Re: Does it open at the front?
Yes returning a satelite is almost never economic.
It was done twice IIRC for the shuttle, although that had the extra restrictions that the satelite had to have been originally designed for the shuttle (eg. no hypergolic fuel) and be in a low enough orbit (ie booster failed). The bigger issue was that a shuttle flight cost $1Bn so apart from something like Hubble it would never be cost effecive
The original USAF plan for the shuttle was to 'retrieve' enemy craft. But it was obvious that as soon as the shuttle was announced the opposition would fit all their interesting satellites with 100g of C4, a bag of nails and a pressure switch.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
