U.S. Space Policy and the Challenge of Integrating Emerging Powers
Workshop in Washington, DC
June 30, 2011
This workshop was made possible by the generous support of the Robina Foundation.
Rapporteur: Isabella Bennett, IIGG Research Associate
In recent years, the number of countries that rely on space for military, commercial, and scientific
purposes has skyrocketed. While the United States remains the leader in space, it now shares that
domain with emerging nations that possess distinct interests, capabilities, and intentions. The result,
as Deputy Secretary of Defense William Lynn observes, is a domain that is increasingly “congested,
competitive, and contested.” Expanding international cooperation and promoting safe and
responsible operations in space are core elements of President Obama’s National Space Policy. To
balance those objectives while preserving U.S. national security and freedom of access to outer space,
the United States and other established powers must work to integrate new space-faring nations into a
common institutional framework, with accepted rules of the road.
Four generic obstacles that hinder transnational cooperation to manage global commons, ranging
from the oceans to cyberspace, also pose a particular challenge to establishing a set of norms to govern
the myriad actors in space. Rivalries between rising and traditional powers complicate negotiations;
the difficulty surpasses questions of technocratic management. Additionally, many rising powers are
at least partially revisionist, and feel that the prevailing norms, rules, and privileges are stacked against
them. Furthermore, though emerging nations are demanding a voice, they aren’t necessarily prepared
to share responsibilities of managing international public goods, arguing that their status as
developing nations should exempt them from those burdens. Finally, changing the management of
global commons is always controversial and consensus is never easy to build.
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As part of the Making Multilateralism Work series, the International Institutions and Global
Governance (IIGG) program sponsored a workshop on June 30, 2010 in Washington, DC, to gather
international cooperation and space experts, U.S. Air Force, State Department, and Defense
Department officials as well as foreign and private sector stakeholders for an intimate workshop on
how to integrate rising powers to a set of global norms for the use of outer space. What follows is a
summary of the discussion, which was conducted on a not-for-attribution basis.
The Implications of an Increasingly Crowded Domain
Between 1957 and 2009, the number of nations and government consortia operating in space climbed
from one to almost sixty distinct actors. The International Space Station, some 1,100 active satellites,
and space debris flying at 29,000 miles per hour increasingly pass dangerously close to one another,
and threaten civil, military, and commercial satellites. Presently, there are some 22,000 items over ten
centimeters across, or roughly the size of a softball, which can be regularly tracked with existing
resources and technology. These include the upper stages of launch vehicles, disabled spacecraft, dead
batteries, solid rocket motor waste, and refuse from human missions. In addition, there are
approximately 300,000 other fragments of space junk measuring between one and ten centimeters,
and over 135,000,000 less than one centimeter, which could potentially damage operational
spacecraft.
Though it took forty years to produce the first 10,000 pieces of softball-sized space debris, it required
less than a decade for the next 12,000. This recent increase was due in part to two worrying incidents,
which, according to NASA, combined to increase the number of total space objects by over 60
percent. In January 2007, the Chinese military destroyed a defunct polar-orbiting weather satellite
with a mobile ballistic missile, and in February 2009 an active Iridium communication satellite and a
defunct Russian satellite, which had been predicted to pass each other 1,900 feet apart, unexpectedly
collided.
The space debris problem is a classic global governance dilemma: though eleven states can launch
satellites, and over sixty countries or government consortia own or operate the active satellites, no one
country or group of countries has the sovereign authority or responsibility for regulating space. Under
Article II of the 1967 Outer Space Treaty: “Outer space, including the moon and other celestial bodies,
is not subject to national appropriation by claim of sovereignty.”
In addition to collision threats, a range of other space security concerns are taking shape. China is
developing a broad range of worrying space technology ranging from military reconnaissance systems
to anti-satellite weapons that endanger the assets of all space-faring nations. Iran jams satellites that
carry Voice of America and al-Jazeera broadcasts, and even Ethiopia has succeeded in jamming
satellites.
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The 2010 National Space Strategy committed the United States to “encourage responsible behavior
and lead by the power of our [U.S.] example.” The Obama administration unilaterally announced that
it would begin announcing satellite launches under the Hague Code of Conduct, hoping to coax
Russia to follow suit. The United States entirely complies with the 1967 Outer Space Treaty that bans
nuclear weapons or military facilities in space. Furthermore, the U.S. Strategic Command’s Joint
Space Operations Center (JSpOC) that monitors space debris even notifies the Chinese government
when their satellites are threatened by space debris created by China’s 2007 anti-satellite test. Despite
JSpOC’s best efforts, however, these same officials acknowledge that no country has the resources,
technical expertise, or geography to meet the growing demands for space situational awareness (SSA).
Increased Opportunities for Cooperation
The world is growing increasingly reliant on new technology based in outer space, but at the same
time, producing the equipment and managing the relevant systems is becoming more and more costly.
U.S. officials attest that the high price of remote sensing satellites has made the U.S. more dependent
on foreign satellites than ever. The United States, for instance, cannot sustain a budget to keep core
satellites devoted to tracking global weather data in 2011. Extricating the United States from
dependency on foreign satellites would be a multi-billion dollar investment. Experts note that the
proliferation of actors in space has the potential to distribute the financial burden among countries.
Plans for “virtual constellations” of coverage have been proposed, and U.S. officials note that it is not
inconceivable that the United States might need to rely on an Indian or East Asian satellite.
Past cooperation successes that may serve as useful models include:
— As early as 1972, the United States and the Soviet Union were sharing technical data and
jointly drafting contingency plans for environmental satellites.
— In the 1990s, the Clinton Administration and the European Space Agency (ESA) agreed to
share responsibility for two polar orbiting satellites on which both the United States and
Europe relied. The United States ceased to launch its mid-morning satellite and relied on
information from the European mid-morning satellite, and Europe discontinued its afternoon
satellite as the United States shared the U.S. afternoon satellite data. Officials say that this
cooperation saved both parties billions of dollars.
— U.S.-European cooperation has been particularly robust in achieving accurate weather
prediction that is vital for anticipating weather crises that can disrupt military, economic, and
government functioning. Advance notification is also necessary to plan appropriate disaster
response efforts to save lives and rebuild after catastrophes. Transatlantic cooperation has
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been indispensable to maintaining continuous coverage of dust clouds from Africa that
generate U.S. hurricanes.
In 1990, the United States suffered a particularly disruptive hurricane season at a time when
the nation possessed only one satellite for weather prediction. Europe loaned the United
States a satellite to predict hurricanes on the East Coast, and U.S. officials expressed gratitude
for European equipment that was shipped to Virginia and helped the United States plan for
Hurricane Andrew, one of the most destructive hurricanes in the country’s history. The
European Organization for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT) has
also loaned the United States a geospatial satellite. EUMETSAT also provides data from its
eastern satellite to the United States, which serves as the source of weather data for the U.S.
forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. In return, the U.S. Department of Defense briefs EUMETSAT
on any potential collisions of EUMETSAT satellites with space debris. European delegates
have expressed particular gratitude for a near miss with Chinese space debris in early 2008.
— In November 2005, Japan lost one of its meteorological satellites, and the United States
shifted the orbit of a U.S. satellite to loan it to the Japanese government for temporary use.
— The United States and Australia cooperate regarding wideband global satellite
communications (WGS), which provides real time operational support to defense
communications systems, including the U.S. army’s ground mobile force and navy ships;
White House communications; and the U.S. State Department. U.S. officials attest to the
enormous financial benefits of such cooperation at a time of significant U.S. fiscal constraints.
Obstacles to International Commitment to Space Governance
Four prominent challenges hinder the effort to garner complete international commitment to
protecting space from a classic “tragedy of the commons”:
— Rising powers are likely to view a proposed international treaty with suspicion, assuming that
the United States and Europe are trying to constrain their development and are not prepared
to accept restrictions on their own activity in space.
— Concerns persist that any proposal for an international institution governing space will be
misconstrued as an effort to avoid the expansion of a Russia-China proposal to prohibit use of
weapons of mass destruction (WMD) in space. Also, the EU is negotiating with India, China,
and Brazil and resents Europe’s exclusion from the Russian-Chinese agreement.
— Transparency is not universally practiced by space-faring nations, and China, in particular, is
reluctant to publicly announce its activities.
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— No international monitoring regime exists. Even if space-faring nations were to commit to a
common set of norms, the world lacks a feasible plan for monitoring compliance or
sanctioning prohibited behavior.
Strategies for Integrating New Space-Faring Nations
Proposalso for reform of space governance range from a globalized version of the EU Proposed
International Code of Conduct to adding space governance to the Group of Twenty’s (G20) agenda.
— Adding space governance to the G20 agenda: Since almost all space-faring nations (except Iran)
are G20 members, some experts contend that it would be an ideal to forum to establish space
governance norms between traditional and emerging powers. Furthermore, South Africa and
Turkey have shown interest to integrating the issue onto the G20 agenda. However,
skepticism remains, primarily over the capacity of the G20 to assume responsibility for yet
another issue, and about whether adding this agenda item would dilute the body’s focus on
global and financial matters. G20 meetings are also relatively short, leading many to doubt
that annual summits could devote sufficient attention to such a complex problem. .
A comprehensive space agreement would require soliciting input and expertise from a large
new set of experts and stakeholders in space. Therefore, some scholars of international
cooperation suggested that the G20 might address space governance as a one-time addition to
its annual agenda, with the idea of spinning off a separate institution charged with
international space governance.
— Internationalization of the European Code of Conduct for Outer Space Activities (CoC): The EU
announced that in late 2011 it will hold a multilateral group of experts meeting, and that it
would release its proposed Code of Conduct for Outer Space Activities (CoC), intended to
enhance measures that guarantee stability and address contestation of space. The United
States, Australia, and Canada have pledged to attend the planned meeting.. The Obama
administration is considering signing the CoC, though U.S. officials qualify their support,
noting that the United States will not accept a treaty that impacts on national security.
Australia has expressed satisfaction with the EU CoC despite some minor definitional and
linguistic issues. Japan, which will need to deepen space cooperation in the near future given
budget restrictions, also supports the EU Code.
However, the CoC has drawn criticism for lack of international input during the drafting
process. Brazil in particular objects to the EU Code of Conduct as a European endeavor
developed without adequate input from other countries, particularly from the developing
world, and demands that space governance be addressed in a proper forum at the United
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Nations. Participants in the workshop noted that securing support from a majority of UN
member states for theCoC would be an arduous process, likely to require at least four years.
— Internationalization of the Russian-Chinese proposal: The prospects for more nations to join the
Russian-Chinese proposal for the prohibition of WMD in space are extremely low. The
proposal is reportedly not feasible, and does not include baseline measures of verifiability.
— Addressing Space Governance in the United Nations: The UN Secretary General will convene a
Group of Government Experts on Outer Space Transparency and Confidence-building
Measures (TCBMS) in 2012 to consider calling for all space-faring nations to sign the CoC.
Brazil is particularly inclined to address the issue in the United Nations, insisting that the UN
is the proper forum for soliciting input from stakeholders around the world, in contrast to the
European CoC that only addresses European interests and then attempts to export them.
— A bottom-up approach: Private sector leaders protest that cooperation in outer space should
not be designed as a bait-and-switch approach to force emerging powers into broader burdensharing. Rather, they argue that information sharing and contingency planning should be an
end in itself. International relations experts add that the generic benefits of transnational
cooperation of technical agencies in non-heavy-duty security fields could lead to functionalist
benefits and larger scale buy-in to international institutions. Participants noted that the U.S.
government has placed restrictions on the National Aeronautics and Space Administration
(NASA) from working with Chinese space stakeholders. U.S. private sector actors in space,
however, are not included in these prohibitions, suggesting that cooperation among individual
actors may be less controversial and suffer fewer roadblocks.
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