Slashdot Mirror
Arms Regulations Damaging US Space Industry
athe!st writes "International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) are a major headache for companies trying to put their satellites into space, so much so that some companies are using 'ITAR-free' (aka free of US technology) as a selling point. The European Space Agency is trying to reduce its dependence on ITAR components, and the regulations are also threatening the nascent space tourism industry."
Reminds me how the Arms Controls stifled innovation and adoption in the Crypto field back in the 1990s.
Our company used to buy a certain kind of component from the US to put into the products we make. Every single one needed an export licence and an import licence. That is an export licence from the US and an import licence from the UK. If something goes wrong with the component and it needs fixing, we need an export licence from the UK and an import licence to the US to return it for fixing or replacement. Again, that replacement needs another import/export licence. That's just for traffic between the UK and the US. If you're then going to export your product to a third country, you need another export licence and possibly another import licence for that country too. It's so bad we actually hire people just to track what's going on with all of the difference licences!
To cut a long story short, we switched supplier to a European company who make similar components. Now of course we need an import licence for the US if selling to the US, but in general apart from countries like Iran, we can freely export our product without the nightmare stack of licences and yes, it is a factor you talk about when giving sales presentations.
Obvious Troll is obvious
Yeah, that's pretty much the case. I used to work in an aerospace company. We liked to use the adjective ITAR'ded.
Some space technology company lobbying against ITAR as they would've otherwise made more money...
Sorry, I don't buy that.
There's a reason for why technology exports are regulated. If that comes at the cost of a bit less money to the aerospace companies then so be it.
However, if it's really a dumb regulation - then it should be rethought. I don't think this is the case though.
Sigs are for the weak.
Shooting yourself in the foot.
Yeah, and this has been the case since, oh, 2001? Well, at least it seems that's when it started to be enforced more strictly. I've heard rumblings that the administration was going to change it, but who knows how likely that is.
Hmmm... I wonder if we could correlate the US's drop in space proficiency with when ITAR for space components started?
ITARded
Just about anything cool is ITAR restricted.
Certain sling mounts for M4. Like it matters that some foreign country buys a slingmount.
It's not like you can't buy ITAR restricted items, you just can't buy them directly from USA. Has to be bought from shops outside USA.
But ITAR is responsible for keeping a lot more US jobs than it loses thanks to it's prohibitions. In a lot of places it's the only thing keeping engineering and manufacturing from being outsourced.
So you went ahead and fed it anyways.
You might not like the regulations, but remember: It's all fun and games until someone nukes *you* from orbit.
Well if you'd read the article, it's from the Institute of Engineering Technology (what Aerospace company is that?) and the article is about electronics components, computer chips made mostly by US based manufacturers.
Now foreign governments are backing competing companies outside the US to source the same type of components in what is a growing market. The first papagraph talks about how many more sats will be launched in the next decade over the previous one.
Since most of the folks mentioned are launching outside the US anyway, no US aerospace company is losing a dime.
In the article they also say the US based components are better, so we have a market that's growing, where US based companies have the best product and people are going somewhere else because of this regulation.
If I owned a big chip company I'd move my HQ outside the US immediately if staying meant I missed out on 10 years of growth.
Do you read the headlines, do you know what growth for businesses in the US is projected to be for the next 10 years, it's not 50% more like sat launches and their electronics components are.
Just a shirt? C'mon, you really want to go for the tattoo!
http://joey.kitenet.net/blog/entry/ouch__33__/
You jest, but the fact that the entire civilized world is on pins and needles to see if Muslims will fly off the handle over a freaking book burning speaks volumes.
I was part of the CubeSAT program at my university. We were designing a 1 foot x 1 foot x 1 foot satellite to be launched. To track the satellite, we needed a GPS module on board. However, due to the ITAR components on the module, the student in charge of software couldn't touch the GPS code or schematics, because he was not a US citizen.
Import that!!
ITAR covers such things as software, documentation for software and even a software engineer talking to someone about said software, even if what the engineer is saying is freely available in public documentation. I work at a place where we have to review ITAR and EAR (Export Administration Regulations) policies every year and at the end of the presentation they make it clear just about anything could be an ITAR violation.
http://www.rootstrikers.org/
We could each go into long diatribes about what we've learned is broken with regard to business, law, policy, or spending, when it comes to the US Government. I assume most of us have had first hand experience with one or more of these subjects, and have recognized its shortcomings from all sides of its implementations. That being said, I pose this question to the /. community:
What implementation has the US Government gotten right? What procedure, has all sides of the equation, all parties that it effects or has a hand in its implementation, pleased with its inception and execution? To put simply, what 'problem' have we solved permanently?
Perhaps this is too broad a question, and absolutes are not how Government should work. However, with the historical progression this country has taken, is it now even possible to implement effective policy and design so that every variable is taken into consideration. To make it equitable to all parties involved?
Pretty much sums up the US government in general...useless regulations that make every-day life a PITA for law abiding citizens and don't really stop criminals from doing anything. Like the way we have to have drivers license, birth certificate, and a note from mom to buy an allergy tablet, yet you can go pretty much anywhere and still buy meth.
... contained how to conform to US export restrictions. The regulations are ludicrous and it is extremely easy to run afoul. E.g. having a foreign visitor glimpsing a concept at a whiteboard can be counted as an export of classified ideas.
I worked in Germany, the US and now Canada for the same employer. I can legally work in all these places. One thing is for sure - if I ever start my own shop it won't be in the US. Any meaningful business has to be global these days and the US is just not as open to that than either Canada or Europe.
Says the guy feeding the troll.
ITAR has been around for my 10 years in space systems and was around before me. European companies are just using it as an excuse to award European only contracts to kill off American competitors. It's actually been greatly improved in recent years, with a majority of commercial space components being put under the Commerce Dept rather than ITAR.
Brasil is developing a C-130-class military transport with no US technology in it specifically to get around ITAR. Scuttlebutt is that Venezuela is the driver but it wouldn't surprise me if most countries are tired of the US sticking their nose in.
Equine Mammals Are Considerably Smaller
After a quick read of the article, my mind associated weapons, space, and piracy. I was transported back to thoughts of GIJoe and Ice Pirates. Good Times!
Looks to me like our military fetish and desire to be a world super power is stifling advancements in aerospace. This is an industry where the USA can still compete with the world. We need to cultivate this industry instead of choking it.
Blar.
Actually, the U.S. administration has already admitted that the current export control system is messed up. In April 2010 U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates called for a major overhaul of America’s export control regime, saying the current system is outdated, hurts America’s competitiveness, and does not adequately protect national security. Of course, admitting there's a problem is not the same as making a change that solves it (or makes it better), but at least they know there are problems and are trying to find solutions. I particularly like this part: "One major culprit is an overly broad definition of what should be subject to export classification and control. The real-world effect is to make it more difficult to focus on those items and technologies that truly need to stay in this country. Frederick the Great’s famous maxim that “he who defends everything defends nothing” certainly applies to export control."
- David A. Wheeler (see my Secure Programming HOWTO)
HYPOCRITE.
By the way, here's the movie reference.
This is /., we all know already.
It doesn't make any difference! They give the shit to Israhell, who then sell it to China, then it goes everyplace. What the *fuck* does it matter any more? Then we have Chinese students and businessmen in *every* industry and research establishment that exists here. So what the *fuck* does it matter any more?
It is fucking security theater, and anyone who isn't lying to themselves knows this. These huge armaments corporations are loyal to MONEY, that's it. There are NO secrets if the price is met, and everything is for sale. This national security bullshit is propaganda for the drools, the ones who "vote" for corrupt "party" D or R, thinking that if "their" liars and thieves get in, everything will be better. They have all been co-opted by globalist businessmen, and they give not a care to whom they do business with, and have developed any number of ways to go ahead and transfer what they need to transfer, even if it takes sixteen cutouts.
This is perfectly in line with Standard Superpower Policy. The superpower(s) will always strive to maintain and crystallize the status quo. And in the grand quest of doing so they will continually mess shit up while stacking layers of beurocracy on beurocracy until what should be an hourglass shaped hierarchy looks more like a pyramid balancing on its top.
Big fucking suprise things reach a tipping point with such a distribution of mass.
Engineering and manufacturing are being outsourced PRECISELY so they don't run afoul of iTAR!
We are LOSING sales and LOSING jobs and LOSING technology due to this stupidity.
There's a reason for why technology exports are regulated. If that comes at the cost of a bit less money to the aerospace companies then so be it.
That's right! And it's a good thing that the US has a monopoly on space and aviation technology that US based companies can afford to deal with these regulations. After all, EAS and other European companies, Japanese, and other Asian companies are completely incapable of competing with US companies in terms of technology and innovation.
A country wants a missile, well they can only buy from the US. Fighter jet? Same thing. Ships - anything military we're the only game in town.
even non-military. Those Dell PCs can be used to design nukalear bomms! And it's a good think PC are assembled in the US because if other countries got the technology to assemble all those Asian made components into working computers and wrote the software for it, we'd be in big trouble!
Thank God the rest of the World is sooo stupid that they can't duplicate our superior American technology!
RIP America
July 4, 1776 - September 11, 2001
From: http://www.pdfernhout.net/recognizing-irony-is-a-key-to-transcending-militarism.html
"Nuclear weapons are ironic because they are about using space age systems to fight over oil and land. Why not just use advanced materials as found in nuclear missiles to make renewable energy sources (like windmills or solar panels) to replace oil, or why not use rocketry to move into space by building space habitats for more land? "
The key idea is to rethink security in terms of "intrinsic" security and "mutual" security (as opposed to "extrinsic" and "unilateral" security), as you imply and as I spell out some more at the link above.
And we're not just a laughingstock because we cripple ourselves as you point out, we're also a laughingstock in the ironic sense as above. Of course, we may still be a laughingstock that is dangerous to ourselves and others... We need to move beyond that to a better paradigm of security, starting with the diplomatic approach as you suggest...
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
... that the US was technologically inferior to Europe and Asia. That we were behind in technology.
Now all of a sudden the world needs our chips? Our technologically inferior chips?
Who knew?
Don't kid yourself. It's the size of the regexp AND how you use it that counts.
"It's not really very hard to take a space launch system and turn it into an ICBM system"
Rockets are big and obvious. As with the slashdot articles about someone building a cruise missile in their garage, the bigger security problem is how easy it is to make things like UAVs guided by a GPS with enough payload to cause trouble. And making designer plagues in a garage is going to get easier and easier, too. And that is not going to be solved by banning model aircraft or GPSs or biotech or garages, it is going to be solved by making the world a more joyful place with abundance for all, and rethinking security in terms of being intrinsic and mutual (as mentioned in another reply).
Some ways to do that I helped put together, related to a basic income, a gift economy, democratic resource-based planning, and stronger local subsistence communities:
http://knol.google.com/k/paul-d-fernhout/beyond-a-jobless-recovery#Four_long(2D)term_heterodox_alternatives
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
Of course, admitting there's a problem is not the same as making a change that solves it (or makes it better), but at least they know there are problems and are trying to find solutions.
Presumably with the same awsome efficiency and effictiveness that the American federal government dealt with the problem of nuclear waste disposal, and are currently dealing the space program.
Government solutions are pretty effective for most problems world-wide, but the US federal government seems uniquely capable of making of mess of things.
Blasphemy is a human right. Blasphemophobia kills.
End the pentagon and the American space program will again take flight!!
It doesn't take a pacifist to see how insanely corrupt the Empire and her corporate lords have become.
American arms deals and aggressions are destroying the stability of the world. All for the sake of making another year of record profits for Wal-Street while millions of her own citizens go hungry and homeless.
"Again, you misunderstand. Having technology that makes your military more effective *does* make you safer, after a fashion. Look back at the interaction between the Spanish conquistadors and the Incas. The conquistadors had metal armor and guns. The Incas had wooden/hide armor, spears and arrows. A single conquistador was a more effective military weapon than a single Incan soldier."
Well, it was guns, *germs*, and steel (see the book with that title). And it was other things as well, like the Inca seeing the invaders as gods, and also being highly centralized and vulnerable to a centralized attack, otherwise millions of Inca would have wiped out a few hundred men with musketts, even on horseback. It's sort of like by the fourth airplane on 9/11 the strategy of the terrorists wasn't working anymore as the people began to fight back (and so that plane crashed in a field). Eventually, the Inca did fight back more, but by then the (mostly unintended) germs were wiping them out. There was also a civil war at the time the Spanish took advantage of, and other factors:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_conquest_of_the_Inca_Empire
"The situation went quickly downhill. As things began to fall apart, many parts of the Inca Empire revolted, some of them joining with the Spanish against their own rulers. Many kingdoms and tribes had been conquered or persuaded to join the Inca empire. They thought that by joining the Spaniards, they could gain their own freedom. But these native people never foresaw the massive waves of Spaniard immigrants coming to their land and the tragedy that they would bring upon their people."
So the Inca empire itself was unstable... If the Inca empire has been more stable, and had (unintentional) disease not been a major factor, I'd suggest the Inca would have easily kicked out the Conquistadors, despite guns and steel.
Columbus' destruction of the Arawaks on Haiti might be a better example of what you say... And a very sad one... They offered him gifts and friendship amd a better way of life, and he repaid them in death, justified in part by religion as well as his business obligations...
http://www.historyisaweapon.com/defcon1/zinncol1.html
But is that what you want to hold up as an ideal? Columbus only lived to age 54; might he have lived to age 100 if he and his men had just settled in Haiti and never gone back to Europe? All that violence must have been stressful for him, and what did that genocide for profit against the Arawaks get him? Beyond being remembered for it (plus being the last person to discover America)?
If you see my other reply, you'll see that all this military technology is ironic and, essentially, making us less secure in the 21st century because it is designed from the wrong paradigm of extrinisic unilateral security (not intrinsic mututal security). For example, having a loaded self-propelled Howitzer cannon in your suburban backyard does not make you safer from home intrusion in a small community (or cancer, heart disease, stroke, and diabestes, the real killers of most US Americans) -- it makes you seen as a nutcase and your neighbors start talking about how to deal with you and get rid of it in case it went off accidentally or kids took it for a "joyride". But if you insulate your house to keep it warm at low cost, use the savings to put solar panels of the roof to power a fridge full of cool beers for passerbys, and then grown an organic garden producing abundant veggies you share with your neighbors, then you are going to have a lot more security and health and prosperity for both yourself and your community for a lot less cost than buying and maintaining a Howitzer in your backyard.
And that's basically the previous poster's point.
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
We've discussed such issues here: http://groups.google.com/group/openmanufacturing
Examples: http://groups.google.com/groups/search?hl=en&ie=UTF-8&q=fernhout+itar+open
and also here: http://www.openvirgle.net/
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
Mudslums are a dangerous threat to our society. Just look at how they're taking over Paris. Burn a Koran on 9/11!
--
Palin 2012!
While this post is incredibly racist and offensive, I happen to agree with the sentiment that the primary role of ITAR is to keep the Muslim nations from obtaining the technology necessary to go into space.
Not that it is working or really effective at doing so anyway. The information about going into space isn't exactly rocket science.... well perhaps it is but it isn't exactly all that difficult. Besides, as is pointed out in the main article the law is hardly stopping "friendly countries" from exporting that technology once those countries figure out how to make the parts themselves. The largest problem with building a rocket is mainly plumbing, and more importantly building a decent high power pump that is both lightweight and can work with cryogenic fuels and can hopefully be fueled by the same energy source that powers the main rocket itself. Pumps aren't exactly a new invention to mankind either. Getting something to burn is basic chemistry that a teenager can figure out on their own.
Over regulation can damage an industry? NO FREAKING WAY!
Stupid, sexy Flanders.
And the reason this screwed-up situation doesn't get fixed, is that whatever politician moves first to try to improve things will get roasted by his opposition for getting troops killed/costing American jobs/betraying us. Bloviating gasbag pundits/celebrities/talk-show hosts will pick up the story, and the public will whip themselves up into a frenzy over the supposed sell-out, because that's what their Guts tell them to do.
If by some chance all political factions come to a sane consensus (some of them realize how stupid this all is) and try to patch things quietly, count on shameless/crazy opportunists to jump in and start flinging poo for personal advantage. And the worst thing is, that this broken dynamic is being repeated over-and-over (booming prison populations and ever tightening sentencing laws, juvinile sexting prosections and sex offender witchhunts, Islamic mosque construction, etc...).
I just quit an aerospace company due to ITAR/EAR/MCTL headaches bottling up good work.
It was fundamental physics research, declared by the DOD funder to be free and open to all. But, at my company, they interpret ITAR it so wrong-headedly that if you do anything actually "new" or "innovative" they squash it. Anyone with talent leaves.
ITAR even contaminates academic research if it's done in collaboration with such a lab, and academics avoid cleared-level work like the plague. As they should.
Why do you call a probability of less than 0.0000000001% a "statistical certainty"?
ITAR is more intrusive than you think.
I had a fellow project next door that was developing a product. We could look a draft documents before they were provided to a US company for review. However, once they were reviewed and commented on, they were now ITAR controlled.
Seriously, if you have the choice, AVOID ITAR controlled products like the plague.
Want to open yourself to a potential billion dollar fine for incorrect handling of ITAR? Be my guest.
I've had a satellite with a "laser" on it I've been trying to get in orbit for years! I want to get on with my international exortion^h^h^h^h^h^h^heye surgery and the US Government keeps getting in my way! You should write your Congressman today!
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
There's little worse than speaking for someone without their permission. Doing so while inventing a problem to solve for them is worse. So's presenting as evidence an unpublished, unreviewed "paper".
The "nascent space tourism industry" presently consists of Virgin Galactic and a handful of sites wanting to be spaceports. The Rutan Clan has been doing fine so far, and landing sites don't need it. ITAR goods are too expensive, unnecessary, and frequently overly complex in and of themselves as well as with respect to the subsystems that feed and operate them.
And just what class of, um, entities makes a habit of speaking for others? Lawyers. Guess what. TFA is a sales pitch for what he wants people to need him for.
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B