How well can the government spy on us via satellite?
[I]f [the donated satellites] had actually been used as spy satellites, what would these super telescopes have been able to see on the ground? It’s a fascinating question, and leads into a nice basic discussion of the optical resolution of imaging systems. In other words, what is the smallest detail that could be picked up by one of these telescopes in orbit?
Have two spy satellites flying in tandem as an interferometer. Mirror width (phase information) is the distance between the two mirrors. Signal intensity (mirror area) is more than adequate as is. We already do tandem flying for exquisite gravitation surveys (much better than Gravity Probe B for much cheaper), terrestrial and lunar.