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Go for Galileo?

Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
This week, Europe's transport ministers gave approval to the European global positioning system, Galileo, to be built and launched, and be fully operational by 2008. There has been a great deal of opposition to this from the US, however, who already have their own system, named simply GPS. They claim that it is unnecessary to have a second system when they already provide free access to their system for anyone who wants to use it.

Do you think Galileo is a good idea?

I personally do, for a number of reasons:
  • Galileo is more technically advanced than the US' GPS. They can position to within approx 2 metres, Galileo 45cm. This is not due to Europe being "better", simply that GPS is much older.
  • Galileo also has a wider coverage of the Earth's surface than GPS, which has a severely weak or non-existent signal in some areas. Galileo will cover the whole planet.
  • GPS is a military system, and thus, in the event of war, may be devoted to the armed services, leaving civilian users in trouble. Galileo is intended as a civilian system, which may be used by the military.
  • Bush has recently shown his instability with regard to free trade when he slapped tarifs on steel. With the recent downturn in demand for planes, he may decide that, to protect the US aerospace industry, he will ban other plane producers, such as Airbus, from using GPS. This will make it impossible for them to produce modern aircraft.
What do you think?

[ 01-04-2002: Message edited by: Vox populi, vox Dei ]

Comments

  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    I think that spending several billion on a system we don't actually need is madness,

    So we could caluclate down to 45cm rather than 2m, when would this be so important is this really worth all that cash?

    Bearing in mind that a feasability study has just been agreed as a cost of £300m, and the new systme won't be operation for at least 6 years, what do you think the cost will be by then?

    This is just another example of 'Europe' trying to show that it is as powerful as the US, and is driven by the French and Germans. They'd do better to spend the cash on job creation schemes than an a GPS system which doesn't give us anything we don't already have access to...
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Originally posted by Man Of Kent:
    <STRONG>I think that spending several billion on a system we don't actually need is madness,

    So we could caluclate down to 45cm rather than 2m, when would this be so important is this really worth all that cash?...</STRONG>

    You mean... that the weenie wagging is NOT important to you??? <IMG SRC="eek.gif" border="0" ALT="icon">

    You mean... that you would NOT spend a trillion dollars to plant a Union Jack on the moon? just to enter into a "territorial dispute" with the US? <IMG SRC="eek.gif" border="0" ALT="icon">

    Think of all the lawyers (or WHATEVER you call them over there) that would not be involved in the septillion dollar litigation!!! <IMG SRC="eek.gif" border="0" ALT="icon">

    ROTFLMFAO!
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    I think it's a good idea.
    During a large scale war what's to stop the USA from hijacking the signals sent by satellites? Imagine an enemy convoy using GPS to locate it's posistion, then the US government simply altering the signal to give a false reading? I'm not saying that there is anything wrong with this, but disrupting the system to a certain area could jeopardise our own armed forces.
    Galileo could be used primarily by us, and in the event of GPS being compromised by an enemy force can be used by the Yanks too. I don't see the harm in having 2 systems?
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Planning on going to war with the USA then Whowhere? <IMG SRC="wink.gif" border="0" ALT="icon">
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Originally posted by Balddog:
    <STRONG>Planning on going to war with the USA then Whowhere? <IMG SRC="wink.gif" border="0" ALT="icon"></STRONG>

    Thats been my aim from the beginning lol.
    What I meant was, that if there were a large war, and GPS was disrupted in some way to give the enemy an advantage then you have Galileo.
    Of course, if Galileo is more accurate then GPS should be the backup.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Originally posted by Whowhere:
    <STRONG>I think it's a good idea.
    During a large scale war what's to stop the USA from hijacking the signals sent by satellites? Imagine an enemy convoy using GPS to locate it's posistion, then the US government simply altering the signal to give a false reading? </STRONG>

    What makes you think that this wouldn't happen anyway?

    In fact, most specialists believe that GOS is actually more secure!

    <STRONG>
    Galileo could be used primarily by us, and in the event of GPS being compromised by an enemy force can be used by the Yanks too. I don't see the harm in having 2 systems?</STRONG>

    Isn't this the point of NATO? I know that the French hate the US (and the French are the main drivers for Galileo), but isn't shared resources what NATO is about?

    Just for the record, in the event of war between Europe and the US, don't you think that we would more likely be siding with the States? Just a thought...
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    What a waste of money.

    Do you know how GPS works?

    For the US government to deny foreign users the ability to use GPS they would have to encrypt all the signals coming from the satellites. Since the satellites that make up GPS are really no more than radio beacons, this would mean that all of the US users would need to get new receivers, otherwise their recievers couldn't read the signals.

    As for the US government using its control to mislead a foreign convoy in time of war, that's ridiculous. It's not possible to single out one receiver and feed it inccorect data. To do this you would have to alter the signals coming from all the satellites covering the area and thus make all the receivers covered inaccurate.
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Originally posted by Lexicon:
    <STRONG>What a waste of money.

    Do you know how GPS works?

    For the US government to deny foreign users the ability to use GPS they would have to encrypt all the signals coming from the satellites. Since the satellites that make up GPS are really no more than radio beacons, this would mean that all of the US users would need to get new receivers, otherwise their recievers couldn't read the signals.

    As for the US government using its control to mislead a foreign convoy in time of war, that's ridiculous. It's not possible to single out one receiver and feed it inccorect data. To do this you would have to alter the signals coming from all the satellites covering the area and thus make all the receivers covered inaccurate.</STRONG>


    The US government/miltary created GPS. How do you know they didn't create some sort of backdoor into the system?
    Nobody knows except for those who created it, and I doubt they would compromise it's security by revealing information like this.

    Explain to me though, why else would the US government be so opposed to a European system?
  • Former MemberFormer Member Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
    Originally posted by Whowhere:
    <STRONG>


    The US government/miltary created GPS. How do you know they didn't create some sort of backdoor into the system?
    Nobody knows except for those who created it, and I doubt they would compromise it's security by revealing information like this.
    </STRONG>

    You're right, I don't know that there isn't a backdoor. But you don't know that there is one either.

    GPS is not as technical of a system as people would think. Basically it is just a system of radio transmitters in space and recievers that triangulate signals from at least three transmitters on the ground. The recievers do not communicate with the satellites themselves. My point is because there is no way to exclude a given reciever from getting the signals, the only way I can think of to stop others from using it would be to either stop the signals or to encode them. Can you think of another way they could stop it from working? How would they prevent foreign recievers from working if there is no communication between the recievers and the satellites?

    If you told me that there was a system by which they could do this I would agree with you comletely. If you can't, well then, it seems to me that your worries are unfounded.

    As for why the US government is opposing this, I don't know. I don't support this position of the US goveernment at all, I think its pointless. But I can say that there is no logical reason for the European community to do this either. I would probably guess that this is just political games being played at high levels, a pissing contest, with no real basis. The US is probably pissed that the EU feels the need to do this, given the connections between us, and the EU probably feels that it wants to show that it can have its own system independent of the US.

    Either way, the money could be much better spent on health care, or communications satellites, or the International Space Station, or social programs, etc........just about anywhere but here.

    I think that this program undermines cooperation between countries that have much in common anyway.
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