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Aviation History
1961
1961 - 1831.PDF
The Earl of Bessborough FLIGHT, 21 December 1961 Missiles and Space flight... UK SPACE RESEARCH THE LORDS DEBATE 945 A REVIEW of opinions and facts on existing British spaceactivity was accompanied by firm suggestions for two furtherdevelopments in the House of Lords debate on space re- search on December 6, reported briefly in last week's issue. A com-munications satellite programme was strongly urged by the Earl of Bessborough, who introduced the debate; and Lord Waleranexpressed his belief in the desirability of a military space programme (see page 943). The references to the European Space Research Organizationand the European Launcher Development Organization during the debate contained no new information, and indeed Lord Hail-sham, Minister for Science, introduced misleading information by implying at one stage that all ESRO satellites might be launchedby the initial three-stage ELDO launcher. As detailed in Flight of November 2, the initial eight-year ESRO programme nowenvisaged would require four heavy launchers of the ELDO type and some 30 smaller rockets of a type not included at present inELDO's plans. The Earl of Halsbury criticized the quoting of "by-products"or "fringe benefits" of space research as justification for a major space programme. On an official US document listing 53 suchbenefits, he stated, all but seven were trivial, doubtful, or "special pleading" for developments resulting primarily from other things.The remaining seven included one "economic non-starter" and two (concerned with plasma physics) which might equally well have comeout of the hydrogen power research programme. Three of the remaining four were not fringe benefits but main space-researchobjectives, and the fourth and last was communication satellites. Lord Halsbury gave examples of branches of science which mightsuffer if large amounts of money went into space research. Tropical medicine, agriculture, and geological surveying; nuclear physics;radio astronomy; and chemistry were mentioned. Lord Bessborough summarized the objects of his motion in theHouse as follows: "first, to increase interest in this country gener- ally in space research; secondly, to urge the Government to pressahead with the European satellite in conjunction with their allies and with industry, and thirdly, to urge the Government also toconsider how the West may co-operate further with the Soviet Union in the peaceful uses of space." His reference to "the Euro-pean satellite" referred to a possible communications satellite system—plans for which, in more than one speaker's opinion, theGPO should have disclosed. Britain should go into space for technical and commercial reasons,Lord Bessborough emphasized, and not purely on academic and theoretical grounds. Further points from the debate are given inthe following extracts:— The Earl of Bessborough: Although it may now be possible—and I hope it will be—as between Governments to form the Euro- pean Launcher Development Organization, it would seem to meto be valuable if private enterprise could ultimately also play its part, and if perhaps a proportion of the funds required from thiscountry were to be raised, say, through the British Space Develop- ment Company, the consortium of ten companies over whichSir Robert Renwick presides. I am personally connected with two of them. I feel that if the British Space Development Company wereauthorized to raise money by public subscription there might be hundreds of thousands of people in this country who would beinclined to risk a moderate investment on the basis of the calculated profitability of a communications satellite. I do not feel that theburden should lie solely on the taxpayers of the countries concerned, many of whom may have no desire whatever to risk even a smallsum in such an enterprise. I should add here that it would perhaps not seem to be right toappeal to the public to invest in this project until the applications of Biue Streak, with its French second stage and German third stage,have been clearly defined. I do not think that I have seen a definite statement from theGovernment that the application—that is to say, what is to be put on top—will consist of a communications satellite. I hope thatthe Government will make a definite statement in this respect as soon as possible. There seems to be a general feeling in official circles,and in industry, that the launching of such a satellite, mainly for telephony, would be desirable. When the application has been The Earl of Halsbury defined, I would hope that it might then be possible to form aninternational company, perhaps similar to the old Suez Canal Company, in which private enterprise as well as governmentswould have an interest.... The Earl of Halsbury: It seems to me that there has been atendency for four major sources of misunderstanding to cloud our judgment in discussing this subject. The first is almost a myth. Itwas derived from the spectacular success of the Manhattan project and the explosion of the first atomic bomb, followed by the fairlyrapid conversion of energy to that provided by a nuclear power station. The myth is to the effect that scientists can do whateveryou ask of them at short notice if given a sufficiently large sum ofmoney . . . The second confusion lies in thedistinction between engineering means and scientific ends. It istrue that the tools in some branches of science that deal with researchhave become very expensive. One thinks immediately of giant par-ticle accelerators that cost millions and millions of pounds. Nuclearphysicists use them in order to study the sub-nuclear structure ofmatter. The same is true of the launching vehicles for spacecraft.All these devices are triumphs of engineering rather than triumphsof science. They are engineering means to scientific ends . . . The third confusion which Ithink afflicts this subject relates to the uselessness of a general truth as an aid to discriminating between particulars to which itapplies. It is generally true that all scientific research tends to overflow into quite unexpected and very often beneficial directionswhich have quite surprising results. However, the generality of this truth makes it quite useless as a means of discriminatingbetween one project and another, for it is equally true of all. Whether we try to put rockets into orbit, on the one hand, or onthe other hand to drill holes in the bottom the North Sea to look for natural gas, I am sure that unexpected benefits would derivefrom either. The fourth source of confusion is the fact that the public are notsufficiently aware of how disappointing are the actual fringe benefits currently coming out of the cold war weapons research. . . . When so much of direct concern to us is in jeopardy, or may begoing by default, what real justification have we for spending, in the name of science, the massive sums required by space research ?I am not an enemy of space research as such. I would only ask that whatever we spend on it for scientific purposes should bearsome reasonable proportion to the scale on which we support science as a whole. In saying "reasonable proportion," 1 do notmean any kind of barren equality. I am not concerned with dis- parities of expenditure by factors of two or three, as between onesubject and another. But the programme begins to look unreason- able, however, when disparities of «..».„,the order of two or three hundred become involved. On this scalethe whole cost of any space re- search project must fall right out-side any limit which can be called reasonable. Therein, of course, lies a majordifficulty, which I acknowledge. A decision to sponsor space re-search will almost certainly be based on mixed motives. Militarymen will want space facilities for some purposes; politicians willwant them for others; the telecom- munications industry may wantthem for purely commercial reasons; and its proposals must stand or Viscount Caldecote
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