Martian Clocks: Phobos and Deimos

[Quantum12]

Looking Askew at Mar’s moons Phobos and Deimos


Both moons orbit over the equator of Mars. That is an interesting fact in itself, but only the beginning of the strange, telling basic facts of the two. Phobos is falling inward, and Deimos is moving outward.
However, Deimos has a near-synchronous with its primary even as it moves slowly away. That is an astounding fact not well known and is rarely mentioned in that fashion in any published details of Mars. Given that peculiar orbit, that fact suggests that at one point in the distant past it was exactly in a purposeful, synchronous motion with Mars.
We have communication satellites in such orbits around earth since 1964. They exist in that mode as a nifty astrophysics trick worked out by Obers in 1922 and reminded to us in a science-fiction story by Arthur C. Clarke in 1945. Such an orbit would be virtually impossible for nature to produce on its own.
If we were curious enough and capable enough, we could do math work and come within a cosmic epoch or two within when Deimos was in an exact stationary orbit over one point on Mars. That would be an astounding revelation of the general point of when a Mars civilization was flourishing. That time would have been tens of millions of years ago. Its current orbit has slowed and lags over time to about 3.3 hours behind matching the motion with the planet as its orbit very slowly drifts outward.
Phobos, also, provides surprising information, but to the exact opposite. Being closer to Mars at about 3700 miles, it orbits in 7 hours and 39 minutes, making about three quick passes lagging around Mars during the Martian day of 24 hours and 37 minutes. It is moving inward due to the drag of the thin atmosphere combined with gravity and slowly gaining velocity.
Were it at a higher and slower orbit, which it must have had at one point millions of years ago, it could have been at one point a precise, astronomical “clock” for the Martians, dividing the day into three equal parts.
I assume that any astronomer or astrophysicist worthy of their degree could easily work out the epoch of time when there was an extended, highly technological civilization on Mars and its moons. That assumption further assumes that Martians could easily have visited earth in those times in a far better fashion than what we hope to use to gain Mars! I further assume from our missions, that at least the US and Russia know that Phobos and Deimos are artificially placed and once we can access them, we will gain immense shortcuts in all fields of exploration and science. I semi-jokingly assume Elon Musk to be the modern tomb raider.

The moons were placed for sure! This is a great thread!