RADARSAT-2 Launch, Dec.
14, 2007:
Canada Reaches New Heights in Hypocrisy and the Militarization of Space
With today's launch of Canada's
RADARSAT-2 satellite, our country has reached dizzying new heights in the
militarization of space.
Blasting this satellite into orbit also represents a new pinnacle in Canadian
government hypocrisy and denial. The Canadian Space Agency (CSA) proudly lists
the applications of RADARSAT-2 as follows:
"Ice; Marine Surveillance; Disaster Management; Hydrology; Mapping; Geology;
Agriculture; Forestry."
http://www.space.gc.ca/asc/eng/satellites/radarsat2/applications.asp
What this public relations puff piece from the CSA neglects to mention is that
RADARSAT is also a billion dollar Christmas present from Canadian taxpayers to
the U.S. military. In fact, RADARSAT is likely the Canadian government's
single-most important technological contribution to U.S. institutions dedicated
to gathering intelligence and waging war. However, the importance of RADARSAT-2
in fighting future U.S. wars will continue to be glossed over, if not completely
ignored, by news agencies that have now begun to bombard us with their glowing
reports about this satellite.
Not only has RADARSAT-2 already helped put Canada on the map as a major global
player in space militarization, its predecessor — RADARSAT-1 — generously mapped
the entire world for U.S. military and intelligence agencies. These U.S.
government departments are in fact among the biggest and most appreciative
beneficiaries of this publicly-funded, but now privately-controlled Canadian
space technology.
When describing RADARSAT, the CSA, Canadian politicians and the corporations
involved have always loudly extolled the benefits this satellite program to
humanity and the planet as a whole. They proudly explain that since its launch
in 1995, RADARSAT-1's Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) sensors have been using
microwaves to produce images of the earth, even when the planet is obscured by
the cover of darkness, by clouds, dust storms or the most adverse weather
conditions.
And, when RADARSAT-2 is launched this Christmas season, we will no doubt be
subjected to many of the same kinds of stories about how useful this device will
be for monitoring environmental disasters caused by global warming. We can only
hope that journalists will do a better job of uncovering the truth about
RADARSAT-2's equally important role in helping the U.S. to fight wars than they
did about RADARSAT-1's military applications. Although the U.S. Navy, Air
Force, Army and various American spy agencies have been among the top users of
RADARSAT-1 data, the government and its friends in the mainstream corporate
media have always downplayed this side of Canada's premiere satellite. (See:
"U.S. Warfighters get their Hands
on RADARSAT Data."
Read more here.)
The article below is a modified version of an article from April 2006. It
summarizes a 30,000-word document, containing more than 350 references, which
was published as issue #58 of Press for Conversion!, the magazine of the
Coalition to Oppose the Arms Trade (COAT). Its full text is available online. (Access
it here.)
=============================================
Canada: A World Leader in the
Militarisation of Space
By Richard Sanders, Editor,
Press for Conversion!
Although RADARSAT-1 is widely recognized as the world's most advanced
"synthetic aperture radar" (SAR) satellite system, most Canadians know very
little, if anything, about it. (See "RADARSAT: From Spin to Secrecy" and
"Meet 'the RADARSAT Family of Satellites.'"
Read more here.)
Perhaps journalists will have by now learned that they should not necessarily
believe government denials about the military applications of Canada's space
program. When the Conservative government of Prime Minister Brian Mulroney
announced the RADARSAT-1 project two decades ago, then-Science Minister Frank
Oberle said "This technology is of no particular use to the military." Then, in
1995, when the satellite was launched under the tutelage of Liberal Prime
Minister Jean Chrétien, CSA officials repeated the same refrain, saying that
RADARSAT would not be used for military purposes. One CSA spokesperson, Mac
Evans, tried to have it both ways saying: "We are fostering the use of space for
peaceful purposes... That does not exclude military use." (See "Secret
Military Eye in the Sky."
Read more here.)
However, for 12 years now, in exchange for NASA's launch of RADARSAT-1, the U.S.
government has controlled of 15% of this Canadian satellite's observation time.
U.S. government agencies also have free access to all RADARSAT data over 6
months old. Despite their considerable control of, and access to RADARSAT and
its data, U.S. military and intelligence agencies have also purchased many
millions of dollars worth of additional RADARSAT time.
Most significantly, the U.S. military a "family" of at least five portable
ground stations, called "Eagle Vision," was specifically designed to control the
operations of RADARSAT-1 and -2. Eagle Vision is "a cornerstone of the [U.S.]
military's commercial imagery exploitation" (SIGNAL
Magazine, March 2001). It allows the U.S. military to directly control these
Canadian satellites and directly downlink their data to deployed soldiers that
are engaged in battle. ( See: "Meet Eagle Vision:
U.S. Military Bridgehead to RADARSAT."
Read more here.)
U.S. warfighters have understandably been grateful for this use of RADARSAT-1
data during Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) operations in
such wars as those waged in Yugoslavia (1999) and Afghanistan (2001-present).
And then there's the lraq war. One of the Eagle Vision ground stations—that
controls RADARSAT-1 operations and downloads its data—was deployed to the
Persian Gulf in early 2003 for use throughout the war against Iraq. A Pentagon
source told Space News: "It's doing great things... It's working like
gangbusters" (
March 31, 2003).
Many Canadian taxpayers might be surprised if not dismayed to learn that they
have, in effect, been subsidising various U.S. wars by providing the American
government with this advanced satellite technology. The design and production of
RADARSAT-1 and -2 have cost Canadian governments about one BILLION dollars.
About 90% of RADARSAT-1's $620-million price tag was publicly funded, while
about 83% of RADARSAT-2's $525-million cost was paid for by Canadian taxpayers.
(
Read more: "The Growing Costs of RADARSAT-1 and -2.")
From the start, the joint government/corporate idea was to privatise RADARSAT
and the Liberal government was quick to begin this process. It handed over
control of the data marketing and sales of RADARSAT to
MacDonald Dettwiler and Associates (MDA) of Vancouver. MDA was, at that
time, a wholly-owned subsidiary of
Orbital Sciences, a U.S. company that is one of the world's top
manufacturers of military rockets, and a top supplier for "missile-defense"
weapons systems. The privatisation of RADARSAT-2 has been even more complete,
with MDA taking over the ownership and control of this second, more-advanced
Canadian satellite. (
Read more: "Selling Off the Rights to RADARSAT and its Data.")
MDA sold the license to market and sell RADARSAT-1 and -2 data outside Canada,
to a U.S. company called
Orbimage. During the privatisation process, Orbimage and MDA were both owned
by Orbital Sciences. In 1998, when Orbimage began selling RADARSAT data to U.S.
government clients, it started hiring a coterie of retired U.S. military and
intelligence officers, including several who had spent their high-level Air
Force careers championing the cause of "missile defense" weapons development. (
Read more: "Meet the Staff at ORBIMAGE.")
In 2000, when MDA was still controlled by Orbimage's parent company, Orbital
Sciences, David Emerson was on the Canadian subsidiary's Board of Directors.
Emerson had been a high-ranking Social Credit bureaucrat under BC Premier Bill
Vanderzalm. Emerson eventually became Liberal Prime Minister Paul Martin's
pro-"missile defense" Minister of Industry and then went on to greater scandals
by becoming the Conservative government's Minister of International Trade. (
Read more: "Meet David Emerson.")
Despite concerted efforts by the NDP and BQ, the contractual agreements between
the government of Canada and MDA—which formalised the privatisation of
RADARSAT-1 and -2—have not even been made available for cursory examination by
MPs. In fact, Liberal and Conservative MPs voted as a block to prevent
Parliamentarians from even asking to look at these privatisation contracts which
had served to hand over Canada's publicly-funded satellites to MDA. (Read
more: "The Contracts that Privatised RADARSAT are Secret.")
Secrecy also shrouds an annex to a Canada-U.S. treaty that was signed in 2000 by
then-Foreign Affairs Minister Lloyd Axworthy and Secretary of State Madeleine
Albright. Michael Byers, a UBC Professor who teaches Global Politics and
International Law testified to Parliament's Foreign Affairs and International
Trade Committee that this secret annex "could enable the U.S. to demand
RADARSAT-2 be used to take images in preparation for a military intervention to
which Canada was opposed....[and] in preparation for a war that was illegal
under international law" (
February 22, 2005).
Even so, the Canadian government still refused to make the text of this annex
available for viewing by MPs. None-the-less, Canadian lawmakers were asked to
pass this legislation, even though they were not permitted to read the
obligations contained in the treaty's secret annex. Thanks to a combined
Liberal-Conservative effort, Bill C-25 (the so-called "The RADARSAT Bill") was
eventually passed into law. (
Read more: "Canada-U.S. Treaties: RADARSAT and Military Exports" and
"The RADARSAT Law’s Secret Annex.")
RADARSAT-2: A New Canadian Gift to
U.S. Warfighters
U.S. and NATO warfighters,
warplanners and weapons technicians are looking forward to taking advantage of
RADARSAT-2 data after its long-awaited launch in December of 2007. The most
coveted military application of this space-based radar system is known as its
Ground Moving Target Indication (GMTI) capability. RADARSAT-2 will be the first
satellite ever launched that has this cutting-edge capacity to track and target
moving, ground targets.
According to the
DRDC's annual report (1988-99), RADARSAT-2 "data exploitation" was developed
by Defence Research & Development Canada (DRDC), an agency of Canada's
Department of National Defence, "under co-operation with BMDO's Joint National
Test Facility." (The BMDO was the U.S. Ballistic Missile Defence Organization.
Now called the Missile Defense Agency, the BMDO oversaw America's entire
"missile defense" weapons program between 1994 and 2002.)
RADARSAT-2's GMTI is being groomed for use in gathering target data for
first-strike U.S. and NATO attacks during future "Theatre Missile Defense" (TMD)
engagements. TMD is the most important aspect of "missile defense." Its stated
purpose is to protect troops, warships and their weapons systems during
deployment in faraway battle zones in wars of the not-too-distant future. (
Read more: "RADARSAT, Missile Defense and the Holy Grail" and "GMTI and
Theater Missile Defense.")
NATO, and particularly U.S., warfighters have been preparing themselves—during
various military exercises, war games and computer simulations over the past
eight years or more—to use RADARSAT-2, and particularly its GMTI capabilities.
Beginning in 1999, Canada joined a NATO-led effort called the Coalition Aerial
Surveillance and Reconnaissance (CAESAR) project. CAESAR's focus was to ensure
the deep integration of air-based SAR/GMTI assets of three leading military
states (the U.S., UK and France), with Canada's space-based SAR/GMTI satellite,
RADARSAT-2. Canada was the only country that rendered a space-based SAR/GMTI
sensor unto CAESAR, because no other country was putting this revolutionary
military technology into space.
Although CAESAR has expired, its successor is an expanded and even more
ambitious NATO-led pact called the Multi-sensor Aerospace-Ground Joint ISR
Interoperability Coalition (MAJIIC). Its goal is to integrate several new
Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (ISR) sensor systems, besides SAR
and GMTI, into the warfighters' toolkit. Canada's contribution to MAJIIC has
grown beyond being the only nation to provide a space-based radar platform (RADARSAT)
and now includes the provision of a Tactical Uninhabitated Aerial Vehicle. And,
in addition, a
NATO technical report said Canada would likely play host to a MAJIIC
"live-fly" exercise in Alberta in June 2006. This probably refered to the "Maple
Flag" war game that Canada has been hosting annually for 40 years at the Cold
Lake Air Force Base. In 2006, this "war game" began on May 14 (Mothers' Day) and
continued until June 23. (
Read more: "From CAESAR to MAJIIC: How RADARSAT plugs
Canada in to future NATO-led wars.")
One of the main functions of both CAESAR and MAJIIC has been to enhance the
ability of the world's best-equipped warfighters to work together as one
integrated team, using their nation's respective SAR/GMTI technologies. These
preparations have included huge "live-fly" war games with incorporated computer
simulations, practised warfighting scenarios with major "theatre missile defense"
components. (
Read more: "Clean Hunter 2001: RADARSAT in a TMD War Game" and "TMD:
Coming to a Theatre of War Near You?")
RADARSAT-1 and -2 have ensured Canada's leadership in the race to further
militarise space. To ensure that Canada will maintain this leading role, a
follow-on project is now in the works. RADARSAT-3, to be launched within the
next few years, will be even more beneficial to domestic and foreign
military/intelligence agencies than were either RADARSAT-1 or -2. It has been
touted as "the most advanced space-borne land information and mapping mission
ever conceived" by both
MDA and the
Canadian Space Agency.
Considering the many rapid advances being made in the development of
Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaisance (ISR) sensors and weapons
technologies, it has become even more crucial for those concerned about war,
militarisation, state terrorism and increasing human rights abuses—such as
unwarranted government surveillance of their own populations—to ask the age-old
question: "Who will watch the watchers?" (
Read more: "Learning from Two Commandments of War: Know the Enemy and
Take the High Ground.")
The information and analysis presented here should raise many doubts about the
widely-held myth that Canada is a strong force for peace and justice on the
global stage. For example, Canadian government departments, agencies and crown
corporations have worked hand-in-glove with military-related corporations in the
creation, development and deployment of a wide variety of "missile defense"
weapons systems. This long-standing complicity did not end when the Canadian
government uttered its much-heralded "NO" to joining the "missile defense"
weapons program.
Canada's hypocritical "no-means-yes" policy on participation in "missile defense"
is also reflected in the Canadian government's supposed non-involvement in the
Iraq war. Canada has, in fact, been deeply engaged in that war from the
beginning as then-U.S. Ambassador was happy to point out when he said:
"Ironically, the Canadians indirectly provide more support for us in Iraq than
most of those 46 countries that are fully supporting us."
(
Read more: "The War in
Iraq: Another Canadian “No-Means-Yes” Policy in Action.")
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The article above summarizes some of the main facts presented in issue #58 of
Press for Conversion!, the magazine of the
Coalition to Oppose the Arms Trade (COAT). Entitled "Canada's
Role in the Militarisation of Space: RADARSAT, The Warfighters' Eye in the Sky
and its links to Missile Defense,"
this 30,000-word publication, with more than 350 references, is available
online. (Read
more)
This was the fourth issue of Press for Conversion! to examine "missile
defense"-related subjects. The three issues (#56, #57, #58) were released
following the Canadian government's February 2005 statement pretending
non-involvement in "missile defense." These issues reveal detailed evidence
proving that there is longstanding and ongoing Canadian government, corporate
and military support for this controversial, U.S.-led weapons development
program. (Read
more)
Permission is granted to quote from the above article or publish it in its
entirety, as long as acknowledgement is given to the author and the source.
Please feel free to use any of the author's other articles in Press for
Conversion! on RADARSAT, BMD and the militarization of space.
Table of Contents for Press for Conversion!
(issue # 58)
"Canada's Role in the Militarisation of
Space:
RADARSAT, The Warfighters' Eye in the Sky and its links to Missile Defense."
Front Cover and
Acknowledgements
Learning from Two Commandments of War:
Know the Enemy and Take the High Ground
Hiding RADARSAT: The Warfighters' Secret
Weapon
RADARSAT: From Spin to Secrecy
Meet "the RADARSAT family of Satellites"
The Contracts that Privatised RADARSAT are Secret
Secret Military Eye in the Sky
Canada-U.S. Treaties: RADARSAT and Military Exports
The RADARSAT Law's Secret Annex
RADARSAT's Role in Missile Defense and
NATO
RADARSAT, Missile Defense and the Holy Grail
RADARSAT-2 to be Launched in December 2006
GMTI and Theater Missile Defense
From CAESAR to MAJIIC:
How RADARSAT plugs Canada in to future NATO-led wars
Clean Hunter 2001: RADARSAT in a TMD War Game
TMD; Coming to a Theatre of War Near You?
Strong Resolve 2002: Commando Peacekeepers?
RADARSAT-1 & Strong Resolve 2002
Privatising RADARSAT and Selling off its Data
The Growing Costs of RADARSAT-1 and -2
Meet MDA: RADARSAT given to branch of U.S. "missile defense" firm
Selling Off the Rights to RADARSAT and its Data
UK Military Agency "Top" Distributor in Europe, Africa & Middle East
U.S. Warfighters get their Hands on RADARSAT Data
Meet Eagle Vision: U.S. Military Bridgehead to RADARSAT
Some Canadian Military Uses of RADARSAT
Meet the Staff at ORBIMAGE
Meet David Emerson
Meet Mark Garneau: Expert on Weapons, Space and PR
Meet the EMS Space and Technology Group
The War in Iraq: Another Canadian "No-Means-Yes" Policy in Action
Meet "Defense" Minister Gordon O'Connor
Three previous issues of COAT's magazine,
Press for Conversion! focused on BMD:
#57 (October 2005) "Canada’s Role in so called “Missile Defense”
Part II: Sea-based, Theatre Ballistic Missile Defense
#56 (June 2005) "Canada’s Role in so called “Missile Defense”
Part I: NORAD, Government Largesse and the ABC’s of Corporate Complicity
#55 (Dec. 2004) "Missile Defense: Trojan Horse for the Weaponization of Space"
For more information, email Richard
Sanders at overcoat@rogers.com