Return of the cold war?
From Reuters
MOSCOW
(Reuters) - Russia plans to launch a direct competitor to
the U.S. GPS satellite navigation system next year using
military technology developed in the Cold War era, project
leaders said on Monday.
RIGHT:
Engineers work on a Global Navigation Satellite System (GLONASS)
satelite at the NPO PM applied mechanics institute in the
Siberian city of Zheleznogorsk
Drivers, hill walkers,
sailors and army commanders around the world navigate using
satellite technology developed by the U.S. military. Soon
they will be able to switch to a Soviet-designed rival --
GLONASS.
"We are planning to deliver
all sorts of devices already available on GPS," said
Alexander Gurko, the chairman of M2M Telematics which
manufacturers satellite navigation equipment.
GPS stands for Global
Positioning System.
"From next year we will
start producing a consumer product from GLONASS," Gurko
said.
He was speaking at a press
briefing alongside Yuri Nosenko, the deputy head of the
Russian space agency Roskosmos, and other GLONASS project
leaders.
Russia will spend 10
billion rubles ($385 million) this year on developing
GLONASS and firing more satellites into orbit but will also
be looking for private partners, Nosenko said.
The Soviet Union started
work on developing GLONASS, which stands for Global
Navigation Satellite System, in the mid-1970s to give its
army exact bearings around the world.
But the collapse of the
Russian economy in the late 1990s drained funds away from
GLONASS and the satellite system frayed.
Now though, it has become a
favored project of Russian President Vladimir Putin,
whose seven years in power have been marked by resurgent
Russian national pride alongside burgeoning oil revenues.
Since the U.S. military
turned on the GPS system for the consumer market in 1993, it
has become a multi-billion-dollar industry.
"Consumers don't care
whether its GPS, GLONASS or Galileo, they just want a
signal," said Yuri Urchich, head of the Russian institute of
space equipment engineering.
Galileo is the European
Union's satellite navigation system which it says will start
beaming coordinates to customers by 2011.
GLONASS presently covers
Russia and some of the surrounding countries but after the
launch of more satellites this year it will spread its reach
until, by 2009, the world will be fully covered by its 24
Russian satellites, the panel said.
They said the GLONASS
system would mainly be used alongside a GPS to provide a
backup and extra security in case of interference such as
deliberate jamming.
India, which buys military
equipment from Russia, has already signed a deal to jointly
develop the GLONASS system.
"Of course there are
problems," Roskosmos's Nosenko said of developing GLONASS.
"Some of them have a certain history, some of them are new,
but they are all being discussed candidly."
