey)Adana (Turkey)Sources: Defense Communications Agency, “Defense Communications System/European CommunicationSystems; Interoperability Baseline,” Washington, DC, 1 February 1981; and Jane’s MilitaryCommunications (Macdonald: London, 1981).İ 2007 Robert E. Harkavyphotoreconnaissance flights. In others, however, data were more limited – thiswas particularly true regarding the relay of data from satellites to major headquartersin the U.S. homeland.The U.S., during the Cold War and beyond, made important use of reconnaissancesatellites which conducted area surveillance, close-look and real-time surveillance.Crucially, this involved the Keyhole series, KH-9 (Big Bird) devotedto area-surveillance and KH-8 (Close Look), later superseded (in 1976) by theKH-11 and later by the KH-12 (Ikon). Mostly, these satellites appear to havefunctioned without the help of overseas downlinks.The U-2 and SR-71 strategic reconnaissance aircraft were usable for a varietyof nuclear and non-nuclear related missions. The latter can fly at a speed of Mach4 (about 4160km per hour), at a height of over 25,000 meters, can track SAM missiles,has radar detectors, a variety of ECMs, and a synthetic-aperture radar forhigh altitude night imaging. Some 15–19 SR-71s were utilized, co-located at someof the same bases as the U-2s, at Mildenhall in the U.K., Kadena on Okinawa andAkrotiri on Cyprus (the U-2s also utilized Incirlik, Peshawar, Clark AFB, Atsugiand Wiesbaden). The still newer TR-1A reconnaissance aircraft, of which some 14were deployed, also utilized some of these bases.Other satellites and also land-based facilities were used for SIGINT, anacronym that subsumes several categories of intelligence collection, i.e.,COMINT (communications intelligence), ELINT (electronic intelligence),TELINT (telemetry intelligence) and FISINT (foreign instrumentation signalsintelligence). The major Cold War SIGINT satellite systems–Chalet, Rhyolite(targeted against telemetry, radar, communications, extending across the VHF,UHF and microwave frequencies), Ferret, Magnum/Aquacade (low orbitingferret satellites used to map Soviet and Chinese radars) apparently made littleuse of overseas downlinks.But, the U.S. long made use of a plethora of ground-based SIGINT stations,as identified in Table 8.Although there were diverse types and mixes of these facilities, a few widelydeployed types were notable. One involved a combination of AN/FLR-9 HF andVHF interception and direction-finding system (DF) with CDAA (CircularlyDisposed Antenna Array) known as an “elephant cage.” Another involvedtelemetry interception capability with combined VHF-UHF-SHF receivers, usedto monitor missile launches.45 Then there were FPS-17 detection radars andFPS-79 tracking radars also used in connection with missile launches. Therewere also a considerable number of AN/FLR-15 antennas.46The identifiable land-based SIGINT facilities included those shown in theaccompanying table. In some of these cases – Canada, the U.K., Turkey andperhaps Japan – SIGINT stations were jointly operated with host personnel, andthe data intake shared to one degree or another, no doubt negotiated on a caseby-casebasis and subject to periodic renewal; hence, a function of the state ofpolitical relationships and associated reciprocal leverage.120 Bases during the Cold Warİ 2007 Robert E. HarkavyPage 27