TIL the NRO photographed the first shuttle flight in 1980 with a KH11 to check the heat shield tiles.
So apparently they can focus that close..

Also now it occurs to me that the NRO probably has high res photos of everything other countries have put in to space

The interesting thing about space is that if you connect a few dots you can predict a lot of “classified” things that are almost certainly happening up there but which are extremely hard to prove without access to space

One of the things that’s hit me visiting the Space Shuttles over the past year is that you can now get very close to things that would have been very valuable intelligence not too long ago

For instance Enterprise has landing gear on it that I think is from Atlantis, and you can figure out how much weight the Shuttle could have landed with if you measured that enough, which would tell you lots of things

For instance- what was it designed to be able to deorbit? We can guess by the payload bay size and gear rating. That tells us about US satellite sizes and weight as well as potentially Soviet tech of the time.

Whatever it was it wasn’t small or light

I’m pretty sure you can fit an entire Soyuz in there with room to spare. Maybe an Almaz? But those are pretty heavy. What’s bigger than a Soyuz but lighter? Reconnaissance satellites.

This is the kind of stuff I think about when I’m stressed out and trying to distract myself from something.