India and U.S. Talk About Space - But Not On The Right Frequency

Here's an anaysis on the recent U.S.-India strategic dialogue from the space perspective ... citing me. The link is also available at Space Today.

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was welcomed warmly in India on
what may well be her final trip there as a senior U.S. government
official. From a space perspective, assuming a more productive outcome
was somehow achievable, this trip never reached its intended orbit. It
never even came close.

For example, in her lengthy column in The Pioneer - "India-US display
space blindness" - Dr. Rajeswari Pillai Rajagopalan, a senior fellow
at the Observer Research Foundation, made her unhappiness about this
lost opportunity in this instance quite clear.

She lamented that no clear goal, no bilateral funding, and certainly,
no new public-private partnerships were forged. She identified several
"cutting edge areas" where cooperation could occur including "space
access, in-space maneuver, space logistics, space infrastructure, etc."
Any chance for job creation was lost in the process, she said.

And she concluded as well that what is needed is, "another big idea to
steer the relationship and take it to the next level." Space
cooperation never surfaced as a viable option, however.



See

http://www.dailypioneer.com/355193/India-US-display-space-blindness.html

A U.S. Department of State fact sheet entitled, "U.S.-India Science,
Technology and Innovation Cooperation" tried to put a positive spin on
the situation.

See-
http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2011/07/168740.htm

"Space"

"Indian Space Research Organization: The United States and India are
committed to building closer ties in space exploration, space science
and earth observation. Both countries are dedicated to using their
space programs to expand the frontiers of scientific knowledge and
produce tangible benefits for their populations. The removal of Indian
Space Research Organization (ISRO) and subordinate agencies from the
Entities List in February 2011 marked a significant step in eliminating
remaining barriers to greater cooperation in space exploration and
research.

"Civil Space Working Group: By exchanging and utilizing satellite-based
scientific data about the Earth, its climate, weather, and geophysical
features, the United States and India are working together to share
information on tropical weather, monsoon forecasting and climate
change. At the July 13-14 Civil Space Working Group, the two countries
took steps towards their cooperation in this area by concluding
substantive discussion on Oceansat-II and Megha-Tropiques missions,
which will help the countries refine scientific models and improve
understanding of global weather patterns."

The India-US joint statement issued in New Delhi on July 19 mentioned
the session held by the US – India Joint Space Working Group on Civil
Space Cooperation in Bangalore.

"Building on the successful Chandrayan-1 lunar mission, NASA and ISRO
reviewed potential areas for future cooperation in earth observation,
space exploration, space sciences and satellite navigation. Both sides
agreed for early finalization three new implementing arrangements for
sharing satellite data on oceans and global weather patterns.
Recognising the research opportunities available on the International
Space Station, both sides agreed to explore the possibilities of joint
experiments. NASA reiterated its willingness to discuss potential
cooperation with ISRO on human spaceflight activities. The two sides
also agreed to expand upon previous work in the area of global
navigation satellite systems (GNSS) with the goal of promoting
compatibility and interoperability between the US Global Positioning
System, India’s Navigation systems, and those of other countries."

Keep in mind that during her speech at the Anna Centenary Library in
Chennai, Sec. Clinton knew full well that here reference to "deepening
our defense cooperation" could soon swing the door wide open as far as
the U.S. space connection to India's Defence Research and Development
Organisation (DRDO) is concerned, although someone has to unlock the
door first.

Was it merely a coincidence that at the start of the very same day,
India elected to test-fire one of its newest shorter range, tactical
missiles known as the `Prahaar', and that Defence Minister AK Antony
sent his congratulations to the DRDO before Sec. Clinton stepped to the
podium? Perhaps.

Otherwise, the overall timing of this trip was simply not right for any major announcements regarding U.S. - Indian space relations.

Was it because the ASEAN Regional Forum was looming? No, the U.S. and China were both navigating carefully already anyway, and aside from a few rhetorical salvos, no U.S. attempt to bolster India's standing in space would have proven too disruptive to those talks.

What about Sec. Clinton's mention of the inauguration of a trilateral
U.S.-India-Japan dialogue in Chennai? Sure, this could yield profound
consequences in space, but here again, the realities of the Indian
nuclear deals represent an enormous counterweight.

In the end, no pressing foreign policy concerns along with the latest U.S. attempts to outmaneuver the Chinese at sea are are not what probably caused the Obama administration to ease back on the throttle here. India's nuclear sector was not the determining factor either.

In fact, Indian commentators generally overlooked the state of disarray permeating the U.S. space sector as a whole. As thousands of U.S. space workers at NASA and major space contractors were being handed pink slips, President Obama in his quest for a second term no doubt did not think it to be a wise idea to be seen as someone who was crafting an aggressive space partnering campaign with India - placing even more American jobs in jeopardy. One might argue that so what given that President Obama has no supporters left in the U.S, space sector today, but that is simply not true.

So, did domestic political considerations shape the relatively sparse menu of space offerings in this instance? This cannot be dismissed altogether.

On the other hand, India might want to weigh the possible repercussions of what NASA was undertaking on the ISS as well. One of the best American commentators active in the "New Space" sector issued a cautionary note this past week, something that readers and space planners in India and elsewhere simply cannot ignore.

In his latest newsletter, Charles Lurio included a section on,
"Refueling Experiment and Issues of Commercialization"

See

http: www.thelurioreport.com

Lurio outlined how the “Robotic Refueling Mission” (RRM) which was
carried aloft by the last Shuttle flight earlier this month includes an
“activity board” designed for use by the Canadian-built “Dextre”
robotic system which is already aboard the ISS.

See -
http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/research/experiments/
RRM.html.

Lurio proceeds to highlight the RRM's testing of technology and
procedures required for refueling, “even [of] satellites not designed
to be serviced.”

So on top of everything else, as India emphasizes its heavy rockets,
and lays the groundwork for Indian launchers to be adorned with
countless new large payloads, NASA stands ready to extend the life of
the entire space infrastructure not just GEOs - we are only talking
about roughly 290 GEO satellites on station today - and restructuring
the entire satellite food chain in the process.

Sorry, but what went on during this trip - that is the last Shuttle
mission to the ISS with the RRM aboard - might end up exerting far more
influence on the Indian space sector in the years to come than Sec.
Clinton's final mission to India.

India's solution in the face of these and other variables could be to
react accordingly - forego partnerships promised but not secured while
innovating like crazy - adapting again to a new set of challenges.

Space remains an area of promises without an actionable agenda ....

In a recent story in Space News, I was cited ... rather my argument as to why space has not gained traction between India and the United States as yet. This is one area with tremendous potential and least controversies although it has remained an area with lot of promises.



Space cooperation represents an enormous opportunity to strengthen ties between the United States and India, but neither side appears to recognize this potential, Rajeswari Pillai Rajagopalan writes in a July 22 op-ed in India’s Pioneer newspaper.

A joint statement at the conclusion of recent talks in Bangalore failed to produce what was needed, she writes: “a bilateral 21st century commercial space initiative or a Space Knowledge Initiative, thereby making space an attractive proposition for entrepreneurs.”

“India and the US need to be more innovative and visionary and identify cutting edge areas to cooperate,” writes Rajagopalan, a senior fellow at the Observer Research Foundation. “There are plenty of candidates: areas like space access, in-space maneuver, space logistics, space infrastructure, etc. This would have several spin-off effects in terms of creating a human resource pool well-versed in dealing with future challenges.”

WPS on the US-India Strategic Dialogue, citing me ....

Here's the OpEd written by Dr. WP Sidhu on the recently concluded second US-India Strategic Dialogue, citing me. Space is a relatively non-controversial area for the two countries to step up their cooperation .... However, despite the intent on both sides, space remains an area of promises and no hard decisions.



The recently concluded Indo-US dialogue—only the second—reflects both a deepening and widening of the bilateral engagement. What used to be rare high level visits have now become routine and, to a degree, predictable. At the same time the range of issues being discussed have enlarged to include cooperation on counterterrorism, cyber security, open government, space, peacekeeping, food security in Africa and even women’s empowerment.

Predictably, there has been a focus on the most contentious issues, notably over the differences related to the Indo-US nuclear cooperation and the troublesome state of Pakistan. However, it is important to note that in the absence of such a dialogue these difficult issues would have continued to fester; the regular meetings provides a forum to at least talk through these. Indeed, it is inevitable that even a strategic dialogue is likely to focus on immediate issues of concern partly because they are unavoidable and partly because they have strategic implications. To that extent, because the dialogue focused on the most immediate concerns it was to a degree successful at least at the tactical level.

At the strategic level, however, neither New Delhi nor Washington appears to be any closer to answering the critical question: where would they like to see this strategic partnership 50 years from now? Once the two sides have reached a common understanding a related question would be: how to get there? Given the ongoing internal, regional and international transformation these are difficult questions for either India or the US to answer, although Washington might have a better sense of its objective.

Clearly, to be truly effective a strategic dialogue must focus on at least one or two grand long-term ideas which are mutually beneficial, along with the other issues that now make up the agenda. The nuclear deal was the big idea of the previous decade. However, the growing obsession by both sides over the divergences on this issue has the potential to weaken if not derail the strategic dialogue.

Today, with the last flight of the US space shuttle, which coincided with the strategic dialogue, there is a real opportunity to develop an ambitious Indo-US civil space cooperation programme; an idea first floated by Indian and American scholars a few years ago and further developed by Indian expert Rajeshwari Pillai Rajagopalan recently. Although the space shuttle was a technical marvel —losing only two ships in its 30-year and 135-flight history—it was also incredibly expensive. According to one estimate, while each flight was advertised to cost around $10 million, in reality it worked out to about $1.2 billion per flight. In contrast, the Indian space programme despite being far more frugal has also notched up some incredible achievements. The discovery of water on the moon by the Indian spacecraft Chandrayaan-1 is one such accomplishment. It also underlines that unmanned missions are probably a more efficient (if less glamorous) way to explore and develop space. Interestingly, Hillary Clinton’s last stop in Chennai, where she exhorted India to be more ambitious and assertive, is also the source of some of Nasa’s best scientists and technicians. It would have provided the ideal setting to announce a commercial space initiative, similar to the agricultural knowledge initiative.

Indeed, of the various joint working groups that make up the Indo-US strategic dialogue, the joint space working group has probably been the least ambitious. Instead of a bold cooperative initiative it merely agreed to sharing satellite data on oceans and global weather patterns; explore the possibilities of joint experiments on the International Space Station; and discuss potential cooperation between Nasa and Isro on human spaceflight activities.

It is imperative for both sides to seize the opportunity to make the dialogue truly strategic and space may prove to be the final frontier.

W. Pal Sidhu is senior fellow, Centre on International Cooperation at New York University. He writes on strategic affairs every fortnight.

India-US display space blindness

Here's the link to an article of mine on the US-India Strategic Dialogue, looking at a space angle, published in today's Pioneer.

Substantive issues were evidently avoided at the Clinton-Krishna talks, otherwise what could explain the lack of interest on both sides to take forward the old idea of cooperation in space? Wasn't it less controversial than the nuclear deal?



The US-India Joint Space Working Group (JWG) on civil space cooperation concluded their talks in Bangalore last week. In terms of concrete steps, the two sides have agreed to work together for sharing information on monsoon forecasting by exchanging and using satellite-based scientific data. This, along with other areas highlighted during the JWG meeting, has been included in the Joint Statement at the end of the second US-India Strategic Dialogue.

But, in most other respects, the US-India Strategic Dialogue, appears to have produced no big ideas for carrying forward the relationship. The joint statement issued at the end of the dialogue focuses on, among other things, the new US-India Dialogue on Central Asia, acknowledging particularly the importance of it in the context of better trade and transit linkages that might contribute to the long-term well-being of Afghanistan; strengthening of defence ties through transfer of technology, joint research, development and production of defence items; US' support for India's membership into the four technology export control regimes - Nuclear Suppliers Group, Missile Technology Control Regime, Australia Group and the Wassennaar Arrangement; and the bilateral initiatives on clean energy options including solar energy, energy-efficient buildings and advanced bio-fuels.

The Joint Statement also included a paragraph on space, with the two sides agreeing to cooperate on a number of areas such as sharing satellite data on oceans and global weather patterns, joint experiments, earth observation, space exploration and so on.

The statement has been along expected lines. Despite its huge potential and almost no controversy, Indo-US space cooperation has not moved to concrete actionable agenda yet. The need of the hour was to introduce a bilateral 21st century commercial space initiative or a Space Knowledge Initiative, thereby making space an attractive proposition for entrepreneurs. Such an initiative would have made space a commercially and strategically sustainable area in India-US relations. The two sides should have had a clear goal along with bilateral funding. Subsequently, it could have been made into a good case for public-private partnership. The Agricultural Knowledge Initiative is often cited as a good example of public-private partnership.

India and the US need to be more innovative and visionary and identify cutting edge areas to cooperate. There are plenty of candidates: areas like space access, in-space maneuver, space logistics, space infrastructure, etc. This would have several spin-off effects in terms of creating a human resource pool well-versed in dealing with future challenges. The spin-off benefits in terms of job creation would have become an attractive proposition for the two countries given the domestic pressure.

India and the US should have ideally produced a joint statement that would have laid out a long-term plan with near and mid-term milestones -- such as monitoring non-traditional security threats including human security issues by studying the environment and oceans, with a roadmap for constructing a space-based sensors constellation. They could have considered a technology demonstration programme for making space-based solar power a technologically viable option or endorsed the goals of the Kalam-NSS initiative and IAA study, calling for the establishment of a working group toward an on-orbit demo of an international space-solar power demonstrator satellite within 10 years, with both Delhi and Washington pledging $1bn over the next 10 years towards. Lastly, the two sides could have established a US-India Space Knowledge / Commercial Initiative. This would have required the two governments making an investment of about $40-50mn over a five-year period while identifying specific projects for this time span.

Lastly, Indo-US relations have been drifting along for sometime now and it is time that the two sides identified another big idea to steer the relationship and take it to the next level. Space cooperation clearly has the potential to play this role. But clearly, its potential has yet to be recognized on either side.

US-India Strategic Dialogue: Lack of Vision in Space

Here's an analysis of mine, published by ORF, on the recent US-India Strategic Dialogue, more from a space point of view.

India and the US need to be more innovative and visionary, and identify cutting edge areas to cooperate. There are plenty of candidates: areas like space access, in-space maneuver, space logistics, space infrastructure, in addition to developing new markets such as space tourism, on-orbit construction and manufacture, terrestrial resource mapping, space resource and energy utilization, space traffic management and active debris mitigation, to name a few.



The US-India Joint Space Working Group (JWG) on civil space cooperation concluded their talks in Bangalore last week. In terms of concrete steps, the two sides have agreed to work together for sharing information on tropical weather, monsoon forecasting by exchanging and using satellite-based scientific data about the Earth, weather, geophysical features. These are by no means the most exciting areas of cooperation on space. This as well as other areas highlighted during the JWG meeting have been included in the Joint Statement at the end of the second US-India Strategic Dialogue which ended on Tuesday evening.

The Strategic Dialogue appears to have produced no big ideas for carrying forward the relationship. The Joint Statement focuses on, among other things, the new US-India Dialogue on Central Asia, acknowledging particularly the importance of it in the context of better trade and transit linkages that might contribute to the long-term well-being of Afghanistan; strengthening of defence ties through transfer of technology, joint research, development and production of defence items; US' support for India's membership into the four technology export control regimes - Nuclear Suppliers Group, Missile Technology Control Regime, Australia Group and the Wassennaar Arrangement; and the bilateral initiatives on clean energy options including solar energy, energy-efficient buildings and advanced bio-fuels.

The statement has been along expected lines. Despite huge potentiality and almost no controversy -- unlike in the nuclear area -- Indo-US space cooperation has not moved to concrete actionable agenda yet. The statement clearly lacks much vision. It included a paragraph on space, with the two sides agreeing to cooperate on a number of areas such as sharing satellite data on oceans and global weather patterns, joint experiments, earth observation, space exploration and so on.

The need of the hour was to introduce a US-India 21st Century Commercial Space Initiative or a Space Knowledge Initiative, along the lines of the US-India Agricultural Knowledge Initiative and the US-India Clean Energy Initiative, making space an attractive proposition for entrepreneurs besides the strategic entities on either sides. Such an initiative would have made space a commercially and strategically sustainable area in India-US relations. The two sides should have had a clear goal along with bilateral funding. Subsequently, it could have been made into a good case for public-private partnership. The Agricultural Knowledge Initiative is often cited as a good example of public-private partnership.

India and the US need to be more innovative and visionary, and identify cutting edge areas to cooperate. There are plenty of candidates: areas like space access, in-space maneuver, space logistics, space infrastructure, in addition to developing new markets such as space tourism, on-orbit construction and manufacture, terrestrial resource mapping, space resource and energy utilization, space traffic management and active debris mitigation, to name a few. The two sides ought to make this into an economically sustainable option, and create a strategic industry around space to make it sustainable in the long-term. This would have several spin-off effects in terms of creating a pool of human and scientific resources, well-versed in dealing with future challenges. The spin-off benefits in terms of job creation would have become an attractive proposition for the two countries, given the domestic pressure.

India and the US should have ideally produced a joint statement that would have laid out a long-term plan with near and mid-term milestones -- such as monitoring non-traditional security threats, including human security issues by studying the environment and oceans, with a roadmap for constructing a space-based sensors constellation. They could have considered a technology demonstration programme for making space-based solar power a technologically viable option or endorsed the goals of the Kalam-NSS initiative and IAA study, calling for the establishment of a working group toward an on-orbit demo of an international space-solar power demonstrator satellite within 10 years, with both Delhi and Washington pledging $1bn over the next 10 years towards such a programme. Lastly, the two sides could have established a US-India Space Knowledge/Commercial Initiative. This would have required the two governments making an investment of about $40-50mn for a five-year period, while identifying specific projects for this time span.

Lastly, Indo-US relations have been drifting along for sometime now and it is time that the two sides identified another big idea to steer the relationship and take it to the next level. Space cooperation clearly has the potential to play this role. But clearly, its potential is yet to be recognized by either side.