Two Disputes over Geostationary Satellite Launches

In 1967 Japan’s National Space Development Center strongly recommended that the country launch its own comsat by 1970 to ensure that it had some weight in shaping the negotiations on the definitive arrangements for Intelsat that got under way in 1969 and that lasted more than two years (see chapter 5). The alternative, as one document put it, was to have Japanese skies “dominated by the U. S. which as a member of INTELSAT (International Telecommunications Satellite Consortium) now has practical control of space communications networks.”44 This concern doubtless catalyzed U. Alexis Johnson’s determined effort to accelerate American technological help for Japan’s domestic launcher in 1969. In the event, the slow progress made in the negotiations to upgrade the N-1 led the Japanese authorities to seek alternative routes to the geostationary orbit for both a meteorological satellite and two communications satellites.

NASA was willing to consider two options: it could provide a reimbursable launch on a Delta 2914 from American soil or it could sell a Delta 2914 to Japan for launch there. The latter option was soon shelved. The agency was concerned about the transfer of launch operations know-how to a foreign country. A National Security directive (NSDM187 ofAugust 30, 1972) specifically restricted the transfer of launch vehicles to other counties for communications satellites.45 Finally the high cost of launching a Delta 2914 from the Japanese site at Tangeashima persuaded the authorities in Tokyo that it was preferable to request reimbursable launches from the United States for their first generation of geosynchronous satellites.

A reimbursement agreement between NASA and NASDA was signed in 1972 for three satellites. Himawari (sunflower, 325 kilograms) was a meteorologi­cal satellite built by Hughes Aircraft for Japan’s NEC. Sakura (cherry flower, 350 kilograms) was a telecommunications satellite built by Ford Aerospace for MELCO. Yuri (lily, 350 kilograms) was a broadcast satellite built by the Space Division of General Electric for Toshiba. They were launched in quick succession between July 1977 and April 1978 from the Kennedy Space Center, though not before a major misunderstanding between the two partners had been resolved.

At the core of the dispute was the question of responsibility for the insertion of the satellite in the geostationary orbit. Early in 1974 NASA decided to offer geo­stationary orbit insertion services only for US government spacecraft launched on a reimbursable basis.46 For other clients, NASA’s responsibility extended only to the separation of the satellite from the launch vehicle at the point of insertion into geostationary transfer orbit. At that point an apogee kick motor integrated into the satellite, and provided along with it by the client, would move the satel­lite to its final desired position. Soon thereafter it emerged that the Japanese, for their part, were under the impression that the reimbursable launch contract with NASA included placing the satellite at the desired location on the geosta­tionary orbit. On learning otherwise they took NASA’s advice and asked for bids from five American firms that had provided software support and insertion into the geostationary orbit for foreign satellites (Hughes, Philco-Ford, General Electric, Systems Development Corp, and Comsat General). These came in at about $12-15 million per satellite, excluding hardware, a figure to be compared with the launch cost of $10 million per satellite.47

Early in September 1974, in the light of this information, and an imminent visit by NASA administrator Fletcher to Tokyo, the Japanese embassy asked NASA to reconsider its decision. It wanted the agency to provide a complete package after the spacecraft was delivered to the Kennedy Space Center, from checkout, installation in the launch vehicle, insertion into synchronous orbit, in-orbit check out, and, finally, movement of the spacecraft to its desired orbital position. It was only at that point that control over and responsibility for the spacecraft would be turned over to the Japanese.

NASA’s associate administrator for tracking and data acquisition, Gerald Truszynski, explained what this commitment would mean to NASA. The agency would have to extend its span of responsibility considerably, and far beyond the normal provision of tracking and data acquisition support from its existing track­ing stations. Providing a full range of services for three satellites launched in quick succession meant establishing a dedicated Spacecraft Project Office (prob­ably at Goddard Space Flight Centre (GSFC)) to carry out the activities involved.

Operation of the control center and the development of the project-unique soft­ware would be major undertakings. Its personnel would not only have to be thoroughly familiar with the spacecraft design and characteristics but would probably also have to have access to the technical specifications to assure overall compatibility with the ground control systems. They would have to conduct mis­sion analyses to determine optimum mission profiles. Also NASA would have to contract with the spacecraft manufacturers to provide the support at KSC before launch and in the control center during and after launch. In summary, the response from NASA clearly stated that to accept overall responsibility, it would have to divert significant civil service manpower for about 18 months or more. Further, it would result in a complex administrative structure since it was very probable that NASA would be essentially placed between the Japanese and their US spacecraft manufacturers. In sum Truszynski suggested that the best that NASA could do was to compute and supply definitive orbit data in real-time, and to track the spacecraft during transfer orbit. It could also lend a couple of people to each Japanese project to provide technical advice of various kinds, and could host some Japanese engineers to work in its mission control centers and other NASA locations to learn how the agency did the job.48

NASA’s reluctance to satisfy Japan’s demands was reinforced by input from US industry. Bud Wheelon of Hughes Corporation let NASA know that he would be happier if Fletcher did not strike a deal with Japan on orbit inser­tion during the administrator’s forthcoming visit to Tokyo. As George Low explained to the NASA administrator,

Apparently, each of the U. S. companies is in a major loss situation with respect to the satellite being built for the Japanese and had planned to use the orbit insertion business to “get well.” In Bud’s words, “if the government now steps into the orbit insertion business, we would in effect be subsidizing the Japanese at the expense of U. S. industry.”49

The Japanese fought back. Their Japanese scientific counselor at the embassy in Washington, Hisako Uchida, pushed the orbit insertion case further by citing the example of the Italian Sirio satellite, where NASA offered to insert the satellite into the geosynchronous orbit. In reply to the query by Uchida, NASA again detailed its general policy associated with orbit insertion services. NASA’s responsibility was limited to “insertion of the space craft into transfer orbit and all subsequent mission operations is lodged totally with the requesting agency or its contractors.” NASA categorically “denied providing such services for any non-U. S. govern­ment spacecraft launched on a reimbursable basis and does not contemplate doing so in the future.” NASA had to offer geosynchronous orbit injection support ser­vices for the Italians because of the formal commitment made to Italian National Research Council (CNR) in 1971. “In recognition of this commitment prior to adoption of the 1974 policy, NASA agreed in late December 1974 to honor its previous commitment and provide minimal geostationary injection support services for SIRIO only.” In all other reimbursable non-US government cases injection into geostationary orbit “has been and will continue to be conducted from facilities other than NASA’s.” For example, the geostationary orbit injection of the Franco-German Symphonie satellite launched by NASA in December 1974 was conducted from ESOC (European Space Operations Center) in Germany.50 With that the matter was apparently closed in NASA’s favor.

As we have seen Japan’s quest for launcher autonomy was intimately linked with its determination to gain access to the geostationary orbit for telecommu­nications satellites, both to enhance its influence in Intelsat and to strengthen its position in the global market for comsats. To secure the strength of national industry the Japanese authorities took a number of measures in the 1980s to close the home market to outside competition. NASDA channeled “all govern­ment satellite procurement to Japanese firms, prohibited the procurement of all kinds of satellites, and banned the procurements [abroad] of Japan’s telecom­munication giant, NTT, despite the lower price and superior quality of foreign satellites.”51 The result was that local content in comsats increased from 24 per­cent in 1977 to 80 percent in 1988, while local content in broadcast satellites grew from 14 to 83 percent in the same period.52

The US authorities, with widespread domestic support, objected strongly to the restrictions on foreign procurement by Japan in this sector. It not only excluded American firms from the Japanese market but also signaled Tokyo’s determination to secure a leading position in the global telecommunications satellite market. Section 301 of the Omnibus Trade and Competitiveness Act, passed by Congress in August 1988, provided the United States with an instrument to lever open the Japanese market. The overall legislation had been in place for almost 15 years, and was a response to the change in the American balance of trade beginning in the late 1970s from a modest surplus to a massive deficit. Section 301 was tightened up in 1988 by introducing a so-called Super 301 amendment that was unusual in being “targeted against the behavior of governments in their home markets instead of focusing on the competition provided by imports in the United States” (e. g., by illegal dumping).53 The US trade representative subsequently charged Japan as being engaged in unfair trading practices in three sectors: supercomputers, wood products, and telecommunications satellites, and threatened to impose trade sanc­tions against the country if it did not open these markets to US exports.

The Japanese were outraged as the United States was basically telling them to rein in their ambitions to be major competitors in the world market for comsats. Tokyo caved in all the same, canceling plans for the development of the fourth series of its communication satellite program. US producers such as Loral Space Systems, Hughes Space and Communications Group, and GE successfully won bids to supply satellites to Japanese firms, so pushing them out of the local market. As one representative from Hughes Space put it, the 1990 agreement opened a few more opportunities for the American company but, more impor­tantly, prevented Japan from sheltering “an infant industry that might eventually become a world-class competitor.”54 By the 1990s Japan had its own launchers, and it had built up immense in-house capability in the manufacture of geosta­tionary satellites. Its aspirations of becoming a world leader in the development and sale of space technology had not, however, been realized.