WEAPONS INTELLIGENCE SUMMARY

Created: 9/27/1976

OCR scan of the original document, errors are possible

OFFICE OF WEAPONS INTELLIGENCE

weapons intelligence summary

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PARTIAL FAILURE

The; mission ofi the People's Republic of China (PRCi; Is assessedartial failure. The assessment iof partial failurea bar.ed on a'

received. The impact of this partial failure onElint reconnaissance program Is difficultat this;

rilllM. AHfl It Is possible that the program may bedelayedxtensive fixes are! required to ensure that this typo of failure will not be repoatod In the future.

hich was; launched fromchunp;-tzu Missile Test CenteronugustWIS for 1 , has been previously assessed asf another Ellnt reconnaissance satellite. This asuessment was based on the similaritieshich were prototype Flint reconnaissance satellites. All three satellites were launched at the same Inclination, carried the same

piowevor, tneEBUb was placed has- arr-apORfte that is about six times higher than those of its prodficeaaors.

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The Chinese hadonthaionthn, respectively, to analyze the data. And we would expect that, innormal progression of sat-lllte testing,:the thirderlea would be more ouvanced

or more extensively tested. [

' 1the onlynd Its "twc predecessors iswhich it was olaced. The apogeestimes higher thanhe npOFieeccurs in thethlo still results in an orbittne view time over areas of the Sovietwere previously monitored. increases the time that the satellite is intheherefore, itpossibleay represent the orbit foraatellitea.

Original document.

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