Europe's Quest for the Universe - Laboratoires de Recherche

48 Europe’s quest for the Universe
Italy and Switzerland
In 1980 ESO’s horizons were suddenly enlarged and wonderful opportunities
to push telescope development arose. For some years discussions had
been taking place with Italy and Switzerland concerning eventual membership
in ESO. The great majority of Swiss astronomers had been interested in
joining ESO. The Geneva Observatory had obtained permission to place a 40cm
photometric telescope at La Silla, and its director Marcel Golay pushed
very hard for membership. From ESO’s side it had been noted that the
agreement to place that telescope at La Silla was made in the anticipation
that full membership would follow. Also in Basel much support was given.
However, the well known solar astronomer M. Waldmeier in Zurich was
strongly opposed and held up the matter for a long time. So the Swiss authorities
turned down the proposal. When it became clear that Italy was going
to join, it was evident that ESO would be the European organization in
astronomy and the Swiss proposal was successfully revived. According to the
convention, new member countries would have to pay an “entrance fee” for
their share in the investments made by the other countries. The negotiation
about the sum to be paid was essentially political, but had to be justified in
terms of the assets of the organization and the depreciation thereof. A sum
of DM 6,000,000 was asked for, which was not quite acceptable for the Swiss.
Finally, I proposed a compromise on the basis of CHF 5,000,000, which at
the time was some 10% less than the DM amount, but by the time it was
paid in 1982 was actually slightly more.
The negotiations with Italy had been going on for some years, pushed
forward by Franco Pacini and Giancarlo Setti. Between the two of them they
covered the most essential parts of the Italian political spectrum in
parliament. The frequent changes in government had made it difficult to
progress; in fact, some five subsequent ministers or state secretaries had been
involved! The decisive push came when Consigliere U. Vattani, at the time
the Chef de Cabinet of Research Minister Scalia, took a personal interest in
the matter. A final negotiation took place in Taormina where after some
discussion our positions were still rather far apart concerning the entrance
fee. When Minister Scalia arrived and was informed of the situation, he said:
“My region (Sicily) may be a poor region, but when we arrive at such a
situation, we usually divide the difference in two” – and so it was done,
somewhat to the distress of Cons. Vattani who believed that ESO ultimately
would have been satisfied with less.
An interesting aspect was that 3 MDM in money would be replaced,
if technically feasible, by a slice of the 3.5-m disk of fused silica that the
Italians had acquired earlier for their national project. Since ESO was now
planning to build a thin mirror telescope and the Italians a copy of this, in
principle it seemed possible to slice that disk in two. After the agreement had
been reached, some speeches were held at dinner, and it turned out that the