Early 1950s ARPA space programs - Suzano, Somnium, Discoverer, Midas, et al

[leovinus]

More hints. When I was reminded about the MOL compendium in the MOL thread, I was surprised to find SUZANO mentioned in "Chapter II: A National Space Station", page 21. Fascinating, also to reread Chapters 1 and 2 for early Air Force spaceflight history.

In addition, I have a lead on more primary ARPA reports about projects like SUZANO, DEFENDER, NOTUS, PRINCIPIA et al. It was confirmed they exist and it is clear there are many more documents waiting in the archives.

I'm delighted that as well as Kepler's SOMNIUM we have Newton's PRINCIPIA. I wonder if there were any other similarly named projects ?

Principia seems to have been  an energetic propellant synthesis progarmme, and to have been ended in in 1965. It's mentioned in the history of what is now the Joint Army-Navy-NASA-Air Force (JANNAF)  Interagency Propulsion Committee, which seems to very much still exist https://www.jannaf.org/about/history

... an ad hoc group, chaired by Dr. Abe Silverstein of the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) Lewis Laboratory, was established by the Research and Engineering Advisory Panel on Aeronautics to review the DoD liquid propellant rocket programs. This committee noted the success and effectiveness of the SPIA operation and recommended that a similar information agency be initiated to handle the rapidly increasing quantity of technical matter in this field. As a result, the Liquid Propellant Information Agency (LPIA) was started at the JHU/APL, also under contract with the Navy Bureau of Ordnance. A Tri-Service Steering Committee (Army-Navy-NACA) was formed to foster exchange of information in the liquid rocket field and to monitor the LPIA operations. In 1959, the Advanced Research Projects Agency (ARPA) appointed representatives from its extensive research program on propellant chemistry to the Tri-Service Working Groups. 
 
Finally, in 1961, individuals directly involved in information exchange activities in the solid and liquid and related propulsion fields agreed that there was a necessity and desirability for official recognition. They believed that reorganization of the information groups would improve the effectiveness of information exchange activities. The charter was drafted, then authenticated by the five agencies – Army, Navy, Air Force, ARPA, NASA – and approved by DoD and NASA. With this action, the Interagency Chemical Rocket Propulsion Group (ICRPG), predecessor of the current JANNAF Interagency Propulsion Committee, was formally activated on November 28, 1962. One of the first actions of the ICRPG was to consolidate the propellant information centers (SPIA and LPIA) into the Chemical Propulsion Information Agency (CPIA).
 
As stipulated in its charter, the ICRPG consisted of a Steering Group, a Solid Propulsion Subgroup, a Liquid Propulsion Subgroup, and such Working Groups as required to achieve the purpose of the ICRPG. The Steering Group was the governing body of the ICRPG composed of one member from each participating agency. Working Groups, for which each Subgroup was responsible, consisted of not more than two members from each agency. Working groups were directly responsible to promote the exchange of technical information in specialized areas of solid, liquid, and related rocket propulsion where technical problems existed or standardized procedures were lacking.
 
In 1964, CPIA became a DoD Information Analysis Center, still operated by the JHU/APL, but now under contract with the Naval Sea Systems Command.
 
In 1965, with cancellation of the energetic propellant synthesis program, Project Principia, ARPA withdrew its support. The name of the ICRPG was changed to the Joint Army-Navy-NASA-Air Force (JANNAF) Interagency Propulsion Committee (IPC) in November 1969

This set of thermochemical tables is one fruit of Project PRINCIPIA: https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/JANAF_Thermochemical_Tables_Sponsored_by/FgngjwEACAAJ?hl=en

Fascinating table. I had not seen much beyond

PRINCIPIA - ARPA's code name for long-range investigations of improved propellants— liquid, solid and hybrid. Numerous private contractors are engaged in research in thermodynamics and thermochemistry,synthetic chemistry, and propellant formulation and evaluation.

in Western_Aviation_Missiles_and_Space.pdf or

PRINCIPIA (ARPA) Study project on solid propellants. Purpose: development of propellant with lsp higher by 10 to 20%than those of propellants now under development. Areas investigated include thermo- chemistry and thermodynamics, synthetic chemistry, and formulation and evaluation of propellants.

from  MISSILE AND SPACE PROJECTS GUIDE 1962 Jacobs et al. Yet another source indicates that PRINCIPIA was mostly about solid propellants. Anyway, on a humorous note, I smiled at @Littlebird's quote where the agencies CPIA and SPIA are mentioned. Obviously a segway and half homophone of PRIN-CPIA. They had a sense of humor.

[leovinus]

More hints. When I was reminded about the MOL compendium in the MOL thread, I was surprised to find SUZANO mentioned in "Chapter II: A National Space Station", page 21. Fascinating, also to reread Chapters 1 and 2 for early Air Force spaceflight history.

In addition, I have a lead on more primary ARPA reports about projects like SUZANO, DEFENDER, NOTUS, PRINCIPIA et al. It was confirmed they exist and it is clear there are many more documents waiting in the archives.

Any detail on the NOTUS military comsat will be interesting as I think most of what we currently know is mentioned in Blackstar's thread about ADVENT.

After six months of patience and talking, here is an update.

First, regarding my lead, I wondered whether there was an ARPA or DARPA archive somewhere with copies of the old reports and memos. No luck. Then I came across the Institute of Defense Analyses (IDA) in Alexandria, VA, who did a lot of management work with ARPA in those late 50s and early 60s. In discussion with their library, a set of IDA documents have been tracked down relevant for the projects in this thread. These are not the full SUZANO project reports but other reports, memos, etc that mention and discuss projects like "space platforms", NOTUS, Shepard, Defender, Transit, Principia, Agena, launch options, etc. IDA checked with DARPA and it was fine to make these document public. So far, I received 6 reviewed versions out of the 10 discussed with IDA.

Secondly, while I was looking mostly for the links between SUZANO, space platforms and the MTSS plans (if any), these answers are not in the new documents. Also, I have no way to know whether these documents have been previously reviewed by historians but in my opinion, the original memos et al always add something.

Thirdly, here is an example I received so far. Per quote above, there was a question on NOTUS. Attached are two documents from January 28th, 1960. This was before the project management was transferred from ARPA to the Army in September 1960 as discussed in the Advent TSR article and Advent thread. The attached document recommends to eliminate STEER and TACKLE as independent programs (2.2.2) and re-orient and simplify COURIER. I like notes like in Section 2.3.2.2.2 "Booster Vehicles" which seem to indicate that they knew there was time pressure and therefore minimized the research aspects. There are some details on the Navy involvement as well per Supplement A.

Finally, a big thanks to the IDA library for their help and patience!

[leovinus]

Here is another document IDA-IM-105.pdf titled MEETING OF AD HOC COMMITTEE ON EQUATORIAL RANGE AT NASA HEADQUARTERS 31 July 1959. On page 2 (image 4) the space mission of a Space Platform is discussed. At that page, it does not mention SUZANO though. This platform could also be a plan like from Wernher von Braun as discussed in his "Mars Projekt" or something entirely different. Later on the page, a discussion of potential launch sites starts as investigated by the Navy. I think we discussed some of the locations in another thread but I cannot find it anymore. No mention of something like  Kahului/Hawaii as envisioned by WvB but he was part of the Army, not Navy.

Next, image 11 as page 2 of the memo "EQUATORIAL LAUNCH RANGE" was interesting. Under point 3 it says "MRS-V and SUZANO will require 30,000 to 60,000 pounds in low orbits in 1965-66". So here we have SUZANO mentioned. And it requires 30,000 to 60,000 pounds to low orbit which is not small. I also like the brief projection on how the payload capabilities will scale in future PS: Does anyone know what is MRS-V btw?

[LittleBird]

Here is another document IDA-IM-105.pdf titled MEETING OF AD HOC COMMITTEE ON EQUATORIAL RANGE AT NASA HEADQUARTERS 31 July 1959. On page 2 (image 4) the space mission of a Space Platform is discussed. At that page, it does not mention SUZANO though. This platform could also be a plan like from Wernher von Braun as discussed in his "Mars Projekt" or something entirely different. Later on the page, a discussion of potential launch sites starts as investigated by the Navy. I think we discussed some of the locations in another thread but I cannot find it anymore. No mention of something like  Kahului/Hawaii as envisioned by WvB but he was part of the Army, not Navy.

One thing that caught my eye was Jarvis island, which was also the site that Hughes were looking at for their minimalist Scout-launched geostationary comsat concept in the late 59-early 60 timeframe-see pp 35 onwards of
Exploring the Unknown Volume III:

https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b8/NASA_SP-4407_Exploring_the_Unknown_-_Volume_III_Using_Space.pdf

[leovinus]

Next, image 11 as page 2 of the memo "EQUATORIAL LAUNCH RANGE" was interesting. Under point 3 it says "MRS-V and SUZANO will require 30,000 to 60,000 pounds in low orbits in 1965-66". So here we have SUZANO mentioned. And it requires 30,000 to 60,000 pounds to low orbit which is not small. I also like the brief projection on how the payload capabilities will scale in future  PS: Does anyone know what is MRS-V btw?

The answer on MRS-V was of course in documents reviewed earlier this year, specifically ADA154363 "The Advanced Research Projects Agency, 1958-1974, by BARBER (RICHARD J) ASSOCIATES INC WASHINGTON DC here. The abbreviation is for "The Maneuverable, Recoverable Space Vehicle (MRS-V)" discussed at page III-45 and something like Dynasoar.

[leovinus]

Next, a document titled "ARPA Space Studies and Supporting Research Program" presented to the JCS by Robertson Youngquist on 29 Jul 1959. Budgets, space technology and more details on LONGSIGHT (see post #1). This document has both the narrative and the slides. The document says on page 2

Most of the other activities in Space Technology are systems Development projects, such as the several satellite projects covered in previous briefings to you. While some research is done within those projects it is usually p limited and hardware-oriented.

We have not seen those previous briefings but they sound fascinating. Also mentioned are recoverable booster studies (this is 1959 ) and the nuclear pulse rocket aka Orion. The special page in this document is page 6a with a mention of Project Orion where it says

The second specific result to be mentioned is that in a year's intensive study of the ORION nuclear-pulse-rocket concept, no technical infeasibilities have been found. However, because of the prospect of a nuclear ban which will prevent its Development or use, this project is being slowed down