PARTE 3

42. Although precise details of US space-based Sigint satellites launched after 1990 remain obscure, it is apparent from observation of the relevant ground centres that collection systems have expanded rather than contracted. The main stations are at Buckley Field, Denver, Colorado; Pine Gap, Australia; Menwith Hill, England; and Bad Aibling, Germany. The satellites and their processing facilities are exceptionally costly (of the order of $1 billion US each). In 1998, the US National Reconnaissance Office (NRO) announced plans to combine the three separate classes of Sigint satellites into an Integrated Overhead Sigint Architecture (IOSA) in order to " improve Sigint performance and avoid costs by consolidating systems, utilising ... new satellite and data processing technologies". 

43. It follows that, within constraints imposed by budgetary limitation and tasking priorities, the United States can if it chooses direct space collection systems to intercept mobile communications signals and microwave city-to-city traffic anywhere on the planet. The geographical and processing difficulties of collecting messages simultaneously from all parts of the globe suggest strongly that the tasking of these satellites will be directed towards the highest priority national and military targets. Thus, although European communications passing on inter-city microwave routes can be collected, it is likely that they are normally ignored. But it is very highly probable that communications to or from Europe and which pass through the microwave communications networks of Middle Eastern states are collected and processed.

44. No other nation (including the former Soviet Union) has deployed satellites comparable to CANYON, RHYOLITE, or their successors. Both Britain (project ZIRCON) and France (project ZENON) have attempted to do so, but neither persevered. After 1988 the British government purchased capacity on the US VORTEX (now MERCURY) constellation to use for unilateral national purposes. A senior UK Liaison Officer and staff from GCHQ work at Menwith Hill NSA station and assist in tasking and operating the satellites.

• COMSAT ILC collection
• COMPSAT

45. Systematic collection of COMSAT ILC communications began in 1971. Two ground stations were built for this purpose. The first at Morwenstow, Cornwall, England had two 30-metre antennae. One intercepted communications from the Atlantic Ocean Intelsat; the other the Indian Ocean Intelsat. The second Intelsat interception site was at Yakima, Washington in the northwestern United States. NSA's "Yakima Research Station" intercepted communications passing through the Pacific Ocean Intelsat satellite.

46. ILC interception capability against western-run communications satellites remained at this level until the late 1970s, when a second US site at Sugar Grove, West Virginia was added to the network. By 1980, its three satellite antenna had been reassigned to the US Naval Security Group and were used for COMSAT interception. Large-scale expansion of the ILC satellite interception system took place between 1985 and 1995, in conjunction with the enlargement of the ECHELON processing system (section 3). New stations were constructed in the United States (Sabana Seca, Puerto Rico), Canada (Leitrim, Ontario), Australia (Kojarena, Western Australia) and New Zealand (Waihopai, South Island). Capacity at Yakima, Morwenstow and Sugar Grove was expanded, and continues to expand.

Based on a simple count of the number of antennae currently installed at each COMSAT interception or satellite SIGINT station, it appears that the UKUSA nations are between them currently operating at least 120 satellite based collection systems. The approximate number of antennae in each category are:
 

Systems in the third category may have been reallocated to ILC tasks since the end of the cold war.

47. Other nations increasingly collect Comint from satellites. Russia's FAPSI operates large ground collection sites at Lourdes, Cuba and at Cam Ranh Bay, Vietnam. Germany's BND and France's DGSE are alleged to collaborate in the operation of a COMSAT collection site at Kourou, Guyana, targeted on "American and South American satellite communications". DGSE is also said to have COMSAT collection sites at Domme (Dordogne, France), in New Caledonia, and in the United Arab Emirates. The Swiss intelligence service has recently announced a plan for two COMSAT interception stations.
 

Satellite ground terminal at Etam, West Virginia  connecting Europe and the US via Intelsat IV	GCHQ constructed an identical "shadow" station in 1972 to intercept Intelsat messages for UKUSA