[ncmncm]

You keep repeating that you don't know whether the DoD did or did not use the capability they had demanded. I believe you!

The answers to all your questions are right there in the message you clicked "reply" on. I invite you read what it says there.

[bumby]

I'll be more direct: Can you substantiate your claim that the DoD missions did not need those specs? You haven't provided anything other than an opinion at this point.

Because to a laymen, that's an unverifiable claim since those details appear to be classified. Meaning that opinion doesn't amount to much. It's plausible, but I'd need a little more than your opinion to believe it.

[ncmncm]

I have, of course, no opinion: this is purely a matter of fact. I merely echo complaints by NASA insiders.

I may speculate that their requirements were such as to be able to loft the NSA equivalent of Hubble into a polar orbit, but that by the time STS was flying, they had retired that design and were using rather smaller birds.

[bumby]

In other words, you can't substantiate it. It is therefore not "purely a matter of fact" any more than someone else saying "I heard a guy who heard a NASA guy say those requirements were necessary." At least the latter instance can point to requirements that at least show an intent to do so, your claim is on shakier ground.

[ncmncm]

It is a matter of fact in that either there were zero missions of such a nature, or there were one or more. I.e., you can refute it by identifying even just one such mission. Posting a list of random DoD missions is not a substitute for that.

People employed at NASA for decades, in a position to know and report even facts not published, that they have had no reason to lie about, say it is true. No one has come forward to say not.

[bumby]

That’s my point. Note I said it was unverifiable. Only one of us is pretending it’s a verifiable fact. I also know manny people who work at NASA, going back from the 1970s to present day. Some were astronauts. Many worked on the shuttle program directly. We seem to have very different ideas about what constitutes a “fact”.

But again, none of that matters unless you can verify your claim. We can just leave it as a known unknown and stop pretending it’s anything different.

[ncmncm]

Then ask them.

If you really honestly think that whether NASA launched any of a certain specific sort of mission is a matter of opinion, I don't know what to say.