Category: In Defense of Japan


New Review of In Defense of Japan

Filed Under: Academic / Scholastic Journal Reviews, In Defense of Japan, Reviews, 未分類 by admin — コメントする
2011年7月11日

Veteran satellite journalist Peter J. Brown has just written a nice review of In Defense of Japan on his new blog Japanese in Space.

One of the issues with In Defense of Japan is that it is not media friendly and not designed to be media friendly as we wanted to reach decision makers and analysts. Undoing misconceptions of Japan’s space program by decades of superficial coverage can’t be done by engaging the mass media as the message just does not jive, or jars with media  shibboleths. However, we are finding that people who are seriously interested in this area find the time to read In Defense of Japan through and “get” our arguments.

Peter’s take amounts to: “…this  writer is hard pressed indeed to identify any recent book in English  that comes close to covering as much ground as this one does.”

Here is an excerpt:

Review of In Defense of Japan by Peter J Brown


Many thanks Peter and keep up the good work on Japanese in Space!

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J-2/ Epsilon is Go!

Filed Under: ASNARO, Epsilon, H-2A, In Defense of Japan, Japan Nuclear Program, Japan space development, Japan space militarization, M-V, 未分類 by admin — コメントする
2011年4月20日

The more I talk to Morita Sensei about the Epsilon, the more I am struck by how important it is to Japan’s strategic solid-fuel dual-use technology maintenance program. Those of you who know your rockets will know that the last two generations of ISAS sold LVs have been judged as readily convertible to ICBMS, and also the J-1, the last time Japan “mixed ‘n’ matched” technologies from its NASDA derived and ISAS derived programs.

But the Epsilon is very very different. Or is it? Where else other than in Japan could you develop a launch-on-demand rocket/ missile for $200 million? The Epsilon rocks! It is only an extreme budget squeeze that is stopping it from launching in its full configuration in 2013 right away. First of all, here is the article I recently wrote for Space News:

The technical changes being made to develop the Epsilon seem to have fully taken on board and learned from the mistakes made for the J-1 (featuring Tomifumi Godai, about whom I talk more about below), which, in one of my favorite articles for Space News in the 1990s, was “hammered” for its costs after a report by the Management and Coordination Agency showed that the J-1 development program cost more than similar projects in other countries. At the time I could see the mantra; Japan was trying to switch to genuinely be seen to cut costs from practically nothing to vapor, while underneath the J-1 was always mainly a technology development program to see if it could integrate an ICBM from its liquid and solid development programs. In terms of the cost per launch, the J-1 was really quite expensive. But in terms of technically showing how easy it is for Japan to produce ICBMs, the J-1 was quite a piece of work!

Here is the Commission to Assess the Ballistic Missile Threat to the United States
Appendix III: Unclassified Working Papers assessment of the J-1: 

To jog your memory: the J-1 was a three-stage solid fuel rocket able to place payloads of about 1,000 kg int low Earth orbit and the first NASDA rocket to be made from a  combination of existing indigenous rockets – the solid rocket booster of the H-2 and the upper stage of the M-3S II. In other words, after an awfully long, twisting and tortured route down the J-1U -> J-2 -> GX route, which was basically IHI’s bid to become a liquid engine technology integration company, the Epsilon is the direct successor of the J-1. The Epsilon is what the J-1 should have been.

Does any of this, taken from the Japan Echo of 15 years ago, sound at all similar?

Information Bulletin No.64
First Launch of Cost-Efficient J-1 Rocket Scheduled for February 1996

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January 8,1996

The National Space Development Agency of Japan (NASDA) is in the process of assembling a new domestically produced rocket, the J-1. Scheduled to be launched from the Tanegashima Space Center in February 1996, the J-1 features a cost-efficient design that incorporates parts of existing rockets. It will carry as its payload an experimental space vehicle that will gather data to be used in the development of a Japanese space shuttle, HOPE.
The mainstay of Japan’s space program is today the H-2, the first of which was successfully launched in 1994. The H-2, which can boost a two-ton satellite into geostationary orbit 36,000 kilometers above the equator, is a two-stage rocket fueled by liquid oxygen and liquid hydrogen. The J-1, on the other hand, is a three-stage rocket designed to place a satellite of about one ton in low orbit. It was jointly developed by NASDA and the Ministry of Education’s Institute of Space and Aeronautical Science with an eye to a likely increase in the demand for rockets to put into low orbit small telecommunications and other satellites.
To save on development and production costs, current plans call for the first J-1 to incorporate the type of solid-fuel rocket now being used by NASDA as boosters for the H-2; the second and third will use a combination of the M23 and M3B sold-fuel rockets that constitute the tip of ISAS’s M-3SII. The J-1, which stands 33 meters tall, measures 1.8 meters in diameter, and weighs 87 tons is rather small compared to the H-2-50 meters tall, 4 meters in diameter, 264 tons-but was developed for only one-ninth of the cost, or 3.1 billion.
The first J-1, scheduled to be launched on February 1, 1996, will carry as its payload the 1,050-kilogram HYFLEX …” [X-37B space bomber test... no no, only joking. It's nothing like the X-37B space bomber at all; here it is landing, right] “…a hypersonic flight experiment vehicle that will collect data for the development of a Japanese space shuttle, named HOPE. HYFLEX will separate from the J-1 at an altitude of 110 kilometers and glide back through the atmosphere. Scientists will be evaluating such points as HYFLEX’s heat-resistant properties as it reaches temperatures as high as 1500-1600 degrees Celsius and its stability and control systems as it hits speeds of up to Mach 15. After completing its glide, the HYFLEX will deploy a parachute and splash down in the ocean near the island of Ogasawara, where it will be retrieved by waiting ships.

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The wonderful thing about this article is that it shows what they Japanese call the 急 (Kyu) pichi (pitch) or the rapid assault on the higher strategic echelons of space development. It’s hard to believe going back to 1990s with the hubris and triumphalism;  with people like Tomifumi Godai, the godfather of the H-2, regaling Japan for its prowess in building better than the gaijin. The NYT article I linked to, unlike the screed put out these days, is actually worth reading! Godai’s pride in the H-2 was soon deflated though and his triumphalist series of articles in NASDA today in the 1990s has now disappeared from web and written out of history. But I remember.

It’s worth reminding people, I feel, that with a little bit more money, Japan would have had its own automated shuttle by now. It’s not doing too badly as it is with Kounotori, which is itself a technical triumph and a bargain- costing only $200 million or so to develop (officially).

But, literally, Japan lost Hope.  In caffeinated and wilder-eyed moments I often wonder how much pressure was put on Japan to sacrifice its space program on the altar of fiscal restraint when other much more wasteful spending programs survived. (I often marvel at how quickly SmartSat disappeared too…did someone in the U.S. embassy  gently whisper sweet somethings  in NICT’s ear so as not to show up the U.S. or frighten the Chinese too much?)

There is no question that the Epsilon is a highly aggressive dual-use ICBM program that actually will fulfill three functions;

a) It’s stated purpose- to provide a low-cost, highly flexible alternative to the H-2A/B for Japan’s microsatellite and science community and ASNARO/ ODA-programs

b) A fast-flexible mobile launcher for military micro/nano/pico satellites at times of increased tension or the buildup or waging of war. In fact the SPRINT series in itself does a nice job building up a standard bus system for modular payloads, which will make them highly versatile for applications starting with medium resolution/ tactical spy satellites aka ASNARO. The SPRINT-A flight is in fact a test launch for upcoming deals with Vietnam and Cambodia to supply satellites as ODA (and to keep them out of China’s orbit- again literally!)

c) A family of boosters for said purposes (a) and (b) and also as an ICBM design for if/when Japan decide to weaponsize its supergrade / plutonium stocks.

I have also put the first article I published on the Epsilon, which was originally called the ASR here, FYI:

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Interview with former Chief Cabinet Secretary Takeo Kawamura

Filed Under: In Defense of Japan, Japan space development, Japan space militarization, 未分類 by admin — コメントする
2011年4月19日

This was one of the more important interviews I had back in the day when I was working on getting Stanford University to try to understand the scale of the changes that were occurring in Japan’s strategic thinking in terms of beginning to show deployment of Japan’s dual-use technologies- when some of the recessed hedge thinking started edging toward…

…let’s put it a different way:- and the dual-use aspect of Japan’s space development strategy started becoming the subject of polite conversation.

Basically the story is that I’d realized it had been on the cards ever since the 1998 “Taepodon flyover,” which Saadia and I call the Taepondon Trigger, when Melco handed me the pre-prepared plans for what were going to become the IGS. Funny, that, wasn’t it?

However, when I pitched to Saadia back in 2003 back in the Okura Hotel’s breakfast bar that Japan was going to militarize its space development, there was concern from her that I was going to go too far too quickly. And our first version of the book in 2005 that predicted what was going to happen (I was about 95% right, if you could put a figure on it, as it turned out) was dismissed out of hand first time round because it didn’t fit the frame. But all I was doing was applying Dick Samuel’s scholarship from beyond the aerospace sector to the space…

First meeting Takeo Kawamura in 2006 was a vital step in plugging into the fundamental changes occurring with the Kawamura Initiative (IDOJ, pp.38) that we documented in In Defense of Japan. Basically I’d gotten a heads up from Kazuto Suzuki, who played a vital role in promoting and drafting one of the key strategic changes in Japan’s normalization, the Basic Law.

Takeo Kawamura is one of those great people that you get to meet in your life who  care about what it means and will take the extra step to put it out. I was there to put the message out to an international audience that someone cared, and he did, and I did, and that was enough. It was a sort of Homer Simpson d’oh moment that started it all.

I remember back in Feb 2004 during one of my many private audiences with Mazakasu Iguchi when he’d told me…you know, they thought they’d checked everything, right down to the last bolt…they’d cleaned out MHI at Nagoya and they were now pristine clean and ready…but Nissan, they’d forgot Nissan. The bloody solid boosters. I can still remember Iguchi Sensei thumping his desk in exasperation.

It was about the same time that Takeo Kawamura, then MEXT Minister, realized he’d been dealt a dud hand. SAC was supposed to be in control of MEXT, or was it CSTP in control of everything? Nobody  really knew. That was the point.  Everybody got blamed, but nobody took the rap. Kawamura realized he was just a figurehead, and that space development was on bureaucratic autopilot. Whatever you felt about Ryutaro Hashimoto at the time, he did really have some sort of guts to try to change things. So Takeo Kawamura stepped up to the plate. The rest is, as you might say, recent history ;-) .

(Scholars have tried to push the idea of the executive taking over from the Kanryo, not realizing that that if they’d seen Yes Prime Minister, they’d know that Sir Humphrey is a two-decade pushover. I’m only half joking!)

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Japan Tests REBR

Filed Under: In Defense of Japan, Japan space militarization, Reentry, reentry technology, 未分類 by admin — コメントする
2011年4月3日

With the Epsilon confirmed for development, Japan’s latest reentry technology experiment appears to have been conducted successfully with the test of  the U.S. Department of Defense’s Re-entry Breakup Recorder (REBR) on Kounotori 2 on March 31.

The DOD's REBR

The DOD's REBR

REBR recorded temperature, acceleration, rotational rate and other data during the  controlled reentry and successfully phoned home that data prior to final impact and was still  transmitting while floating in the ocean. REBR was made possible by using miniature sensors and cell phone technology, built as basically a satellite phone with a heat shield.

REBR’s stated purpose is to collect data during atmospheric reentries of space hardware in order to help understand breakup and increase the safety of such reentries. Of course this data is valuable for a number of dual-use reasons. Let’s not talking about improving the accuracy of warheads for now, however.

The robotic HTV-2 (Kountori-2) is a highly-advanced automatic cargo carrier for the ISS

The REBR project is supported by the U.S. Air Force, NASA, and the Boeing Company. The first flight test of the small, autonomous device was coordinated by the Department of Defense’s Space Test Program which includes highly aggressive military space programs including the Orbital Express program which is dual-use ASAT technology demonstrator, on top of a variety of military microsatellites tested and under development by the STP.

In Japan’s case, REBR  began collecting data,  ultimately detaching from the disintegrating spacecraft and continuing in freefall from approximately 60,000 feet from the ocean. REBR effectively made a “phone call” over about five minutes before landing in the Pacific Ocean.

A second test will be REBR’s reentry aboard the European Autonomous Transfer Vehicle 2, called Johannes Kepler, in early June.

As we pointed out in In Defense of Japan, Japan has made sure to accumulate reentry targeting technology through Hyflex, Express, USERS, and so on as part of its securing the technology option to develop a counterforce strategy based on Epsilon and the ability to develop highly compact, boosted fission warheads based on the country’s supply of supergrade.

Now the gloves appear to be off with JAXA working directly with the DOD.

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Japan Maps Pathway to H-X Part I

Filed Under: Epsilon, H-2A, H-2B, H-X, In Defense of Japan, M-V, Technonationalism by admin — コメントする
2011年3月31日

….First steps halted by lack of budget…

I get sort of incredulous when folks talk about the various failures of Japan’s space development programs to do this and that. The only things Japan’s space development program is guilty of is being inexpensive and successful. Oh No? Shucks. How much did Kounotori cost to develop then, and the H-2B? Burning up time indeed.

Following the Asahi’s punt at describing JAXA’s H-3 rocket earlier this year, I decided to take look at Japan’s steps toward human spaceflight via upgrading the H-2 family. After talking to MHI back in 2005, I didn’t expect too many changes, with the primary new technology driver for the H-3 being the LE-X engine.

Five years later, and things seem to be on the same course, although JAXA is now openly offering its development schedules and plans to those interested and it makes for a great look into the future.

First of all, the fact that JAXA will be embarking on a “Phase I” upgrade this April spurred me to file an article for Space News, which is now below. Initially I’d like to make comments on the missing elements of this story and background that can’t be crammed in a 550-750 word article, and then I’ll move on to future plans in more detail in Part II, which will also show just how advanced thinking is on polishing the space silverware in Japan.

First of all, here is the story, then some follow-up below:

Comments:
Ever since I first started writing on the H-II, with a story on Nissan importing CFRP technology for the  H-2A’s initial SRB-As, what, back in 1997 as I remember, we have been “waiting” for the H-IIA  to fulfill its stated public goal of being “commercially” successful.

Commercially successful. Hehe. What the hell is that supposed to mean? How much taxpayers money has been sunk into the military by Japan’s competitors to produce hardware. Where is the dividing line?

Well I’ve been attacked by some very unpleasant people about my idea that it doesn’t really, really matter if the H-2A is commercially successful or not, because the money will always be found to keep on developing Japan’s liquid (and LNG and solid) propulsion and system’s integration technology, whether the rocket makes a profit in the commercial marketplace or not.

There are several parts to this argument: but my point is that that fundamentally, money will always be found because that’s been essential part of Japan’s technonationalist industrial policy since the Meij Ishin period (see Rich Nation, Strong Army, which forms an essential plank for the arguments in In Defense of Japan).

Beyond the spin-on, spin-off paradigm, and MHI’s long-standing interest in microsatellites, MHI is very keen to get the story about about these upgrades because they show the strong commitment to improving this wonderful system, showcase MHI’s and Japan’s technologies, and well, if the yen were even 120 to the dollar, how cheap would the H-2A be compared to the Atlas anyway?

That’s wishful thinking, but it is a fact that Tanegashima’s issues don’t begin and end with ralicraltant fishing unions who need regular dollops of fiscal and pools of alcoholic lubrication to open up the launch windows.

Locals can be lubed, but the physics of getting a payload into orbit from Southern Japan don’t change no matter how much awamori is consumed. Firstly, the rocket has to take a bit of a long and winding ascent to avoid you name it South East Asian nations who don’t appreciate tons of flaming toxic space debris landing on them should the worst happen. Then, and here’s the spin, Tanegashima is quite a way off the equator meaning the H-2A is loosing out on arrival as well. So the top line is the bottom line and MHI are very keen to point out that the long-cruise capability saves (potential) customers money.

The second point I would like to make is that the upgrade I wrote about is actually a stripped down version. The Epsilon has also been hit. Despite both LVs being high priority, penny pinching means that the improvements to the H-2A and the Epsilon are actually strung out to a different timetable and diluted implementation compared to what even was the consensus for the development pathways as late as last September.

But that is for Part II

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Moving Beyond A Zero-Sum Military Space Game

Filed Under: ASNARO, Epsilon, IGS, In Defense of Japan, Japan ASAT, Japan BMD, Japan Spysats, Japan space development, Japan space militarization, M-V, Michibiki, 未分類 by admin — コメントする
2011年2月14日

I  just filed a Military Space Special for Space News last week and am giving an update here. What I have done is to copy an early version of the story below (which has a few more details than the SN version) and some comments and background.

Basically, I recently conducted a sit-down with three director-level MoD personnel who did a good job of convincing me that the MoD is very interested in military space development but feels its hands are tied  as long as it continues to face a zero-sum budget game. I stress that this was not said to me directly by the MoD who stressed that the MoD’s budget has held up despite huge pressures on the DPJ to cut due to fiscal pressures.

After talking to industry, however, there is very deep dissatisfaction with the slow pace of movement. Nobody is saying that the DPJ has reneged on the commitments made by the Basic Space Law, but it does appear that military space is drifting in neutral until budget is found. Nobody is being blamed. However, it is clear that the leadership, clear command and budget lines that were supposed to have been introduced by now, are absent.

Until the SHSP or the new Space Agency materializes and budget according to the 「ニーズに対応した５年間の衛星等の開発利用計画（１０年程度を視野（案)」as promoted by the Basic Space Law, no specific budget lines can be drawn up for the MoD, or by the MoD, and this seems to be the single biggest factor stopping more concrete progress.

1. Japan is forging ahead with IGS

In an interview with the CSIC, the one sure bet is that Japan will continue plowing money into  IGS. It’s a bit of a Melco money pit, this one, by very efficient Japanese standards, and the system has been plagued by troubles. The first generation optical satellites that have not been performing to spec- let’s hope they could at least resolve buildings, and the radar satellites have been winking off with that old bane of Melco satellites- electrical problems. (Please bear in mind, thought, that compared to spiraling procurement costs of many U.S. military procurement programs, the IGS emerges as freshly laundered as a blouse in a soap suds TV commercial!)

Anyway, hopefully these issues can be ironed out. The new generation of optical satellites should function at 60cm resolution and the new test optical satellite going up next year should be another big leap forward, given that GeoEye-2,  has a planned resolution of 25 cm  (9.8 in) it would be surprising if NEC and Goodrich couldn’t get at least half way to that. Afterall, ASNARO is looking at 50 cm or so. Given that NEC’s Daichi/ALOS satellite is the basis for the optical system for IGS, and NEC is integrating ASNARO, you can draw your own conclusions about the clarity of IGS’s future vision.

Here is the opening of the story:

Japan’s reconnaissance program continues to burgeon while military space program faces a series of difficult choices, according to a series of interviews with officials in the Prime Ministers Cabinet Office and Ministry of Defense (MOD).

Japan’s Information Gathering Satellite program, known as IGS, will see the launch launching of 10 satellites by 2018, including an extra radar satellite, an official at the Cabinet Satellite Intelligence Center (CSIC) said February 7.

One optical and one radar satellite will be launched fiscal 2011 and a radar satellite and a technology test satellite for future higher-capability optical satellites in fiscal 2012; fiscal 2014 will see the launch of a further optical satellite and an “extra” radar satellite. A further optical and radar satellite will be launched in fiscal 2016, and the CSIC is now planning to request the launch of a radar satellite in 2017, “assuming we get the budget to do so,” the official said. Japan’s fiscal year runs April through March.

IGS is designed to function as a fleet of two radar and two optical satellites, but the November 2003 destruction of an H-2A rocket and IGS-2A and 2B and the early failures of two radar satellites (IGS-1B) in  March 2007  and IGS-4A in August 2010 have left fleet with only two operational satellites.

As a hedge against future service interruption, Japan decided in October to launch an extra radar satellite and boost CISC’s budget to cover the satellite’s development costs, the official said.

“Yes, we have enough budget to include the extra satellite, although at the moment the plan is continue to maintain a basic four satellite system for the foreseeable future,” the official said.

2. MoD is Pushing Out Development Budgets for Military Space Programs Until 2015 or So

Here is part 2 of the original story:

Japan’s Ministry of Defense, meanwhile, is taking a cautious approach to space acquisition, weighing its needs against what it can afford, according to officials who spoke to Space News on condition of anonymity.

The Ministry of Defense was formally barred from building space systems until 2008 when Japan’s Basic Space Law overrode a 1969 resolution committing Japan to use space exclusively for peaceful purposes.

In addition to making space programs fair game for the Ministry of Defense, the Basic Space Law called for restructuring control of Japan’s space-development budgets and programs away from competing ministries and into a single cabinet-level agency. The 2008 law also called for Japan to double its space spending between 2010 and 2020 and to pursue programs that contribute to its national security.

In response to this direction, the Ministry of Defense in 2009 released a report detailing a long list of space programs it might be interested in developing.

Commentary: According to the MoD’s Basic Guidelines for Space Development and Use of Space of January 15, 2009 by the Committee on Promotion of Space Development and Use, Ministry of Defense of Japan the MoD would look into just about everything except throwing Auntie Maud’s old boot stuffed with a bag o’nails up in orbit, including- more and better spy satellites, space-based early warning for BMD, a dedicated communications satellite, a SIGINT satellite (no doubt using ETS-8), Space Situational Awareness capabilities (seat belts and rear view mirrors?), microsatellites (ahem) satellite protection (wow- defensive counterspace already!) a dedicated LV (Epsilon, or I’ll eat my hat) and QZSS for, well, I’ll bet you can hazard a very, very accurate guess….

Kiku-8: Listening in on the Neighbors Soon? Perhaps not!

However, the Japan’s latest National Defense Program Guidelines – a planning document produced every five years — is much less specific. The document, approved by the Security Council in December, focuses on the ministry’s role in developing military space programs aimed at bolstering the nation’s space-based surveillance and reconnaissance capabilities.

For now, officials said, the Ministry of Defense is researching when and if to develop a series of capabilities, including its own space-based early warning system, a signals intelligence satellite, a communications satellite, reconnaissance satellites and experimental microsatellites. But with so many decisions to be thought through, these officials said, the ministry will hold off on starting any development programs until 2016, when the next five-year Defense Program Guidelines is due.

For example, the Ministry of Defense is questioning whether it can afford and really needs a space-based infrared missile warning satellite for its fleet of Aegis cruisers and Patriot missile batteries, according to one official.

“When we consider a cost-benefit analysis [of a space-based early warning system] we should consider the U.S.-Japan relationship,” the official said Feb. 8. “We get enough data from the U.S., so we should find out exactly what new capabilities we could get from our own satellite. If we can get appreciable benefit and if we think it is affordable, then we can consider development.”

Part of the issue for the defense ministry’s conservatism is concern about future budgets, said Satoshi Tsuzukibashi, director of the Office of Defense Production at the Japan Business Federation.

Thirty months after enactment of the Basic Space Law, Japan has yet to form a new agency to coordinate national space programs and the sought after budget increased have yet to materialize. “The most difficult problem is budget. If there is a specific budget provided for the [Ministry of Defense], the [ministry] will move ahead and promote its space programs without troubling its commitments to land, air and marine forces,” Tsuzukibashi said Feb. 9.

Commentary: MoD is playing a waiting game: here are the major points I gleaned that are publishable

Even Stage I (2013-17) Epsilon will be the Best Solid Rocket in History

1. Communications: Current transponders on Superbirds, B2, D and C  are facing end-of life issues as satellites are retiring. Building a dedicated communications satellite is still under cost-benefit analysis

2. Sigint: This really got the MoD cautious. I will leave you to draw your own conclusions. However, preliminary studies are looking into the feasibility and need for this and the possibility of Japan using a satellite is under study and not ruled out.

3. ASNARO: MoD will consider it IF it works. That’s as far as they would go. ASNARO seems sure to get money for ODA for at least Vietnam and maybe Cambodia. I’m still optimistic that this dual use technology will prove alluring for MoD. At least its a hedge.

4. No surprise here: MoD likes Epsilon. And who couldn’t. It’s great! Even Stage I (2013 Phase 1) Epsilon will be the best solid rocket ever made and for only $200 million. Prof. Yasuhiro Morita is such a genius! Just wait till Phase II is out.

5. SM3 Block IIA is on target and on course, and I believe it’s Japan’s involvement that is helping this to happen. It seems to me to be no accident that the the most successful element in BMD is the part where Japanese companies are supplying the cutting edge components. Bloody hell, the version out now can knock out satellites, functioning as a direct ascent ASAT, just with a software shuffle. I can’t imagine how scared Japan’s neighbors are when they realize just how far they are behind!

6. MoD continues to study microsatellites, what kind of satellites and their potential applications, and that is all that it will say right now. On the other hand the sterling work being up and down Japan in UNISEC and related laboratories, and the plethora of dual use technologies being developed, as well as the guaranteed budget  for Japan’s micro/nano/picosatellite development programs means that the MoD is sitting on a goldmine of talent and experience here. Purely accidentally, of course.

It’s time for the SHSP to show us the money ;-)

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Text of Review of In Defense of Japan by Foreign Affairs

Filed Under: Academic / Scholastic Journal Reviews, In Defense of Japan, Japan space development, Japan space militarization, Japan space program, Reviews by admin — コメントする
2011年1月12日

It’s nice that Andrew J. Nathan Class of 1919 Professor Columbia University Political Science took the time to review In Defense of Japan for the January/February 2011 edition of Foreign Affairs and even nicer when he’s got a lot of time for the book too.

We would like to say a very big thank you to Prof. Nathan.

Here is the full review:

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In Defense of Japan Reviewed in Foreign Affairs

Filed Under: Foreign Affairs, In Defense of Japan, Japan space development, Japan space militarization, Japan space program, 未分類 by admin — コメントする
2011年1月6日

Foreign Affairs has just put in a brief review of In Defense of Japan (linked to Amazon, rather than Stanford University Press, for change!) so we are happy to see us getting noticed by the people that count.

The book was touch and go for a while because when I first proposed it in 2003, the media orthodoxy (which I had been more than a little responsible for with articles such as The Decline of Japan’s Space Program on Space.com, for example, back in 2000). Around 2005 when the Kawamura Initiative was being formulated, we managed to convince people what was happening and by the time the Basic Law was passed in 2008, the book was time perfectly. As the Japanese goes: 縁がある！

Fortunately we were able to get reviews from Andrew L. Oros, Associate Professor of Political Science and International Studies, Washington College, and support from Dick Samuels at MIT and Kenneth Pyle and now that the militarization of Japan space is proceeding along the lines we suggested, we hope the rest of the world will start understanding Japan the way China views the country, rather than through the mirror of western media.

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SNS Features Japan’s Strategic Space Development

Filed Under: IGS, In Defense of Japan, Japan ASAT, Japan BMD, Japan Nuclear Program, Japan space development, Japan space militarization, Japan space program, Orihime and Hikoboshi, SNS by admin — コメントする
2010年12月11日

Here is a special edition of SNS updating my original article of 2006 predicting what was going to happen in Japan’s space development. Four years later, I turned out to be spot on. Strategic News Service provides real information based on original reporting by experts to try to bridge the chasm opening up between the familiar media tropes and cliches of the mass media and what’s actually going on. Almost none of the information in this newsletter is from “news” conferences.

The interesting thing about the introduction to my piece is the great anxiety raised by the MOD over China’s blue water fleet and aircraft carrier. Japan is planning its own SLBM program at some point if it decides to build a strategic deterrent. With news of 800 Chinese marines at one point preparing to land on the Senkakus (only warned off at the last moment by a very angry Hillary Clinton) hopefully Japan will realize the only way to stand up to a bully is to show you that you have your own knife at the ready to his club.

—-

Publisher’s Note: For several years now, we have been watching, predicting, and documenting the basic military profiles of China and Japan, but only as they have affected international trade and markets. The latest aspect of this would be the firing of a submarine-based intercontinental missile off the coast of Los Angeles on November 5th, most likely by a Chinese submarine – an event the Pentagon continues to deny publicly.

As we’ve seen the result of China’s sustained 19%+ compound annual growth rate in military spending, it has been obvious that her neighbors in the ASEAN world have become increasingly uncomfortable. The advent of a “blue water navy,” built around a new air-carrier capacity, coming soon, will only add to this unease.

At the same time, we continue to witness China’s client state, North Korea, acting with increasing belligerence and apparent lack of care. One is reminded of a small-minded bully trying to cause trouble in the schoolyard, and then running back under the protection of some larger kid as soon as things get hot.

The peace requirements of the Japanese constitution have long been a matter of debate and contention inside Japan, and the legal modifications mentioned in today’s issue by author Paul Kallender-Umezu appear to have opened the door to a conversion of defensive hardware, software, and budget into the offensive category.

As any modern military expert will tell you, space represents the high ground in coming global conflict. As you are about to discover, the Japanese have used a large number of peaceful programs, in concert, to allow a flip-the-switch space offensive capability beyond almost anyone’s current estimation.

I have no doubt that all of our members will be surprised and awakened to a new military space power they previously had underestimated. I think this issue of the SNS Asia Letter lives up to a well-earned reputation for clearly describing a major strategic issue that other media have yet to touch. If you want to understand Japan’s response to China’s military buildup, this letter provides an excellent place to start. And given the positioning of these second- and third-largest global economies, and their recent and growing skirmishes, this understanding should be required of all people doing business in Asia.

Americans didn’t take much notice when North Korea fired missiles over the country a few years ago – but the Japanese did. The results follow. – mra.

___

» Japan’s Strategic Space Development: Onward and Upward!

By Paul Kallender-Umezu [Tokyo]

Japan is rolling up its sleeves and getting to work on beefing up its military space technologies, whether it looks like it or not.

When explaining Japan’s military space program to otherwise intelligent people whose main source of information may be only reports from the mass media, I often get blank stares. “Japan? Does Japan even have a space program?” Some might remember astronaut Naoko Yamazaki performing the important scientific task of making sushi in a kimono on the International Space Station; others might remember an asteroid mission that recently brought some cosmic dust back to Earth. But overall, when people think of Asia and space, they probably think of China’s space program, because that’s where the majority of media attention is.

The recent Hayabusa[1] (“Falcon”) mission is a case in point. In a seven-year journey, Hayabusa flew over 2 billion kilometers on a revolutionary new ion-engine propulsion system, overcoming technical malfunctions to collect samples from an asteroid and bring them back to Earth. The mission, which contained many firsts, was spearheaded by half a dozen eggheads on a couple of hundred million bucks (that’s trim and tremendous in the space world). But you wouldn’t know much about that if you’d read the mainstream press, with coverage which focused more on problems and caveats rather than  successes.

So when I start talking about Japan’s military space programs, I often use the metaphor of a high-quality Japanese hocho – a type of kitchen knife – to describe what’s up with this strategic national technology program. As the NRA is fond of reminding people, it’s not the gun that kills, it’s the person pulling the trigger. The hocho may not be official issue in the SAS or Delta force, but this 10-inch-plus, finely crafted, durable and razor-sharp sushi-slasher is the weapon of choice for many a Japanese convenience-store robber. The shape and label point to a different application, but the sharp end still does the business. Similarly, Japan’s space program was explicitly meant for peaceful purposes right up to 2008.

Actually, Japan is a military space power with a huge toolkit of up-to-date and serviceable technologies that will keep it in the leading pack of space-faring nations, if and when it chooses to go nuclear, or if and when an orbital arms race kicks in. Sound outlandish? My book In Defense of Japan: From the Market to the Military in Space Policy (Stanford University Press, 2010)[2] goes into this exhaustively, but for a digest of some of the main issues, please read on.

Four years ago, in the SNS newsletter, I predicted that the militarization of Japan’s space program would kick into higher gear after 2010, once the nation’s almost childishly sentimental legislative breaks on such activities – a 1969 Diet resolution that limited Japan’s space development to peaceful purposes only – were removed.

This has indeed happened. In May 2008, Japan passed the Basic Space Bill establishing a national Space Headquarters for Space Policy [3](SHSP) in the Prime Minister’s Cabinet office to remove the longstanding ban on Japan’s military use of space assets and to promote Japan’s space industry. Most notably:

  • Article 2 “provides that space development and use shall be conducted in accordance with international treaties and other international commitments including the Outer Space Treaty, and pursuant to the spirit of the peaceful principle of the Constitution of Japan”; and
  • Article 14 requires the government to take “necessary measures to promote space development and use” that would promote both national and international security.

….and so on. Please go to the SNS site for the rest.

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More News on Japan’s Strategic Nuclear / Space Hedge

Filed Under: In Defense of Japan, Japan Nuclear Program by admin — コメントする
2010年11月30日

Senior Vice Foreign Minister Takeaki Matsumoto admitted November 29 in not so many words that Japan in the late 60s was considering developing nuclear weapons. The fessup followed an in-house MOFA probe on the recent NHK documentary on a senior MOFA official’s deathbed confessions that Japan conducted under-the-table negotiations with West Germany that the two collaborate on building nukes in the late 1960s. In the event the Germans said no and the Japanese went ahead to build a virtual nuclear weapons and delivery systems program anyway. You know this as Japan’s peaceful nuclear energy program and Japan’s recently for peaceful purposes only space space program. Except it ain’t quite so peaceful these days ;-) .

Each time these revelations roll out, In Defense of Japan just looks more and more prescient.

In connection with this the Mainichi Shimbun has just released news that MOFA wavered over whether Japan should sign the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) in 1970, thereby giving up the right to possess nuclear weapons. In fact, 15 documents reveal more formal data on how close Japan was in 1968-70 to arming itself with nuclear weapons as a response to China’s extraordinarily swift development of deployable thermonuclear weapons.

Two critical issues were 1. Could Japan rely on the U.S. nuclear umbrella and 2. would signing the NPT might impair Japan’s domestic nuclear energy program by making allies loathe to supply Japan with enriched uranium.

Most tellingly documents show that in September 1969 Japan was drawing up guidelines committed to the need to have the capability to convert its nuclear technology into nuclear weapons while promoting the peaceful use of nuclear energy.

The critical points are here:

また、外交政策大綱では「当面核兵器は保有しない政策をとるが、核兵器製造の経済的・技術的ポテンシャルは常に保持するとともにこれに対する掣肘（せいちゅう）（制約）をうけないよう配慮する」（６９年９月）と核兵器製造の潜在力保持の必要性を指摘。原子力の平和利用を進めながらも核兵器に転用可能な選択肢を残すよう求める意見が記されている」

“While Japan is adopting a policy of not possessing nuclear weapons for now, it should possess the economic and technological potential to produce nuclear weapons and there should be no limits to such potential,” the guidelines state.”

This confirms why Japan’s pluthermal program is designed, accidentally on purpose to produce plenty of supergrade plutonium in order to produce highly efficient nuclear weapons anyway.

This is highly significant because it confirms the premise of In Defense of Japan that Japan did not actually develop a nuclear deterrent, it did decide to develop and maintain all the technologies it needed to make sure that in an emergency Japan could rapidly go nuclear.

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Proof for “National Security” Ahoy!

Filed Under: In Defense of Japan, Japan space development, Japan space militarization by admin — コメントする
2010年11月24日

Just received the proofs for  “National Security in Japan’s Space Policy” from Purnendra Jain at the  Centre for Asian Studies at The University of Adelaide. We are “doing” Chapter 6 for his book “Japan: A Declining Giant?” (Routledge, 2010).

Purnendra Jain is a recognized Asia expert- even the media knows-  and it’s good to see our work getting attention from people that count.

It’s only 10 pages but we still managed to rack up 48 footnotes.  It’s a bit better than some of the biased and ignorant screed I’ve seen in dirty digger rags of late.

Looks like we are behind the scheduled publishing date of December, but, hey, what the heck.

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Personal interview with Seiji Maehara, and "spare IGS"

Filed Under: IGS, In Defense of Japan, Seiji Maehara by admin — コメントする
2010年10月19日

Space News have just published a recent interview I had with Seiji Maehara, former State Minister for Space Development and now Foreign Minister.

It was pretty interesting in terms of confirming that Maehara is not a dove at all. But for me, what was interesting was what Maehara Daijin left out, namely:

a) There is no fixed deadline on when the Space Activities Act is going to be passed. The deadline came and went for this a few months ago. Commitments to standardize and have a legal basis for all sorts of issues have been locked since spring spring 2009. This is a critical point and I’ll be writing about this later.

b) Early Warning: EW is supposed to be a priority for Japan, and several sources have stated this repeatedly. However it also appears that the MOD is becoming increasingly alarmed by the size of China’s blue water fleet. The major priority seems to be more money for the navy. So it appears a more traditional wing and big bucks for contractors in the form of MSDF spending has won out (albeit temporarily) in the MOD.

c) What is going to happen to the doubling of the space budget over the next ten years that was de facto promised by Takeo Kawamura, and is the financial backbone of Japan’s ten-year timetable for satellite launches? Again, more on this later.

More Spy Bird Cash for Melco


Separately, there was confirmation that some cash has been found to launch a “spare” Radar IGS to try to offset any more failures. Those of you who watch J-space will know that 2 of Melco’s radar birds, IGS 1A and 4B have both failed before their nominal 5-year on-orbit lifespan.

IGS 1A failed in March 2007, a nearly respectable 4 years into its 5-year mission, the cause of which was an “electrical failure.” IGS 4B, with an improved SAR with about 1-meter all-weather resolution, conked out this spring, half-way through it’s mission, also due to an undisclosed electrical failure. Officially the CSIC is investigating the cause to see if the electrical failures are related.

It should be noted that I have reliable sources stating that there were other problems with IGS 1A. It’s quite well known that it wasn’t working properly.

Of course, it’s pure speculation that these failures could also be related to the electrical failures that have visited other Melco satellites, namely Adeos-2 (Midori-2) in October 2003 possibly caused by short in the cable bundles supplying electricity from the solar panel to the bus.

The CSIC has officially denied that the “spare IGS” will be launched in FY2014 and that it will cost 30 billion yen about “half” the cost of a “standard” IGS.

Anyway, here is the rest in the Space News format:

 Japan’s reconnaissance satellite program is designed to function as a fleet of two radar and two optical satellites enabling reasonably close coverage of East Asia in general and North Korea in particular. The first generation radar satellites are able to resolve images through cloud with a resolution of 1-3 meters, while the first generation optical satellites are designed to resolve objects of 1 meter.

The latest failure means that the fleet will be without radar coverage until the launch of the next radar reconnaissance satellite in fiscal 2011.

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First Royalties Notice from Stanford University Press!

Filed Under: ETS-VII, Hyflex, In Defense of Japan, Michibiki, Orihime and Hikoboshi by admin — コメントする
2010年9月22日
Well its nice to see the book on sale and the nice comments I have gotten from friends and family. On the other hand it was nice to get a sales report and royalty notice from SUP.

Several media have noted interest in the book and it’s going to be reviewed by one major media organization (thanks Dave!) While a little bit of media coverage is great, this was not our target audience. Basically the way to change perceptions is to change the input, so this means academia in the U.S. So gradually I hope our messages will filter down that far from being some sort of parochial science and technology boondoggle or vanity project to show Japan as a major economic and technological power, (which of course it is all of that as well) Japan’s space development program is a strategic hedge and recessed deterrent that has been exquisitely successful in making sure that Japan is up to speed on each major space technology development paradigm shift.

Many development programs are framed in contexts that mask their deeper roles through their sheer obviousness. For example, ORS in Japan is called SOD.

Japan developed an automatic, hypersonic space plane more than 15 years ago and successfully tested it. Unlike the U.S. This sort of technology is busily being tested by DARPA, in the shape of the HTV-2. A bomber is currently a high priority in strategic technologies the Pentagon wants to develop. But the event in Japan was largely masked by the fact that it was supposed to be a technology demonstrator for Japan’s ill-named space shuttle program. I say, well, just as much as Japan didn’t get a space shuttle, it did get its core data and demonstrate key technologies. Oh, you may have forgotten that Hyflex was launched on top of a “rocket” which U.S. planners have basically called a dead ringer for an ICBM. What other country could demonstrate ASAT technologies in terms of star struck lovers or warhead reentry technologies are presented as a wok?

So indeed we turn to last week’s launch of Michibiki, basically a Melco /CRL sponsored program that I have been monitoring for 15 years, about the time when the old STA was openly calling for Japan to have its own GPS system. There is almost no need for Japan to spend $2-3 billion on developing a fleet of GPS-augment systems. Just about everybody knows where everything is in Japan anyway in terms of structures, and highly accurate handheld positioning can be gotten for nothing as a ubiquitous service on keitai. So what pray, is the need for Japan to have 1-meter accuracy (the original proposals were for cm-level accuracy)?

What indeed, eh….

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New Growth Strategy? We’ll See…. PART I

Filed Under: ASNARO, In Defense of Japan, Japan space development, Japan space militarization, Japan space program by admin — コメントする
2010年5月31日
…a case of growing, growing…gone.
On May 25, the SHSP (Strategic Headquarters for Space Policy) released its 12-page report “Promotion Strategy for Space Policy for National Growth: Space Sector Focus,” (my translation
of（案）宇宙分野における重点施策について ～ 我が国の成長をもたらす戦略的宇宙政策の推進 ～) to the almost complete silence of the media, except for a hilariously inaccurate Gomiuri Shimbun article on the subject.

In the plan, the SHSP writes that Japan should double the scale of the nation’s space industry from the SHSP’s current estimate of 7 trillion yen accumulated value to a 14-15 trillion yen (US$164.4 billion) value in the next 10 years.

If this sounds rather ambitious, it is. What gives the report a patina of legitimacy is that the SHSP is nominally chaired by Minister Yukio Hatoyama. Adding to the report’s superficial credibility is the fact that it repeats roughly 90% of the June 2008 Fundamental Space Law in calling for moves to stimulate both domestic demand and promote international cooperation and overseas commercial sales and boost the participation of the private sector.

In slightly more detail: The report recommends that Japan focus budget on developing standardized technology to build a fleet of high-performance and low cost small Earth observation, disaster monitoring and communication satellites for domestic use and that Overseas Development Assistance and other government foreign aid funding mechanisms be used to sell these systems and related services to developing countries.

Funds should also be invested in the development of a small rocket and for small and medium-sized enterprises to boost their participation in the space industry to accelerate development of low-cost components and systems.

In other words, the GOJ, according to the “Promotion Strategy” is going to copy Chinese diplomacy and bribe governments of developing countries into buying Japanese, or at least set up some quid pro quos and who knows what other blandishments for the local authorities to grease the purchases of NEC Asnaro/Sasuke satellites and the ASR/Epsilon.

I’ve heard that SJAC and Keidanren have been dutifully schlepping all around South East Asia trying to get people interested in the package. Much as they did in the late 1990s trying to get people interested in NEC’s small bus satellite, without success.

One of the major themes of In Defense of Japan is that the failure to commercialize Japan’s space technology is one of the major reasons why Japan is militarizing space. What we don’t say is the the flip side of this is that, ho-hum, tsk, drat, darn…but, gosh!, Japan’s commercial space business has always been fatally crippled by a lack of funding at crucial stages.

It’s almost as if the GOJ wanted to carefully nurture the key technologies for space development, which are all dual-use and strategic, but wanted to avoid trade and diplomatic conflicts with the U.S. by actually making inroads into the international commercial market, which is dominated by U.S. weapons makers, who also own huge swathes of the U.S. media and the Congress and Senate.

So, the government pays for Japanese companies to develop top-class strategic technologies, then suddenly turns off the investment spigot just at the point when cash was needed to invest to make the technologies commercially competitive.

In NEC’s case, the small bus turned out to be Asnaro. I heard that NEC hasn’t had much success in convincing SE Asian nations that they should buy into an 8-satellite constellation of high resolution “disaster monitoring” satellites. Ho-hum, if they don’t, then, well, what to do. It just so happens that plans already exist for just such a constellation under the Fundamental Space Law, which is to be a military spy satellite network. Mmm, sounds a little bit like “From the Market to the Military in Japanese Space Policy” to me folks. Didn’t I read that somewhere before?

….but what about the context of this report?

The report is part of the “New Growth Strategy” announced by the Democratic Party of Japan in December 2009. The said “strategy” aims to grow the nation’s economy an average 3% each year through 2020 by boosting demand and creating 4.76 million new jobs. The finalized version of the national strategy, of which report is part, is due to be completed by the end of June.

I’m not exactly the first to be skeptical about the New Growth Strategy, and I won’t be the last. The DPJ’s desultory dance to disaster over the last few weeks inspires no confidence that the New Growth Strategy is not worth the paper it will be written on.
But let’s turn to the case for space…

So hold on here….12 pages? Isn’t that a little lean for a major strategic area covering a ten-year time span that involves, by my rule of thumb, doubling both the official Space Activities Budget and all the other money that’s invested via different budget lines that you haven’t heard about? You know, if I was going to ask for $40 or $50 billion dollars from the taxpayers, I would at least try to put together some detailed spen…I mean investment plans….

…or maybe not. Didn’t President Obama give Wall Street cart blanche a little way back with a two-page fax basically saying “fill in the number of billions of taxpayers money you want us to throw in your grubby trough and return….” ?

The fact is that the “Promotion Strategy” actually contains NO detailed budget requests, no annual development planning, no step-by-step or staged implementation summary AT ALL. So given the fact that the annual government budget request has to be completed and shoved off to the MOF by the last week of August, isn’t the SHSP cutting things a little fine?

The paltry “Promotion Strategy” put together by the SHSP is, in fact, growing nowhere. Without any detailed budgetary proposals, it’s administratively dead meat. There are no teeth in the cogs- no specific spending proposals in the paper, and no prospect of any emerging, IMO, in the next six weeks. Spinning wheels indeed.

Considering that the SHSP has had SIX Months to draw this up, you might be within your rights to ask, what’s going on?

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The Shape of Things to Come- In Defense of Japan takes SUP Shape

Filed Under: In Defense of Japan, Japan space development, Japan space militarization, Japan space program, 未分類 by admin — コメントする
2010年5月18日

Well here it is folks- In Defense of Japan PR from SUP with a nice blurb by Andrew L. Oros.


“What makes this book so useful and impressive is that it draws together extensive coverage of developments in Japan’s space industry—both from the government and the corporate side—with a broad treatment of government reform and Japan’s evolving security policy. In addition, it provides the most sustained argument I am aware of on the role of corporations in Japan’s security policymaking.”—Andrew L. Oros, Associate Professor of Political Science and International Studies, Washington College

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Last 60 pages of footnotes edited

Filed Under: In Defense of Japan, Japan space development, Japan space militarization, Japan space program, 未分類 by admin — コメントする
2010年5月14日

Well at running up at to 100 footnotes per chapter and what must be 500+ sources, that was was…a slog.

So there you have it; 362 pages, seven chapters, 19 tables, seven years and a tanker of coffee into In Defense of Japan.

In a key interview with Matsui a few weeks ago I got a strong sense of just how revolutionary Maehara is trying to be- he’s attempted to completely short circuit the SHSTP, sidestep the opposition of MEXT and outflank METI in making sure that civilian control is hardwired into what is effectively a re-establishment of the old Space Activities Commission.
We’ll know by August whether he succeeds or not. I’m interviewing him on June 1 to try to get the SP. Too late for the book, though.
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Galleys due in mid-April

Filed Under: In Defense of Japan, Japan space development, Japan space militarization, Japan space program by admin — コメントする
2010年4月1日

Well we did a final gentle rewrite of Chapters 1 and 7 mid-month and I have just heard that the galleys will be out in two weeks (mid-April).

Even now as I am thinking about the book, I am wondering how to refine our arguments more subtly.

The need for the book seems clear and present even within the Space community. I’ve been reading Space Security 2009 recently and am surprised by how much they ignore Japan’s technology, including ETS-7 for proximity maneuvering!

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In Defense of Japan:Final Edits for Chapters 1 and 7 Completed

Filed Under: In Defense of Japan, Japan space development, Japan space militarization, Japan space program, 未分類 by admin — コメントする
2010年3月16日

Finally…home stretch now!

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Copyediting finished

Filed Under: In Defense of Japan, Japan space development, Japan space militarization, 未分類 by admin — コメントする
2010年2月4日

Just got the e-mail from SUP and the ZIP- and so the copy editing at this end begins!

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In Defense of Japan Launches into Production

Filed Under: In Defense of Japan, Japan ASAT, Japan BMD, Japan space development, Japan space militarization, Japan space program by admin — コメントする
2009年12月18日

Hopefully not into the wrong orbit. 

It’s hard to think that it is already a year ago that we had to defend the thesis, and there was a quite an air of unreality about things then. We strongly got the sense that in trying to break the mould, whether it be accepted academic or media conceits, we faced a slog against hostility to someone trying to rock the boat. The other reaction will probably be 黙殺  here in Japan. But hey, who knows!
 The good news from SUP  is that page proofs will be ready in April.  I am really looking forward to the process of turning dead trees into academic literature. I think it’s just like hitting the makiwara!
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