Satellites are great, but their orbits are predictable and they can't be everywhere at once.
As a result, there IS an ongoing need for flexible recon-on-demand missions.
It's well known that certain terrorist groups were well informed of the times at which their camps would be in view of recon satellites, and they simply scheduled activities around those passes. This information could be gained from the Russians, who maintain a space radar net (akin to Norad's space radar net) that can track anything in orbit to the size of an egg, roughly. And the orbital parameters alone suggest the mission of the satellite.
The SR-71 was retired years ago.
We've never retired an asset that was of strategic significance without putting a replacement for it FIRST.
It turns out, now, many years later, that Jimmy Carter cancelled the B-1 because he knew about something we didn't, and that'd be the F-117 and the B-2 programs. In retrospect, his decision was more sensible than it seemed at the time, though it was still a bit optimistic.
Do you think those guys in the Skunk Works, and the entire black budget crews have been doing nothing?
Hell, the B-2 Stealth bomber AND the F-117 Stealth fighter BOTH flew for a decade or more before they were revealed to the public...and you know what? I never ONCE saw a "ufo sighting" photo of EITHER type of aircraft before they were revealed publicly. The military's secrecy machine works very well indeed.
Only those who actually KNOW about the SR-71's replacement really know what's up. I'm not sure myself, not having been involved in any way with any of that, but I AM quite certain that the replacement DOES exist and is in regular service. I believe that it was used in Desert Storm, and its flight path was down the Eastern seaboard, across to the Azores and then to Africa, and then to the middle east, jumping from one airborne tanker to the next all the way.
During the time of Desert Storm, there were occasional faint sounds of thunder that came from the ocean (I'm beachside) yet there wasn't a cloud in the sky. I speculate that the 'thunder' I was hearing was actually Aurora (or whatever it's really called) running super- or hyper-sonic on the southern leg of the journey.
I haven't heard this distant thunder (with no clouds in the sky) since the end of Desert Storm, more or less.
Yeah, it's out there. And be glad it is.
CJ