[Feature: Questioning Japan's Space Strategy] Internal Organizational Convenience Takes Precedence Over External Demands and Technical Necessity—The "Weakness" of Japan's Space Development Projects

Japan's space development system can be broadly divided into four periods: (1) The Formative Period (from the Pencil Rocket experiments at the University of Tokyo's Institute of Industrial Science to the establishment of the National Space Development Agency of Japan: 1955–1969); (2) The Development Period (a dual-track system of practical application by the National Space Development Agency and space science by the University of Tokyo/Institute of Space and Astronautical Science: 1969–2001); (3) The Transitional Period (from the integration of central government ministries to the establishment of a unified Cabinet Office system following the enactment of the Basic Space Law: 2001–2012); and (4) The Practical Application Period (promoting space utilization led by the Cabinet Office with an emphasis on security: 2012–).

To summarize this like a story plot: first, from the chaotic organizational situation of the formative period, the Space Activities Commission was established under the Prime Minister's Office. This established a dual-track system consisting of space science research by the Ministry of Education, centered on the University of Tokyo, and technological development for practical space utilization by the National Space Development Agency of Japan (a special corporation under the jurisdiction of the Science and Technology Agency, the Ministry of Transport, and the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications).

Under this dual-track system, Japan's space development progressed smoothly through the 1970s and 80s. However, at the end of the 1980s, the United States, feeling threatened by the growing Japanese economy, initiated the Super 301 trade negotiations. As a result, Japan was forced to promise to open the procurement of practical satellites to international competition. The path for launching a space industry—where the government would designate domestic manufacturers to order satellites, and those manufacturers would accumulate technology through satellite development to gain a foothold in the international satellite market—was severed.

As a result, Japanese space development in the 1990s specialized in government-led technological development. The new H-II rocket was launched, development of the H-IIA began immediately after, the M-V rocket started operations for launching scientific satellites and probes, and technical test satellites and scientific probes were launched one after another. While technology advanced, the industry itself was in a state of decline.

In 2001, due to the reorganization of central government ministries, the Space Activities Commission, which had been directly under the Prime Minister's Office, was downgraded to a committee within the newly established Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT). This marked the beginning of a period of confusion without a national command center. The Prime Minister's Office is a government agency that assists the Prime Minister's duties, and space development, which had been policy-wise directly linked to the Cabinet, was downgraded to the work of a single ministry, MEXT.

From within that situation, an argument arose from the political side to "use space as a policy tool"—in other words, "space is an important element for national security and should be controlled by politics." In 2008, the Basic Space Law, which serves as the foundation for overall space policy, was enacted. Along with this, the Strategic Headquarters for Space Policy, composed of Cabinet members, was established, and the space sector once again returned to a system under direct government control. Subsequently, after the creation of the Cabinet Office's Committee on National Space Policy to replace the Space Activities Commission, a unified Cabinet Office system was completed in 2012 with the establishment of the Office of National Space Policy within the Cabinet Office.

One cannot help but say that the course of Japan's space development over the past 60-plus years has been aimless. The system of the Space Activities Commission under the direct control of the Cabinet, which had been successfully established within the Prime Minister's Office, was dismantled during the 2001 ministry reorganization. (According to one theory, the newly formed MEXT, created by merging the Ministry of Education and the Science and Technology Agency, took in the Space Activities Commission in an attempt to gain total jurisdiction over the space development field.) It then took 12 years to finally return to a system similar to the old one with the Cabinet Office's Committee on National Space Policy.

However, it has not returned completely to the way it was.

The Cabinet Office is a gathering of personnel seconded from various ministries, and the interior of the Cabinet Office is a site for turf wars between those agencies. With the enforcement of the Basic Space Law, jurisdiction over space development moved from MEXT to the Cabinet Office, but if the personnel seconded from MEXT are the ones running things within the Cabinet Office, the actual situation remains unchanged.

It took four years from the enactment of the Basic Space Law in 2008 to the completion of the new system with the establishment of the Office of National Space Policy. In fact, the Basic Space Law had a supplementary provision stating that the transition to the new system should occur within one year of enforcement. There are several reasons why what was intended to be one year took four (including the Great East Japan Earthquake on March 11, 2011). However, the biggest reason lay in the internal feuds between ministries within the Cabinet Office. It was a battle between MEXT, which did not want to lose its authority, and the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI), which wanted to seize it.

METI had been enthusiastic about the industrialization of space development since the era of its predecessor, the Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI). In the 1970s, under the pretext of "searching for underground resources with earth observation satellites," its Agency of Industrial Science and Technology promoted R&D of elemental technologies at the Mechanical Engineering Laboratory, the National Research Laboratory of Metrology, and the Geological Survey of Japan (all of which have since merged into the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology). Entering the 1980s, it collected investments from the industrial world to establish what could be called "MITI's version of the National Space Development Agency": the Institute for Unmanned Space Experiment Free Flyer (USEF), the Earth Resources Satellite Data Analysis Center (ERSDAC), and the Japan Resources Observation System Organization (JAROS). (These three foundations are now integrated into the Japan Space Systems.) Since the launch of the Earth Resources Satellite "Fuyo-1 (JERS-1)" in 1992, it has a track record of launching and operating several satellites. Within the ministry, it has watched for opportunities by establishing a Space Industry Office within the Aircraft and Ordnance Division, making it an independent Space Industry Division, and then moving it back to a Space Industry Office.

The movement to enact the Basic Space Law originated from dissatisfaction on the political side, claiming that "MEXT only does technological development for the sake of technological development, and it hasn't become space development that is at all useful for the country." The root cause of this was that politics made significant concessions to the U.S. in Super 301 and gave away the seeds of space industrialization, but politicians conveniently forgot this and harbored dissatisfaction toward MEXT.

I do not know whether it was METI that guided that dissatisfaction toward the Basic Space Law. However, it is a fact that in enacting the Basic Space Law, politicians conveniently used METI as an operational force to counter MEXT, and METI moved aggressively.

As a result, an internal feud broke out in the Cabinet Office after the enforcement of the Basic Space Law over the struggle for authority between METI and MEXT. Although called a feud, it was a battle of words. Based on the text of laws and the track records of each ministry's work, they clashed over claims like, "Because this means XX, we should do it this way under the new system."

METI wanted to move actual power to the Cabinet Office. If they did, personnel seconded from METI to the Cabinet Office could effectively run space policy. MEXT wanted to keep the Cabinet Office as a mere figurehead as much as possible and preserve actual power within MEXT.

What moved the situation in METI's favor was the satellite positioning system. This is the Quasi-Zenith Satellite System (QZSS) "Michibiki," Japan's unique satellite positioning system currently under development.

A satellite positioning system is a mechanism for knowing one's position by receiving radio waves from multiple satellites. Currently, four giant systems covering the entire world with about 30 satellites each are in operation: the U.S. "GPS," Russia's "GLONASS," Europe's "GALILEO," and China's "Beidou." Additionally, India's "IRNSS," a regional system covering the Indian subcontinent, is active. Japan's Michibiki, like IRNSS, is a regional system limited to the vicinity of Japan, consisting of a total of seven satellites: five in a special orbit called the Quasi-Zenith Orbit and two geostationary satellites.

The Quasi-Zenith Satellite System has gone through various twists and turns since its technical possibility was proposed in the 1970s, but at the stage of the Basic Space Law's enforcement in 2008, it had hit a deadlock.

The Quasi-Zenith Orbit is an orbit where a satellite remains almost stationary directly above the Japanese archipelago, located at 30–40 degrees north latitude, for more than eight consecutive hours. In other words, if three satellites are launched, one satellite will be visible near Japan's zenith at all times, 24 hours a day, by taking turns. Including backup satellites in case of failure, the total becomes five. Sending radio waves from directly overhead prevents them from being blocked by terrain or buildings. This allows for a radio environment with excellent reception.

In the 1990s, the use of the Quasi-Zenith Satellite System for satellite mobile phone services was considered. However, this concept vanished because demand sufficient to cover the cost of three satellites could not be expected. Next, a use was proposed to provide multi-channel digital broadcasting to moving objects such as automobiles. Toward its realization, in 2002, a business company called New Satellite Business Co., Ltd. was established, led by Mitsubishi Electric and involving even Toyota Motor Corporation, but this too was dissolved in 2007 because profitability could not be expected.

The last remaining use was "GPS complementation," which involves transmitting positioning signals compatible with the U.S. GPS from directly above Japan. GPS consists of 24 satellites (30 including backups) orbiting at an altitude of 20,000 km, transmitting positioning signals. A receiver on the ground can determine its latitude and longitude if it can receive waves from at least three of them, and its altitude as well if it can receive waves from four or more. However, since GPS satellites are not always directly overhead, the waves can be blocked by terrain or buildings. Furthermore, waves reflected by terrain or buildings are a major cause of positioning errors. Therefore, if there is one satellite transmitting positioning signals from directly overhead, stable positioning becomes possible at all times. At the stage of 2008, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) was in the middle of developing an experimental satellite "QZS" (launched in 2010 and named "Michibiki") for that purpose. Only one QZS satellite had been budgeted, and there was no roadmap for how to proceed toward a practical system after that.

METI picked that up.

How did they pick it up? They argued, "A satellite positioning system is space infrastructure related to the work of all ministries. Therefore, it is inappropriate to place it under the jurisdiction of a single ministry like MEXT, and it is appropriate for the Cabinet Office, which oversees national policy in general, to hold it." They used the satellite positioning system as a weapon to strip MEXT of its authority and transfer it to the Cabinet Office.

In fact, there was a hole in METI's argument. The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism (MLIT) had already begun transmitting "MSAS" signals to increase the precision of GPS signals with the Multi-functional Transport Satellite "Himawari 6," launched in 2005, and "Himawari 7," launched in 2006. If MEXT had said, "The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism is already doing it," they should have been able to refute METI's claim. Had that happened, the Quasi-Zenith Satellite System "Michibiki" we see today might not have existed.

However, MEXT did not notice this and was forced to accept METI's argument. METI's plan to transfer authority from MEXT to the Cabinet Office succeeded. As a result, the successor satellites for "Michibiki," whose future had been uncertain, were budgeted all at once, and it became the centerpiece of space development under the new Cabinet Office-led system as the "Quasi-Zenith Satellite System," a social infrastructure developed by the state.

How should policies regarding the satellite positioning system have been decided originally?

First, a fundamental debate was likely necessary: "Should Japan have a satellite positioning system or not, and if so, what would be the merits and demerits?" Next, a discussion should have been held on "if we are to have one, what kind of system is optimal across various fields such as administration, diplomacy, and security?" Space technology should have been reconciled with the demands of policy and administration to choose the most cost-effective method that was technically feasible, and then it should have been translated into an actual space plan.

In reality, it was not so. The Quasi-Zenith Satellite System had been smoldering for a long time since the 1970s because "no profitability could be seen even if we tried to use it," and if left alone, it should have ended with a single technical test satellite, "Michibiki." METI picked it up not because it was the "optimal satellite positioning system for Japan," but because it could be used as a "tool to transfer administrative authority from MEXT to the Cabinet Office," and eventually built it up into the centerpiece of the new system. Of course, there is no doubt that a common understanding that "a satellite positioning system is a necessary space infrastructure for Japan" had permeated by then. However, originally, the first step should not have been based on the premise of having a Quasi-Zenith Satellite, but rather a more fundamental discussion of "what kind of satellite positioning system is optimal for Japan."

The Quasi-Zenith Satellite System leaped to become the centerpiece of Japan's space policy not as a result of reconciling the demands of administration, diplomacy, and security with space technology, but due to organizational convenience within the government structure.

The process leading to the realization of the Quasi-Zenith Satellite System can be said to encapsulate the chronic ailments of Japanese administration. Something that originally should have been planned by reconciling policy demands with feasible technology is instead elevated to a major issue of national policy due to internal organizational dynamics and convenience.

"Using space as a policy tool" was the basic philosophy behind the enactment of the Basic Space Law. However, the resulting new system ultimately just rebranded the former Space Activities Commission of the Prime Minister's Office as the Committee on National Space Policy of the Cabinet Office, and the group of bureaucrats pulling the strings simply changed from MEXT (formerly the Science and Technology Agency) to METI.

Even now, we have not reached the point of deciding space plans after properly discussing "what kind of tool is most optimal for what kind of policy," and the structure where inward-looking organizational reasons sway policy remains in place.