SPEAKING
FREELY Iran's pipe dream in
space Radhakrishna Rao
Speaking Freely is an Asia Times
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Iran, in the eye of
a storm over its nuclear program, wishes to attain
the status of a global space power status by
putting an astronaut into space by the end of the
decade. But since at best, its space capability
appears on par with that of North Korea, that
quest is likely to remain a pipe dream.
Iran is nowhere near the Asian space front
runners - Japan, China and India. What's more, it
will have to go a long way before its catches up
with its sworn enemy, Israel, which has built a
series of high profile radar imaging satellites
that can be deployed for surveillance and
reconnaissance. In the backdrop of its modest
success in launching lightweight satellites, many
factors stand in its way. Iran is far from having
a high-tech industrial base and has
a glaring lack of
expertise for building a man-rated,
high-performance launch vehicle and autonomous
crew vehicle, along with its virtually nil
expertise in re-entry technique crucial for the
successful accomplishment of a manned mission,
As Western space analysts point out, the
rudimentary nature of the Iranian space program
hardly provides credence to the Iranian claim of
launching a manned space mission by the end of
this decade. Indeed, China ,which realized its
first manned flight in 2003, had successfully
built and launched its high thrust cryogenic
fuel-driven space vehicle in 1980. And India,
despite its successful space program, is
struggling it out to prepare a solid technological
platform for its maiden human space flight mission
slated for a take off in 2016.
Without
doubt, in the backdrop of UN authorized sanctions,
Iran will have problems sourcing critical
components and hardware for building advanced ,
heavier class satellites meant for applications
such as communications, weather watch, navigation
and earth observation. For instance, Mesbah-1
(Mesbah means lantern in Farsi), a low earth orbit
telecom satellite that Iran had ordered from the
Italian aerospace company, was prevented from
being exported . Other European space nations like
Germany and France have already refused to make
available high-speed computers and star sensor
technology that Iran needs to build its high
performance satellites.
Amid the mounting
international concern over Iranian nuclear
program, the Islamic Republic of Iran quietly
launched a satellite named Navid (Gospel in Farsi)
in February this year. This satellite, weighing
around 50 kilograms, will help Iran collect data
on climatic conditions and monitor natural
disasters. Navid, which happens to be the third
satellite to be launched from the Iranian soil,
was built by the students of the Sharif University
of Technology. Significantly, Navid was delivered
into space by means of Safir-II block II rocket
equipped with two liquid fuel-driven stages.
Indeed, the international concern over the
military potentials of the Safir (ambassador in
Farsi) rocket, whose second stage details were
kept under a wrap, was very much in evidence in
the aftermath of Navid launch.
Reports
suggest that Iran is developing a large diameter
solid propellant rocket. For solid fuel, being
earth storable and easy to handle and transport,
is quite ideal for use in a ballistic missile.
Unlike solid fuel, the volatile liquid fuel, it
cannot be stuffed into the missile stages in
advance to derive strategic advantage in the event
of a sudden and quick nuclear exchange. As it is,
during the long drawn out Iran-Iraq war of 1980s,
Iran had made extensive use of solid fuel-driven
missiles. As such Western intelligence sources
hint at the possibility of Iran reconfiguring the
launch vehicle used for hoisting Navid into space
into a long range strategic missile. The political
establishment in Tehran made a point that despite
sanctions that prevented Iran from buying some of
the critical components for Navid satellite,
Iranian space scientists managed to develop these
components indigenously.
Prior to this, in
June 2011,Iran had successfully launched a
satellite named Rasad-1(meaning Observation in
Farsi) by means of Safir-1B rocket. Rasad -1
described as a mapping satellite was meant to
provide Iran inputs for building operational
surveillance space platforms. However, a September
2011 Iranian mission to send a monkey on a 20
minute sub-orbital flight came a cropper.
Uzi Rubin, a former head of the Israeli
missile development program observes that 29
months span between Iran's first and second
successful launches indicated that Iranians are
pouring money into its space program. US Air Force
Intelligence believes that the Safir launch
vehicle could be a test bed for developing long
range ballistic missile capability. But then there
is a lack of solid and indisputable proof about
the militaristic ambitions of the Iranian space
programme.
Even so, Western space analysts
hold the view that the Iranian satellite launch
missions are but a cover to boost its long range
missile capability. For many elements such as
chemicals, electronics and guidance as well as
materials are common to civilian launch vehicles
and military missiles. And with some fine-tuning
it is possible to turn a launch vehicle into a
military missile. Meanwhile, the US Intelligence
authorities have expressed the concern that North
Korea and Iran may strengthen their collaboration
in nuclear and space sectors to boost their
arsenal of nuclear tipped long range missiles.
Iran sent its first domestically made
satellite Omid (Hope in Farsi) into orbit in
February 2009. With the successful launch of the
27-kilogram Omid, Iran became the ninth nation in
the world to go into space on the back of its "own
rocket power". Described as a micro satellite,
Omid was designed for data processing and
technology evaluation. In 2005, Iran launched its
first satellite, Sina-1, which was built in
cooperation with Moscow, on a Russian rocket.
Russia, along with North Korea and China, has been
supporting the Iranian space program. Iran says it
wants to put its own satellites into orbit to
monitor natural disasters in the earthquake prone
nation and improve its telecommunications network.
On another front, Iranian officials while
pointing out to the stunning success with which
American armed forced used a wide variety of
satellites for their smooth intervention in
Afghanistan and Iraq, say that Iran needs similar
capability. Indeed, Iranian space endeavors are
based on the ambitions to derive both military and
civilian advantages.
Meanwhile, Iran has
announced that it would orbit the 65 kilogram Fajr
(Dawn in Farsi) reconnaissance satellite by means
of Safir-1B rocket in June this year. This
satellite would boost Iranian surveillance
capabilities. Tehran views its space program as a
source of national pride and victory against
external forces. Strategic analysts believe that
by riding on the success of its satellite
launches, Iran may develop a missile capable of
reaching Northern Europe .
Meanwhile,
India's rapidly expanding defense and space ties
with Israel cannot but be an "unpalatable
development" for Iran. The RISAT-11 radar imaging
satellite that ISRO (Indian Space Research
Organisation) had built in association with IAI
(Israel Aerospace Industries) and launched in 2009
is said to have been acquired recently by Israel.
This satellite with a radar imaging capability
along with the Ofek-9 Israeli satellite launched
in 2010 could help boost Israel's surveillance
capability particularly aimed at Iranian nuclear
and missile development sites by a substantial
extent. Israel had also made use of India's four
stage space workhorse PSLV (Polar Satellite Launch
Vehicle) for getting its TECSAR surveillance
satellite off the ground in early 2008. TECSAR has
been described as a spy satellite primarily meant
to monitor Iranian military activities.
Expressing unhappiness over Indian launch
support to this surveillance satellites of Israel,
the Iranian ambassador to New Delhi, Seyed Mehdi
Nabizadeh, observed, "Wise and independent
countries like India do not give their advanced
space technologies to launch spying operations
against Iran". Nabizadeh added, "The US continues
to be hostile to Iran and even today is trying to
create problems between Iran and its friendly
countries. We expect friendly countries to realize
this".
On account of its geographical
location, Israel is in a position to launch
satellites only in western direction against
earth's eastward spin. This anomaly is known to
have limited the range of Israeli satellite's
orbit over Iran. And the launch of Israeli
satellites from Sriharikota island on India's
eastern coat facilitate their eastward movement
for their ultimate positioning in the desired
orbit.
Meanwhile, Iran has been watching
with dismay the growing US pressure on New Delhi
to keep a distance from this West Asian Islamic
country. Not long back, the United States had
opposed the Iran-India-Pakistan gas pipeline
project with the warning that India could face
sanctions if it went ahead with the project. And
more recently, India has fallen in line with US
dictate to reduce oil imports from Iran. And in
Washington, Assistant Secretary of State for South
and Central Asia, Robert Blake, informed lawmakers
that India had been working on a plan to cut down
on crude imports from Tehran.
On another
front, for quite sometime now, officials from the
International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) have
been pressing for access to a site at Iran's
Parchin military facility that they suspect was
being used to test multi-point rapid explosives of
the kind needed to set off a nuclear charge.
A recent , well documented IAEA report
says that Iran has built a large chamber at
Parchin, southeast of Tehran, to conduct explosive
tests that are "strong indicators" of efforts to
develop a nuclear weapon. But the widely perceived
view is that Iran is years away from having a
deliverable nuclear warhead. Iran is believed to
have achieved some degree of success in uranium
enrichment, the technology of which is zealously
guarded. But Iran has not yet achieved the
"sufficient quantity or level of purity" to help
fuel a bomb. Intelligence reports say Iran
conducts uranium enrichment at the Natanz plant in
central Iran and at a site deep in mountainous
region in the proximity of the holy city of Qom.
The United States, Israel and Western countries
believe that the Iran could exploit its advances
in enrichment technology to build nuclear weapons.
But then as independent strategic analysts point
out this observation may not be more than just a
"conjecture".
A section of US intelligence
officials believe Iran has the largest inventory
of ballistic missiles in the Middle East and many
of these projectiles could be reconfigured to
deliver nuclear warheads. Israel looks at Iran's
nuclear programme as potential threat to the very
existence of the Jewish state. Obviously, on
several occasions, top ranking Iranian officials
had made a call for the destruction of Zionist
state. Against this backdrop, Israel has not ruled
out the possibility of making a pre-emptive
military strike to paralyze the Iranian nuclear
program.
But then there is as yet no clear
picture pointing out to a reliable ground reality
of Iran's nuclear weapons development program. In
the ultimate analysis, the hype and concern over
Iranian nuclear programme could prove no more than
a "damp squib" much the same way as the "weapons
of mass destruction" of Saddam Hussein that acted
as a trigger for US intervention in Iraq.
Radhakrishna Rao is a full time
aerospace and defense writer with three decades of
experience in contributing stories in areas of his
professional interest to a wide ranging global
media.
Speaking Freely is an Asia
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have their say.Please
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