Operation Damocles Read Online Free PDF

for Jupiter, for all we know. If it boosted to a higher transfer orbit, nobody saw an apogee burn that would have parked it in a station-keeping orbit. It just disappeared.
    “So that’s about the size of it. Unless the bird emits radiant energy of some sort—RF, microwave or something—we are going to have a hard time finding it.”
    “There’s no chance of the orbit decaying, and it falling back to Earth? You’re certain about that, Zeke?” asked Patterson.
    Richards answered, “Not unless it makes a U-turn, Butch, and we know it hasn’t yet. If it fired retros, it would eventually decay and fall back, but the chances of it surviving reentry are slim to none. What would be the point, anyway? Why go geostationary, twenty-two thousand miles out, only to drop out later. It wouldn’t make any sense.”
    “What does?” remarked Dykes, absently contemplating the paperclip he turned round and round in his fingers.
    “Well, at least this means that it is not a reentry vehicle for a weapon,” said Patterson, his worried frown visibly relaxing. “It’s certainly not big enough to be a missile launch platform, and geostationary orbit rather limits its potential applications to communications or surveillance, wouldn’t you say, Joe?”
    “Yes,” Dykes answered with a sigh, tossing the paperclip on the table and leaning back in his chair with fingers laced across his stomach, “and I haven’t breathed this easy in days. I think that, at worst, someone has hoodwinked us out of a free satellite-insertion job. A few million bucks in lost revenue is nothing to what this could have cost the agency in appropriations cuts, and loss of agency and personal prestige, not to mention the potential harm to the population, if it had been a weapon. If it is some sort of propaganda hoax, we can always deny that we helped to put it up, even if they claim we did. In fact, I suggest that we do deny it, emphatically. I don’t like lying, but it wouldn’t do anyone any good now, to admit to such a thing. If we did admit to it, we as individuals might eventually live it down, but it would do irreparable harm to this agency.”
    “A lot of other countries have launch capability,” Castor interjected. “Even the Russian satellite countries. There’s no way to prove that one of the European countries didn’t do it, and I vote we play it that way. If some terrorist faction in the Middle East wanted to put one up, there isn’t anything to stop them from buying a ride on an Ariane or Soyuz booster.”
    “That’s true,” Patterson said, gazing at the tabletop reflectively, “so why use NASA?”
    “Good question,” Castor responded. “It must mean that it’s a U.S.-based group that did it. Someone without access to other countries’ spaceflight communities. Perhaps it’s as simple as someone who just wanted to get an experiment into space, but couldn’t afford the freight. We’re looking into past applications for experiment transport—you know, university science projects, small business research initiatives we’ve sponsored, that sort of thing. We get a thousand applications for every one that we accept. It seems like a stretch, but weirder things have happened.”
    Richards commented, “Whatever the case, I have an idea we’ll know something before too long. Whether it’s an experiment, a comm satellite or just some sort of thumbing-us-off gesture, in order to be useful, it has to do something. When it does, we’ll know what it’s all about.”
    “Still no idea how they did it, Joe?” Patterson addressed Dykes.
    “Not yet. Whoever they were, they knew our launch make-ready procedures, and our launch schedule, including particulars about our cargo. It had to be planned meticulously, months in advance, and skillfully carried out. We’re checking employees, both those currently employed, and those who were dismissed ‘for cause’ as far back as two years. It’s difficult, when you can’t say why you want the