"The European Union is building its own network of spy
satellites allowing Brussels to ensure nations and private
individuals are obeying its policies, it was announced
yesterday."
Scary sia. Monitoring everybody's movements through out the
Globe?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/11/15/wgmes15.xml&sSheet=/news/2005/11/15/ixworld.html
EU to build network of spy satellites
By David Rennie in Brussels
(Filed: 15/11/2005)
The European Union is building its own network of spy satellites
allowing Brussels to ensure nations and private individuals are
obeying its policies, it was announced yesterday.
The multi-billion-pound system, known as "Global Monitoring for
Environment and Security" (GMES), should be up and running by 2010,
a commission spokesman said. Announcing the launch of a "pilot
stage" for GMES, the commission stressed its "user-friendly"
application in guiding relief work after disasters or providing
real time images of forest fires or oil spills.
But a commission memo also acknowledged that GMES would play a key
role in the "implementation, review and monitoring of EU policies",
including watching for agriculture and fisheries fraud and boosting
"internal security".
In addition, officials hope GMES will support the EU's first steps
towards becoming a military power. It will "provide authorities
with necessary elements for a European Security and Defence
Policy", the commission memo said.
The commission in Brussels will identify and develop possible uses
for GMES. The management of the satellites will fall to the
European Space Agency (ESA), which pools the space resources of 15
EU member states, including Britain, plus Norway and
Switzerland.
US politicians are already suspicious of the ESA's "Galileo"
project, a 30-satellite global navigation system designed to
improve on the Pentagon-controlled GPS system. The EU's invitation
to China to become a major investor only increased US
concern.
Gregor Kreuzhuber, the commission's spokesman for industry policy,
yesterday described GMES as "a little brother for Galileo, a sort
of satellite system where you can better monitor what is happening
on our planet".
GMES is intended to exploit existing assets belonging to individual
EU nations. National governments would retain control over their
satellites, Mr Kreuzhuber pledged.
Harmonising the use of national assets in space should mean Europe
does not need to launch a full set of new satellites though some EU
spacecraft are expected to be needed.
With the ESA, the commission has already spent £154 million on
preparatory work, and expects the whole project to cost £1.54
billion between 2006 and 2013. Funding is to come from the
commission, national governments and private defence and space
firms.