A nuclear-armed orbital platform launched by the United States from McKinley Rocket Base in 1968, which Gary Seven sabotages and detonates harmlessly high above Earth to frighten the great powers.
The orbital nuclear warhead platform is the object of the mission in the Original Series episode Assignment: Earth. In 1968 the United States prepares to launch it from McKinley Rocket Base in answer to a similar weapon placed in orbit by a rival power, an escalation that Gary Seven's unseen sponsors believe could end in war.
Seven slips onto the gantry and alters the rocket's controls so that it will go off course, but his work is interrupted when the Enterprise, visiting the past for historical research, beams him away. The warhead arms itself and begins to fall towards Asia.
With Kirk and Spock finally deciding to trust him, Seven detonates the platform at 104 miles above the ground. Spock notes that this matches the historical record exactly, and the scare prompts second thoughts about weapons in orbit.