Exploring the Unknown - NASA's History Office

EXPLORING THE UNKNOWN 573
activities so there may be independent consideration of sensitivities, implications and additional
coordination requirements of a public, international, governmental, congressional
or industry affairs character. The system should not be designed to delay or screen activities
but rather to permit “flagging” problems on a timely basis if they should be perceived.
Cost-benefit analysis may be the appropriate tool for evaluating some applications.
Before resources are committed to doing such studies, the criteria noted under the paragraph
above on Space Applications should be considered. But there is a continuing need
for such cost-benefit studies for many potential projects. Traditionally these studies have
been done by the various program offices. As more are done, there is a need for uniform
techniques to be applied to cost-benefit analysis so that the results of the various studies
can be compared. These criteria should be determined by a central office and then
applied with the assistance of the various program offices or field centers.
– International. The Space Act mandates a program of international cooperation,
and the Outer Space Treaty calls for the sharing of the benefits of space activity. There is
no requirement to transfer technology itself abroad.
The options are to conduct “give-away” or support and aid-type programs or to seek
cost-sharing or other economic return. Until the Landsat program, the precedents established
for cooperative programs were generous, but most often were subjected to requirements
of scientific validity and mutual interest.
[19] Thus, in the first experimentation with communications satellites, foreign states were
permitted to participate in the testing phase (not the R&D) on the basis that they funded
the necessary overseas ground stations. NASA thereby saved the expense of funding facilities
at both ends of the experiments. Even in the weather satellite field, the initial cooperation
entailed comparison flights by foreign aircraft coordinated with spacecraft passes
and other activities designed to help calibrate and validate the first satellite data analyses.
Landsat. In the Landsat case, it was felt that a peculiarly economic application was
involved and that cost-sharing for the space segment should be established in principle.
(The foreign users, of course, fund all their ground-based facilities and activities.) Before
cost-sharing was even broached, however, NASA’s agreement to program Landsats to read
out for foreign stations was offset by several quid-pro-quos: the foreign stations undertook
to supply data free to [principal investigators] selected by NASA; they were obligated to
provide data of interest to NASA on request; and they represented valuable insurance to
NASA for desired foreign coverage when the spacecraft tape recorders should fail.
Technology transfer, in the sense of industrial know-how, is not involved in the above
Landsat type foreign involvement. Here we are speaking more of the transfer of the benefits
of a technology, but some transfers of data processing and analysis know-how are
required by training personnel. NASA does not operate training programs as such,
although limited on-the-job training opportunities are made available under certain conditions.
Industry and [the Agency for International Development], along with other specialized
government agencies, often provide training services.
FEDD. The options are whether to continue to try to control unclassified technical
outputs by NASA and its contractors or not, and if so, whether through the FEDD program
or another.
[20] The arguments for control are these: NASA has been criticized for its large output of
technical information available to foreign competitors. The circumstances of release of
supercritical wing information at least suggested that major innovations with significant
military and/or commercial potential might be compromised and that professional motivation
and tradition may operate to obscure the national interest. The fact that public
funds are used to underwrite such R&D would, with other factors, seem to require some
regard for the national interest.