Posted on 11/24/2004 8:49:19 AM PST by sukhoi-30mki
Space In India :India's Space Pioneer President Designs His Nation's Future
Aviation Week & Space Technology 11/22/2004, page 51
Neelam Mathews and Frank Morring, Jr. New Delhi
Indian president draws on a career in space, missile work to design his nation's future
Dare To Dream
At 73, A.P.J. Abdul Kalam, India's 11th president, doubts he will be able to get to Mars before he turns 90. But the space and missile pioneer, widely respected throughout his country as a poet, spiritualist, educator, philosopher, writer and rocket scientist all rolled into one, sees no reason he shouldn't be able to get there.
In his vast study overlooking the Mughal Garden of the presidential palace, seated behind a large teakwood desk stacked with books and the latest issues of Aviation Week & Space Technology, Kalam spent 40 candid minutes on Sept. 21 sharing his vision for India's space program and prospects of India-U.S. cooperation in space science.
"Personally I would like to go [to Mars], yes," he says. "By the time India is ready to take off from the Sriharikota Range, which will be a spaceport by 2020-21, I will be 90 years old. That is my vision." A practical man who got his start building small "pencil rockets" for atmospheric experiments before becoming project director of the SLV-3, India's first indigenous satellite launcher, Kalam concedes India must work with the rest of the international space-faring community to make his vision a reality.
"We should be in a multinational mode and be able to collaborate with the U.S. and others," he says. "Working together has advantages for both countries."
Chiding the U.S. for restricting India's access to the latest technology, he says there can be no lasting peace in the world if only the developed nations are technologically and economically advanced. In the past India has hinted it would accept a nonproliferation package in exchange for favorable U.S. export control policies that could include participation in the International Space Station.
"India is a peaceful country," Kalam says. "In its 5,000-year history, we have never invaded any country. Both World War I and II were created in Europe and the U.S. . . . We're peaceful; something that has been our traditional attitude and that says you forgive [the U.S. for imposing sanctions]."
In Kalam's view, U.S. sanctions on India have been self-defeating. He suggests technology embargoes under the Missile Technology Control Regime delayed and increased project costs in India but did not bring them to a standstill. "It was for us, a learning curve," he says.
"No country will be a loser except the one that imposes the sanctions," he says. "If you don't do business with the country that has had sanctions clamped on it, like in this case India, it comes out the winner. The guy who got the sanction will win, as it will indigenously develop [what it needs]. This is plain logic. It is only a question of time and money."
Kalam's view is corroborated by U.S. industry groups that have indicated a concern that unilateral sanctions would reduce their role as suppliers to India's space industry and end up hurting the U.S. aerospace industry. But it has hurt India too, he says, listing as an example an estimated penalty of five years and a 10% increase in cost for some solid-fuel rocket technologies.
"We have the core competency and it is inevitable that an independent nation of over 1 billion would like to be self-reliant," Kalam says. "Nobody can stop it. We launched the Edusat [dedicated distance-learning satellite]--why? Because [we have] 600,000 villages with 700 million--70% of Indians live there. That is our priority. No other country can decide that for me."
Kalam's publicly stated goal as president is to make India a developed nation by 2020. In his "Vision 2020" manifesto, Kalam emphasizes space applications in agriculture, transport, education and health care as harbingers for a developed India.
DESPITE SOME PROGRESS, Kalam says he remains skeptical about the outcome of the Indo-U.S. "Next Steps in Strategic Partnership" initiative. Now in its second phase, the initiative is a framework for bilateral relations in civilian nuclear activities, civilian space programs and high-technology trade. It calls for measures to address proliferation and compliance with U.S. export controls.
While the first phase of NSSP has been heralded as a success by U.S. and Indian officials, Kalam sees more hurdles ahead as both sides focus on details of cooperation relating to dual-use technology and third-party usage.
"Once the sanctions are lifted, I will be sure," he says. "In India we are assuming they will not be. After all, they have been 'lifted' three times!"
Still, Kalam says he doesn't believe the problems are insurmountable, given the common ground the two nations share.
"India and the U.S. have unique systems," he says. "We are two democratic nations and in the changing dynamics of the world, should work together through peace, not war, as war leaves enmity and more wars. We need a system to evolve enlightened citizens--which only democratic countries can do."
At the Indo-U.S. Conference on Space Applications and Commerce held in Bangalore in June, Kalam listed some of his ideas for cooperation in space, including attaining access to it and making use of its unique environment to benefit citizens on the ground below.
"The foremost challenge before the space-faring nations now is to bring down the cost of access to space through the use of innovative technologies including an Indo-U.S. partnership in Solar Power Satellites," he says, arguing for a goal of reducing launch costs to less than a fiftieth of current rates.
With cooperation, in Kalam's view, there are no limits on what can be accomplished in space.
"I visualize, in the year 2050, an Indo-U.S. team establishing a habitat in Mars, mining industrial units in space and working on a joint program to destroy or deviate the asteroids when the Earth is endangered."
Within this decade, Kalam says he hopes NASA and Indian space scientists will collaborate on predicting earthquakes at least a week in advance using advanced Earth-observation techniques. But those same techniques have produced military spinoffs that underlie the current difficulties with the U.S. and other space-faring nations.
During the interview, Kalam dismissed the dual-use nature of hardware like the Technology Experiment Satellite, with its 1-meter resolution imagery capability. "There's no fuss. All you put is a [sensor] on a satellite to get images."
But Kalam is also known as the father of India's missile program, and in his book Wings of Fire, he elaborates on the dual benefits of technology to India.
"I have three visions for India," he writes. "Freedom, that we must protect and nurture or no one will respect us; development--we have 10% growth rate in most areas. I have a third vision--that India must stand up to the world. Only strength respects strength. We must be strong not only as a military power but also as an economic power. Both must go hand-in-hand."
I'm convinced India will kick the world's collective butt when the tipping point is reached where they've eliminated most of their poverty and we've become terminally strangled in debt. Indian leaders, for the most part, actually have vision. Our leaders have visions of obtaining more bribes, er, campaign contributions, for their reelection campaigns.
A joint Indo-US Mars base in 2050? Sheesh.
This plan also assumes no Sino-Indian war in the future...
Never said they don't have problems. But I meet lots of Indians, and they are an ambitious and clever people, clearly on their way up.
India is generations away from prosperity because the Brahmin caste refuse to give up what is essentially an apartheid system where lower caste people are actively prevented from obtaining social mobility. In my own experience with Hindus I have found the lower caste people to be honest, kind, and wonderful to be around while the upper caste people are viciously racist to the extent that a Nazi would blush at their views of the rest of the world. India looks down her nose at the rest of us becuase they believe that they have some sort of 'manifest destiny' to rule the world and that the rest of us are ignorant obstructionists who refuse to acknowledge Hindu racial superiority.
Let India be a free country and then we can talk about India taking her place with free nations.
True, and not just the leaders. Indians have more interest in space development than has any other national group. China is a nation of lemmings. Europe is one mismanaged and failed revolution after another, S America is too democratic to move in any direction, N America is complacent as contact cement. India might be the one, if there is to be one, to conquer outer space.
Err,India is a free country & if it wasn't free,the Hindu nationalist led coalition would still be in power & a Muslim would never have been nominated to become president.The future of any government in Delhi depends on the support of a handful of social justice based parties-which primary represent the lower castes.While i will readily accept that the Caste system is not yet dead,it's all pervasive influence has been steadily & significantly eroded since Independence.Why??Because Free India's constitution(which has features of both the British & American models & is the largest written political document in the world) mandates the State to uplift under privileged sections of society,including the lower castes & Being an Indian residing in India,I can tell you massive change has taken place.Many people belonging to such groups have started getting college education,jobs(govt & private) & more importantly,a sense of identity.
PS-well a lunatic fringe of the Hindu right(which was visible during the past 6 years) does have visions of regional supremacy,the rest of India & Indians only want to see their nation as becoming strong-tell me which nation wouldn't want that.Besides,seeing the views of many Freepers makes me think that those loonies are just polite!!
Well if they were professionals they come from a tiny social class (caste, really) and they are hardly reflrective of the nation. This is this illusion that we hae about India. We will see about the "rise" of Idia and even China. Their is much more to devopling a great nation than supplying cheap labor.
I see that, too, from my limited exposure at the university. A lot of the regular people are showing up as students lately, so there may be a sea change underway.
You left out,2 darkhorses-Israel & Japan.Japan's space programme is far ahead of the rest,barring the US & Russia.The only thing keeping them backward is their economy.Israel is too busy with it's national security,so i would'nt see them as being obsessed with sending a man to the moon.But Israel,has over the past few years,increased cooperation with India in the space sector-They are building a joint space telescope(to be made & launched from India but with Israeli instruments),spy satellites & Israel has been invited to send payloads on India's unmanned moon mission in 2008.So if India does decide to send a man to the moon,an Israeli could be included,esp if the Israelis provide the cash & also give a few more dollops of military tech.
About the US,well if China,India,Japan,Russia et al,get busy in space,the slumbering American giant may just get the jolt it needs to fire away to Mars!!
PS-watch out for the Iranians & Pakis-they've just launched their first satellites(through other nations ,of course) & have already claimed it's 30 years ahead of the infidels.
Japan could lead in space exploration, but they seem so timid, not surprising considering.
Not exactly,India's middle class is nearly 400 million strong & the upper caste is only a fraction of the population.Residing in India,I can say that nearly every section of society is trying to hop on to the tech bandwagon through a variety of ways & it is having results.You have to remember that the restructuring of the Indian economy began only in the late 80s & went full steam by the mid-90s,but the economic & social upliftment,which happened in that period is too significant to be wished away.That being said,more needs to be done to bring every section of society firmly into the booming sectors.
They've got the kick in the rear-end to get their space programme up & running,when they got the news that China sent a bloke into space.The China-Japan & China-India rivalry (in all spheres) is something to watch out for.
It helps if you have your infrastructure in place before you go asking for Mars.
You have to bear in mind that India is NOT YET decided on sending a man into space on it's own or to Mars for that matter.It's still being passionately debated.If it was China,we are talking about,they would have launched a Mars mission by 2005-because nobody will take the govt to task for wasting resources.That's not the case in India where the system is transparent.Most of India's space programme has been devoted to welfare-Education,communication,resource location,metrology & even medicine.
There's a reason why the multinationals are fleeing the U.S. and heading for India for professional help. It's not just cheap labor. Mrs. Warchild interfaces with these suits as part of her job, and she says they say Indian professionals are thorough, hard-working, numerous, and cheap. And I've had the misfortune of going head-to-head with middle-class Indians (and government-sponsored Red Chinese) both in academia and industry, and they're extremely hard-working and smart, quite the challenge. Also, India's middle class now outnumbers our entire population.
I've read where the Chinese plan on orbiting a surveillance satellite every six weeks starting the end of next year, and extending out six years from there. Even so, I can't see a Communist country outperforming a noisy, messy, optimistic free country like India in the long run.
And Israel will only maintain their role in this as long as they can pick the pockets of people like me.
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