But the crash of the vehicle, which Iranian officials said occurred more than 140 miles from the border with Afghanistan, blew the program's cover.
"This position of the IMF is puzzling, and they clearly want to either leave the program or blow the whole thing up".
Outside the C.I.A., many others risked their jobs and legal peril in efforts to blow the whistle on a program they found ethically, morally, and legally heinous.
"If they start letting some people through security, it blows the whole security program," said Kathy Lynch, the project manager at the Aviation Consumer Action Project, a group founded by Ralph Nader in 1971.
They are the officers who blew the whistle on the program internally and externally, some of whom have paid a very high price for their actions.
Ex-NSA officials blew the whistle on the program to journalists James Risen and Eric Lichtblau, who presented an investigative article to the newspaper in November 2004, weeks before America's presidential election.
But she said it would not necessarily deal a major blow to the program.
"The allegations, if true, represent a serious blow to the program, and they need to be fully and promptly investigated," said Senator Carl Levin, Democrat of Michigan, who is the ranking Democratic member on the Armed Services Committee.
In a letter to Dr. Cleave last fall, 16 present and former Explorer scientists said, "Such a lengthy suspension would be a devastating blow to the program and the science community".
Campaign finance experts say any such defection would deal a blow to the program, which has fed presidential campaigns since 1976, after its creation as part of a wave of Watergate-era reforms.
