Space Security Index

1. Transporting astronauts to LEO could be turned over to the commercial sector. If this
option is chosen, the government should create a competitive bidding process.
2. Levels of international cooperation between the U.S. and other national space programs
could increase.
China began developing the Shenzhou human spaceight system in the late 1990s and
completed a successful human mission in 2003, becoming the third state to develop an
independent human spaceight capability. 69 A second mission was successfully completed
in 2005 and the third and latest in 2008.
Other civil programs are also turning to human spaceight and the Moon. In 2005, JAXA
released its 20-year vision statement, which includes expanding its knowledge of human
space activities aboard the ISS as well as developing a human space shuttle by 2025. 70 e
ESA also has a long-term plan to send humans to the Moon and Mars through the Aurora
program. India approved a human spaceight program in 2006. 71 In 2007, both Japan and
China launched robotic lunar missions: Kaguya and Chang’e-1, respectively. 72 Germany,
India, and South Korea have also considered lunar missions going forward. 73
Direction of civil space programs
More civil space projects are now explicitly focused on social and economic development
objectives. ISRO was established on this basis in 1969 and has since developed a series of
communications satellites that provide tele-education and telehealth applications and remote
sensing satellites to enhance agriculture, land, and water resource management and disaster
monitoring. 74 In 2000, Malaysia launched Tiungsat-1, a microsatellite that included several
remote sensing instruments for environmental monitoring. In 1998, ailand and Chile
together launched TMSat, the world’s rst 50-kg microsatellite to produce high-resolution,
full-color, multispectral images for monitoring the Earth, and FASat-Bravo, a microsatellite
to study depletion of the ozone layer. 75 Algeria, Egypt, Nigeria, and South Africa have built
or are in the process of building satellites to support socioeconomic development. A part of
the 2007 EU/ESA Space Policy’s mission was to serve the public in the area of “environment,
development, and global climate change.” 76
Eorts have also been made to expand the reach of such programs. China and Brazil have
agreed to provide free land images to African and Asian countries from their joint optical
remote sensing satellite CBERS-2B (China-Brazil Earth Resource Satellite-2B), launched
in September 2007. 77 ey will also provide the software needed to read the data, which
is intended to help countries respond to threats such as deforestation, desertication, and
drought. 78 India has also committed to sharing remote sensing data for disaster management
in the Asia-Pacic region and provides data analysis and training to countries without
independent access. 79
Civil space programs, particularly meteorology and Earth observation science, are increasingly
used for national security missions. For example, the objective of the EU/ESA Global
Monitoring for Environment and Security program is to “support Europe’s goals regarding
sustainable development and global governance, in support of environmental and security
policies, by facilitating and fostering the timely provision of quality data, information, and
knowledge.” 80
Civil Space Programs
85