The Joys of GPS

AROUND the middle of February, American satellite drivers will turn on their newest orbiter: a Navstar GPS satellite currently set for a January 29 blast-off That’s on a hurry-up schedule, because it normally takes them about 40 days after a launch to prepare a satellite in the Global Positioning System for full operations. They have to nudge it into a final orbit and make sure it’s working correctly—and able to send out the signals that help bombers hit bull’s-eyes. “Satellites are pretty complex, and they don’t just start working a few hours after they’ve gone up,” says Air Force Lt. Col. Scott Henderson. Teams working nonstop will compress the usual 40-day timetable to 17 days or less, because two of the 28 GPS satellites now zipping around the planet are dying of old age. Another source of urgency comes from what Henderson calls “the evolving world situation.” Does he mean Iraq? “Let’s just call it ‘the evolving world situation,”’ he says, with the instinctive caution of a military man holding a high-level security clearance.

The 1991 Gulf War is sometimes called the First Space War, because it was the first clash in which military assets above the earth’s atmosphere played a major role in aiding forces on the ground and in the air. GPS was a state-of-the-art technology back then. Today, it’s fundamental to the American way of war: Every American war is a space war.

About the Author

John J. Miller

John J. Miller, a former national correspondent for National Review, is the director of the Dow Journalism Program at Hillsdale College. He is the author of A Gift of Freedom: How the John M. Olin Foundation Changed America.

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AROUND the middle of February, American satellite drivers will turn on their newest orbiter: a Navstar GPS satellite currently set for a January 29 blast-off That’s on a hurry-up schedule, because it normally takes them about 40 days after a launch to prepare a satellite in the Global Positioning System for full operations. They have to nudge it into a final orbit and make sure it’s working correctly—and able to send out the signals that help bombers hit bull’s-eyes. “Satellites are pretty complex, and they don’t just start working a few hours after they’ve gone up,” says Air Force Lt. Col. Scott Henderson. Teams working nonstop will compress the usual 40-day timetable to 17 days or less, because two of the 28 GPS satellites now zipping around the planet are dying of old age. Another source of urgency comes from what Henderson calls “the evolving world situation.” Does he mean Iraq? “Let’s just call it ‘the evolving world situation,”’ he says, with the instinctive caution of a military man holding a high-level security clearance.

The 1991 Gulf War is sometimes called the First Space War, because it was the first clash in which military assets above the earth’s atmosphere played a major role in aiding forces on the ground and in the air. GPS was a state-of-the-art technology back then. Today, it’s fundamental to the American way of war: Every American war is a space war.

About the Author

John J. Miller

John J. Miller, a former national correspondent for National Review, is the director of the Dow Journalism Program at Hillsdale College. He is the author of A Gift of Freedom: How the John M. Olin Foundation Changed America.