Galileo System To Include Jamming Capability

CharonX writes "The Galileo project, an european alternative to the US based (and controlled) GPS system, recieved a severe setback today. Under US pressure the EU has agreed to use transmission frequencies that could be easily disturbed or completely jammed by the US military. Since one of Galileo's main advantages had been being independent of goverment or military control, this is a severe setback. Read more here on Heise.de (German - ya might want to use the fish)" Some of the background on this had NATO being unhappy with some of the provisions of it as well - at the least military structure.

Comments

Re:Unbelievable...

[Dun Malg]

down the road the U.S. decides to invade a country which uses the Galileo system for its weaponry, what's to keep the U.S. from jamming and disabling their systems for a clean sweep? In a word, this is unfair.

You're worried about one side having an unfair advantage in war? That's just weird, man. There's no "fairness" in war. The US dictating to the EU how their nav sats should work, that's pretty lame. But the EU will be even more lame if they knuckle under.

Naivity

[Anonymous Coward]

Let us not be naive; there was no other real reason for Galileo than EU money into EU industry, the massively underestimated budgets (30 billion Euros only) is a big hint on that. Just launching the 24 satellites (and that assumes NO losses) would eat up about that amount of money, and then you have ground stations, staff, development and, best of all, maintenence.

The whole thing has been presentet as being too good to be true, and guess what: it should then not be assumed to be true. The US has developend, evolved and maintained the GPS for about 30 years and it has cost a bit more than what EU has guesstimated.

Secondly it was always rather hazy just who should control Galileo and just what limitations should be in place; it was always this unclear "someone" in "the approporitate commission", which should alert anyone who didn't fall out of a tree yesterday of big corruption ahead. Those still in their diapers might be surprised of jamming capability; the rest of us should ne be.

The French have always been a big proponent but then again they have this massive penis envy with respect to the US.

I wonder

[tempestdata]

I wonder if the EU (or any other political/military entity) has the ability to jam US military GPS signals. If that is the case, then this only means that a balance of force exists. ie. I'll jam yours if you jam mine.

However, if the US GPS system is difficult (or impossible?) to jam.. then this is definitely a bad idea. However, the US is only doing what any bully would do. Make sure no one ever gets in a position where it wont have to take his/her/its bullying. (yes mod me down for calling the US a bully.. but frankly when the article says the US 'pressured' the EU into changing the systems specs, it really means 'bullied')

Does anyone know if the US system can be jammed? Is china working on a similar system?

Re:NOT obviously the US

[hummer357]

well, one of the geatest fears of the US is that a lot of oil-producing countries (in south america, africa, ex-soviet union) are/were considering pricing their oil in euros.

the US government wet their pants at that prospect.

Re:Article is flamebait

[sphealey]

If you can selectively degrade it simply by flipping a switch that give the EU a bargaining chip in negotiations with the US (ie, we can make this whole galileo-jamming bit real easy for you if you only change policy xyz).

The funny thing is that in the last three armed conflicts in which the US has taken part (Iraq I, Balkans, Iraq II) the US Space Command has bent on every effort to increase the accuracy of the GPS system. During Iraq II they took the risk of degrading the signal in the rest of the world so they could concentrate more satellites over Iraq, which increased both diversity and accuracy.

Guess that wouldn't always be the case, but it is a bit ironic.

sPh

Re:Policy of hypocrisy

[perly-king-69]

That might sound straight to you, but from over here it seems that you only worry about these problems _after_ someone's shat on your doorstep, so to speak.

Take terrorism. In England people were murdered for decades by IRA terrorists funded in no small part by Americans. Suddenly the Twin Towers are attacked and terrorism is the new world evil and the IRA funding via NorAid is stopped.

Welcome to the wonderful world of hypocrisy.

(more) Comprehesible Explanation

[daniel.probst]

Obviously most advanced tech countries can jam GPS signals. The EU can jam US GPS and and the US can jam Galileo. The point of dissent is the overlap of military frequencies. The EU wants to have their military frequency to partly overlap the US frequency so that the US cannot jam Galileo without degrading their own military signal quality (and vice versa). The US obviously would like to be able to jam Galileo without degrading their own military performance hence the request to move the Galileo military frequency. Note that both India and China are participating financially at Galileo. China would certainly not pay a cent for a system under US control.

Re:Rough Translation by me :)

[ultranova]

Besides which, why can't the EU "just say no"?

Because the USA has a bigger army and is actively trying to stop us from making a common army of our own. I have to admit, I hate the idea of losing our national independence, but if we have to lose it, I'd rather lose it to Bryssel than to Washington... Meaning, I'm starting to wonder if the idea of making EU a real nation actually has merit...