THE RUSSIAN President, Mr. Vladimir Putin's criticism of the militarisation of Space, while addressing the United Nations on the challenges it is facing in the 21st century, has obviously been provoked by his anxiety over the scope for use of outer space for waging war. The same technology which is now extensively used for instant telecommunication, accurate cloud mapping, weather forecasting, broadcasting and television can be used with the required adapations for geo-strategic spying from space. Missiles hurled into space to zero in on their targeted locations by ill-advised military decisions could spark a war which could be directed from space. If the missiles are nuclear- tipped, their destructive potential will be enough to depopulate the globe.

This is not a horror or a science-fiction inspired scenario but the projection of what could become dreadfully real if the militarisation of Space, which has in fact already begun, is pursued to its logical end. The other danger, which is just as unnerving, is that the technology for the breakthroughs in Space- oriented missile operations are now being achieved through commercial and not secret military research as was the case earlier. This could, therefore, lead to global, commercial use of the same. ``Among these technologies创, says the Strategic Survey 1996-97 carried out by The International Institute for Strategic Studies, London, ``are cheap guidance and navigation systems based on the U.S. Global Positioning System (GPS)创 which can provide ``one-metre satellite resolution imagery to target fixed objects, new guidance and navigation technology for cruise missiles创 which can ensure accurate delivery. Intelligence- gathering satellite capability to carry high-powered optical equipment with a resolution of 2 to 3 metres and electronic devices and radar for all weather and night observation has in fact a history dating back to the 1970s. (Nuclear Command and Control in NATO by Shaun R. Gregory, Macmillan Press Ltd., London). It was the Space-based GPS with its night and low light vision devices which were deployed by the U.S. in the Gulf War. The NATO, however, could not allay fears of France about the vulnerability of its strategic nuclear command and control to a variety of threats from the Warsaw Pact countries during the Cold War.

The launching of Sputnik, the world's first spacecraft, by the erstwhile Soviet Union in 1957 set the pace not merely for making Space the arena for surveillance, communication, navigation and meteorology but also for military applications. Though the U.S. moon-landing was generally seen as the first step towards further space exploration, the fearsome military possibilities it held out were hinted at in something like a hiss when President Kennedy said ``No one can predict what the ultimate meaning will be of the mastery of space创. (Quoted in War and Anti-War: Survival at the Dawn of the 21st Century. By Alvin and Heidi Toffler. Little Brown Company, U.S.). The Gulf War of 1990-91 gave very clear indications of how Space could be used to target locations on Earth with infrared devices. Later in 1993, the Chief of the U.S. Air Force left no one in any doubt when he said that it must find a way to get on with the construction of capabilities aimed at ensuring that no nation denies it part of its hard-won space superiority. The Gulf War was in fact won by the U.N.-led operations against an enemy who could not blind and disable the U.S. military satellites and had no access to Space.

``Military Space Forces: The Next 50 Years创, a study commissioned by the U.S. Congress, is an exhaustive discussion of how Space is bound to become the military base of the future. The relevance of the moon landing to military operations is clearly spelt out in the study when it points out that the decisive control of the L4 and L5 ``liberation points创 (which are locations in Space where the gravitational pulls of the earth and the moon are exactly equal) would be the decisive requirement for the prospective winner. This is more clearly spelt by the study when it says that ``Who controls circumterrestrial space commands Planet Earth. Who rules the moon commands circumterrestrial space创.

Space, however, does not hold out a wholly safe haven for military operations because of the technology now available for frustrating them. The Gulf War itself revealed the vulnerability of U.S. satellite communications which would have come to light if Iraq had the time to design and develop devices for interception, jamming and deception. There is now global availability of technology, over which neither the U.S. nor any other country can acquire exclusive control, for getting sophisticated images of tanks or troops or missile emplacements with a 15-foot accuracy. The ring of satellites which commercial firms are planning to put around the Earth could ensure communications which are invulnerable to jamming. Terrestrial proliferation of electronic networks could provide satellite intelligence to whoever needs and could pay for it. Apart from enabling snooping of strategic military locations, the satellite-based Open Skies military inspection facilities developed by the U.S. imparted a fitness to aerial reconnaisance. The space-based sensors of the synthetic aperture radar could see through any weather and operate at night and take a close look at objects which could not otherwise be seen beyond ten feet. The inexcusable folly of militarisation of space, already begun at a cost of several million dollars, for waging wars which cannot be won decisively by any country can be seen in the neglect of a great many possibilities held out by Space.

The positive achievements so far are led by the communications satellites, which have made the world a global village by enabling instant voice and visual transmission around the world. Weather forecasts can now save thousands of lives by tracking down cyclones. ``Unless we spend more, not less money, on the practical uses of Space,创 writes Mr. Arthur C. Clarke in his ``Greetings, Carbon-Based Bipeds创 (HarperCollins Publishers), ``millions will be condemned to live ignorant, disease-ridden lives when they live at all创.

As for the billions of dollars spent on the military use of Space, he is happy that the same military establishments launched the reconnisance satellites which exposed them. ``We may well thank the secret reconnaisance satellites which make it impossible to conceal large scale military operations for the fact that our planet is not already a radioactive ruin.创

The orbiting velocity of the Geostationary Launch Vehicle (GSLV) is the same as that of the Earth and it provides for the unrestricted use of a band not less than 100,000 megacycles per second wide. Though the initial cost of launching will be high, it would be just a fraction of what is required for the present world networks. The promises held out for not merely enriching life on Earth but also for the exploration of the galaxies should reveal the utter stupidity of using Space for military purposes.

Moves of militarisation of Space can only be reflective of a mad death wish given the possibilities for annihilation they could unleash, from which the end of the Cold War should have saved the human race.