The presence of the classified new headquarters was revealed by the Federation of American Scientists who obtained unclassified copies of the blueprints filed with the building permit application . After 9/11 those blueprints were apparently classified . The reports of an NRO slush fund were true . According to former CIA general counsel Jeffrey Smith , who led the investigation : " Our inquiry revealed that the NRO had for years accumulated very substantial amounts as a ' rainy day fund . ' " In 1999 the NRO embarked on a $ 25 billion project with Boeing entitled Future Imagery Architecture to create a new generation of imaging satellites . In 2002 the project was far behind schedule and would most likely cost $ 2 billion to $ 3 billion more than planned , according to NRO records . The government pressed forward with efforts to complete the project , but after two more years , several more review panels and billions more in expenditures , the project was killed in what the Times report calls " perhaps the most spectacular and expensive failure in the 50-year history of American spy satellite projects . " In January 2008 , the government announced that a reconnaissance satellite operated by the NRO would make an unplanned and uncontrolled re-entry into the Earth 's atmosphere in the next several months . Satellite watching hobbyists said that it was likely the USA-193 , built by Lockheed Martin Corporation , which failed shortly after achieving orbit in December 2006 . On February 14 , 2008 , the Pentagon announced that rather than allowing the satellite to make an uncontrolled re-entry , it would instead be shot down by a missile fired from a Navy cruiser . The intercept took place on February 21 , 2008
9/11
September 11 attacks
National Reconnaissance Office