Death of a spy satellite program

New York Times : By May 2002, the government’s effort to build a technologically audacious new generation of spy satellites was foundering. The contractor building the satellites, Boeing, was still giving Washington reassuring progress reports. But the program was threatening to outstrip its $5 billion budget, and pivotal parts of the design seemed increasingly unworkable. A panel appointed to review the program stated that the project was far behind schedule and would most likely cost $2 billion to $3 billion more than planned.Even so, the experts recommended pressing on. It took two more years, several more review panels and billions more dollars before the government finally killed the project âmdash; perhaps the most spectacular and expensive failure in the 50-year history of American spy satellite projects. The New York Times Philip Taubman looks at the failure of the satellite program , and what went wrong.