IP: Europe GPS Plan Shelved

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

> From: Dewayne Hendricks <dewayne () warpspeed com>
>
>
> Europe GPS Plan Shelved
> By Steve Kettmann
>
> 2:00 a.m. Jan. 17, 2002 PST
> <http://www.wired.com/news/print/0,1294,49778,00.html>
>
> BERLIN -- Exasperated European officials say U.S. pressure appears to have 
> torpedoed a $3 billion project to build a European version of the U.S. 
> global positioning system, which uses signals from orbiting satellites to 
> track geographical position within 36 meters.
>
> The proposed system, dubbed Galileo, was intended to give Europeans more 
> autonomy, both industrially and militarily. That's no small concern, since 
> the United States can selectively block access to GPS, as it has during 
> the military campaign in Afghanistan.
>
> Also, European plans to develop a rapid-reaction military force will 
> become much more credible with their own GPS in military operations.
>
> But U.S. Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz sent a letter to all 
> 15 European Union defense ministers last month, urging them to influence 
> their governments not to proceed with Galileo. That deferred any decision 
> on the project, and now looks to have brought its momentum to a halt.
>
> "Galileo is almost dead," Gilles Gantelet, spokesman for Loyola de 
> Palacio, the European commissioner in charge of the project, said.
>
> "We expect that we could have the decision by March at the latest. If 
> there is no decision in March, then we could consider Galileo ... dead."
>
> Wolfowitz's rationale, according to Gantelet and published reports, was 
> that the United States Defense Department, which funds and operates GPS, 
> plans to upgrade the system's capabilities and use more frequencies for 
> signals. The European system, Wolfowitz reportedly cautioned, could 
> interfere with that.
>
> But Gantelet questions that claim. He said the Europeans have communicated 
> to the U.S. government plans to avoid any technical problems with 
> operating two systems.
>
> "We consider all the technical aspects to have already been dealt with or 
> easy to overcome," he said. "We think it's mainly now a political decision."
>
> But it's also possible that U.S. pressure helps give European governments 
> cover so they can shy away from such an expensive project. That was the 
> view Turkey's ambassador to NATO expressed on Monday.
>
> "I know there are some problems with (Galileo)," said Onur Ã?ymen, whose 
> country is a member of NATO, but not the EU. "We can perhaps not expect to 
> have everything at once."
>
> "The important thing is to have an awareness that if the European Union 
> wants to have its contributions to European defense, they have to spend 
> money for that. I can't say that the Europeans are reluctant in improving 
> their militaries, but whether their budgets are enough for that, it's an 
> open question."
>
> The politics of the project -- and the bitterness likely to be generated 
> by its demise -- are not without their sense of drama.
>
> President Jacques Chirac of France was quoted in the International Herald 
> Tribune as saying that if Europe did not pursue Galileo and other space 
> projects, the failure "would lead inevitably to a vassal status, first 
> scientific and technical and then industrial and economic."
>
> Timing is a major issue for Galileo. The Europeans believe the project can 
> earn significantly more than it will cost, but only if Galileo moves 
> forward in the near term. They say it must be up and running by 2008 to 
> turn a profit.
>
> "One advantage of Galileo is that it will be better than the current GPS 
> system, and it will arrive on the market before the new generation of 
> American system," said Gantelet. "But if the delay is too long, there will 
> be no interest from consumers in using it."
>
> Most frustrating for the Europeans is that, in essence, the Americans 
> don't trust them with so powerful a tool. The Europeans argue that it 
> makes sense for the Western community to have more than one system, just 
> in case.
>
> "It's important for Europe to develop its system, and important for all 
> the Western countries to develop another system that is not a competitor 
> to GPS, but could be alongside it," said Gantelet. "With tough times that 
> are starting, you don't know that there will be no terrorist attacks 
> against the GPS. It's more reliable to have two systems."
>
> That argument has not, so far, swayed the thinking at the Pentagon.

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