MECHANIX ILLUSTRATED JANUARY 1963

Found an interesting quote in here from the article "THE MIRACLE LIGHT BEAM" by James Winchester. On pages 59-60 it says this:

At the Redstone Arsenal in Alabama, the Army Ordnance Missile Command is deep into the development of a mobile light ray machine for use by ground troops against low flying planes. A single burst from the "death ray" gun would ignite fuel tanks. Air Force scientists are working toward the day when supersonic planes would fight one another with these invisible rays. Electronic equipment would be made unworkable, the plane itself knocked off course, its crewmen blinded.

Spy satellites, armed with laser guns, will be extremely valuable for reconnaissance, allowing infrared photos to be taken from high altitudes with pin point accuracy. A laser camera, for instance, aimed from New York, could photograph a golf ball dropped over Chicago. With Substitution of harmful rays of light for the visible light, literal "death rays" could be directed onto earth from satellites. Whole areas could be terrorized. Military scientists are already testing the effect X-rays of gamma rays might have when concentrated from a height of several hundred miles. The Navy is hard at work seeking to adapt laser rays for underwater anti-submarine sound detection uses.

I take the import of this to be that American Oligarchs had the SDI technology the kind associated with the 1980's Stars Wars of Ronald Reagan at their disposal in January of 1963. I say this because most engineers say that public release of such technology usually lags about a decade. Take for instance the F-117 people were not told about the technology until the whole program was a decade old. So, American oligarchs had the capability to shoot down the USSR's ICBMS in 1963 from space. This was before missile silos. Which did not happen until the 1970's. So, at this point in time America would have destroyed Russia's missiles right on the launch pad. The military might have questioned Kennedy's insistence on building missiles. Especially in light of the fact that the military had the technology to out run most Soviet SAM's with the B-70 and SR-71. And we had SBL's in orbit probably with stealth skirts. This is why Kelly Johnson called the TFX a national scandal. 

05 August 2017
This article is announcing the intentions of the American Military to build Star Wars. 


16 May 2020
This January 1963 article claims that spy-satellites with less than 2 inches of resolution from 700 miles above the Earth.