This request made it clear to the French in particular that space projects without
proper launchers could be held hostage by a third country. NASA finally ended up
launching the Franco-German satellite from Cape Canaveral in 1974, but the
Symphony affair continued to influence European space policies from that moment
onward.
It was not by chance that just one year later in 1975, ELDO and ESRO rapidly
merged into the European Space Agency (ESA), a single intergovernmental
agency responsible for managing all integrated space programs. France and nine
other nations joined this governing body, which was tasked with gathering funds
among the various member states to develop space programs. The ESA functions
were conceived to preserve the national interests of all federated nations through
the adoption of the so-called Juste-Retour rule. Through this, the agency was
allowed to give contracts to European industries in proportion to each nation’s
contribution to the agency itself. So, even countries with few resources could contribute to large programs with limited industrial shares.
In particular, ESA was tasked with building a reliable rocket, the Ariane launcher,
which was to be designed by CNES and largely manufactured by French industry.
In a way, the origins of the Ariane launcher can be found in the German V2. Just
before the end of the war, several scientists from von Braun’s team escaped to
France and started working in the newly created Laboratoire de Recherches
Balistiques et Aérodynamiques (LRBA). Together with French engineers, they
contributed to designing the first sounding rockets, Veronique and Vesta, which
were launched from the test range of Hammaguir in the Algerian Sahara.
13
The first Ariane 1 successfully took off on Christmas day in 1979 from the
Guyana site. ESA entrusted a private French company, Arianespace, to sell the
Ariane launch services worldwide. Since the company’s main shareholder was the
French space agency CNES and the minor one was the French industry, France
kept full control of the whole chain. Some years later, the fourth generation Ariane
4 launch vehicle became a mature and reliable rocket that could challenge the US
in the rising market of launch services for telecommunications satellites.
This European success was in part due to an unfortunate event. Until the mideighties, the US held the monopoly of the market with an annual turnover of $3
billion, but when the Challenger shuttle exploded, NASA grounded its shuttles for
years. Since the other rockets, such as Atlas, Delta and Titan, were reserved for
military satellites only, the entire US commercial launch business remained on the
ground with the shuttle fleet. And since Russian and Chinese missiles were off the
market for geopolitical reasons, Arianespace had very weak competition. In the
following decade it launched 83 satellites, as opposed to the 39 of the Americans,
eight of the Chinese, six of the Russians and four of the Japanese,
14
securing an
average revenue of more than $100 million per launch.
This monopoly generated a huge cash flow, making Arianespace’s annual revenues soon reach $1 billion, one third of ESA’s annual budget. The company’s
13
Huwart, Olivier. 2004. Du V2 à Véronique : la naissance des fusées françaises, Marines éditions.
14
http://www.spacelaunchreport.com/.
28 Rocket Science: Globalization and Missiles
proper launchers could be held hostage by a third country. NASA finally ended up
launching the Franco-German satellite from Cape Canaveral in 1974, but the
Symphony affair continued to influence European space policies from that moment
onward.
It was not by chance that just one year later in 1975, ELDO and ESRO rapidly
merged into the European Space Agency (ESA), a single intergovernmental
agency responsible for managing all integrated space programs. France and nine
other nations joined this governing body, which was tasked with gathering funds
among the various member states to develop space programs. The ESA functions
were conceived to preserve the national interests of all federated nations through
the adoption of the so-called Juste-Retour rule. Through this, the agency was
allowed to give contracts to European industries in proportion to each nation’s
contribution to the agency itself. So, even countries with few resources could contribute to large programs with limited industrial shares.
In particular, ESA was tasked with building a reliable rocket, the Ariane launcher,
which was to be designed by CNES and largely manufactured by French industry.
In a way, the origins of the Ariane launcher can be found in the German V2. Just
before the end of the war, several scientists from von Braun’s team escaped to
France and started working in the newly created Laboratoire de Recherches
Balistiques et Aérodynamiques (LRBA). Together with French engineers, they
contributed to designing the first sounding rockets, Veronique and Vesta, which
were launched from the test range of Hammaguir in the Algerian Sahara.
13
The first Ariane 1 successfully took off on Christmas day in 1979 from the
Guyana site. ESA entrusted a private French company, Arianespace, to sell the
Ariane launch services worldwide. Since the company’s main shareholder was the
French space agency CNES and the minor one was the French industry, France
kept full control of the whole chain. Some years later, the fourth generation Ariane
4 launch vehicle became a mature and reliable rocket that could challenge the US
in the rising market of launch services for telecommunications satellites.
This European success was in part due to an unfortunate event. Until the mideighties, the US held the monopoly of the market with an annual turnover of $3
billion, but when the Challenger shuttle exploded, NASA grounded its shuttles for
years. Since the other rockets, such as Atlas, Delta and Titan, were reserved for
military satellites only, the entire US commercial launch business remained on the
ground with the shuttle fleet. And since Russian and Chinese missiles were off the
market for geopolitical reasons, Arianespace had very weak competition. In the
following decade it launched 83 satellites, as opposed to the 39 of the Americans,
eight of the Chinese, six of the Russians and four of the Japanese,
14
securing an
average revenue of more than $100 million per launch.
This monopoly generated a huge cash flow, making Arianespace’s annual revenues soon reach $1 billion, one third of ESA’s annual budget. The company’s
13
Huwart, Olivier. 2004. Du V2 à Véronique : la naissance des fusées françaises, Marines éditions.
14
http://www.spacelaunchreport.com/.
28 Rocket Science: Globalization and Missiles