Bit Of A Problem, There

A report recently produced by the Defence Science Advisory Board in Canada, representing researchers and scientists from industry and universities, insists that the country must ensure it has the wherewithal to launch and control its own satellites. Toward which purpose the government should seriously consider handing over some $100-million in funding for a domestic industry to build and launch micro-satellites.

Our very sovereignty is involved, since the micro-satellites would be employed to watch over Canadian territory, inclusive of the Arctic which that same report warns "will become a 'cockpit' of competing international and commercial interests potentially detrimental to Canadian interests". The report calls upon the Defence Department to plan for an expanded national surveillance program.

The bottom line is that technologies and manufacturing capabilities should be Canada-based and funded. The report recommends that "the storage, analysis and distribution of the collected data must be managed and controlled by Canadians", while at the same time inviting foreign participation, under Canadian oversight.

A bit of a problem has surfaced with the publication of the fact that MacDonald Dettwiler, a Canadian company employing three thousand people and considered the backbone of the country's space industry may soon become American property. Federal scientists, as well as some senior MacDonald Dettwiler employees have taken exception to this, insisting that Canada cannot afford to lose control of the company.

In large part because the satellite system that has been most attractive to the purported buyer - Alliant Techsystems, a huge American manufacturer of munitions - has been funded by Canadian taxpayers. The reason the Canadian satellite is of such interest to Alliant, is its future use by the American Military. Were it to be sold, this tax-payer funded satellite so vital to Canadian interests, will be off bounds for Canadian use; solely dedicated to American military use.

It's up to the Government of Canada to come to a conclusion and make a decision. Prime Minister Stephen Harper has spoken often, and emphatically, of the need to protect Canadian sovereignty of the Northwest Passage and the Canadian Arctic. Without the scientific and space satellite capacity to maintain surveillance, we will be incapable of looking to our own interests.

The solution seems simple enough: the government, through Industry Canada, should retain the right to insist that the company and its tax-payer funded satellite remain Canadian.