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Guest: Nicholas J. Wood; Topic: The S. Korean space program analysis re the Center for Space Policy and Strategy. Robert S. Wilson was the co-author of the study which you can find at https://csps.aerospace.org/sites/default/files/2023-08/Wilson-Wood_SouthKorea_20230802.pdf. You will find a link to this paper on the blog for this program. I urge you to read and review this paper as it goes into far more detail than we had time to do for our 66-minute program. I also urge you to once again pay attention to the Tags used for this archived program as they do include important subtopics from the paper that may have received little or no mention during our discussion. For your convenience, the Tags are repeated below.
Tags: Nicholas Wood, the South Korean space program analysis, S. Korean budget concerns, privatization, Public Private Partnerships (PPP), Russia, S. Korean space program focus, military focus, research goals, The Republic of Korea, space debris role, U.S. assistance to S. Korean space program, Korea Aerospace Research Institute (KARI), U.S. ITAR considerations, S. Korea acceleration to become a space power, easing of U.S. licensing for satellite technology, S. Korean space goals, President Yoon space goals, Korea’s Fourth space Development Promotion Basic Plan 2023, building the S. Korea space industry and economy, S. Korean civilian space awareness and attitudes, S. Korea and Artemis, S. Korean human spaceflight plans, GPS national security considerations, S. Korea space economy on a global measurement scale, private space stations, India’s space program, S. Korea and spy satellites, Space Force considerations with S. Korea, nuclear weapons, ICBM awareness, S. Korea regulatory issues for space, collaboration with the U.S., potential U.S.-S. Korean PNT collaboration (regional GPS)
There were many highlights mentioned during the show that caught my attention. First, I don’t believe that the South Korean space program has received much Space Show attention over the years so to me this was a very educational and important program given the key role of S. Korean in overall U.S. national security plus the security of the region. Early in the program our guest was asked about a commercial space sector in the Korean space program. I was surprised to learn that such a segment did exist, that it was growing, and it had a focus on Public Private Partnerships with the government. Our guest then went on to discuss the different focus and goals of the S. Korean space program which included both military and pure research goals. Our guest talked about S. Korea having developed a three-stage Nuri rocket which deployed a satellite to orbit in 2022. The Nuri rocket was built by the government Korea Aerospace Research Institute. The success of the rocket and satellite launch to orbit put S. Korean into the club of nations that were able to launch into orbit. This particular club of nations was not a big club, but it was a big deal for S. Korea. Also mentioned was an earlier joint rocket program with Russia but the program did not continue. Nico (the preferred name for our guest for this program) continued to point out that the Republic of Korea was aggressively pushing their space program forward as they want to be a real space power. So far, the ROC has put into orbit electro-optical imagery, synthetic aperture radar, and comm satellites for dual purpose with both civilian and military usage.
Later in the discussion, one of our listeners sent in an email asking about the civilian population’s space awareness level and attitude toward a robust space program for their nation. Don’t miss what our Nico had to say about space and the Korean population. I was surprised to learn that Korea was undertaking a space debris mitigation program. In addition, as mentioned earlier, they want to have a regional GPS and there will likely be U.S. collaboration on these projects. Our friend Marshall called to point out that S. Korea was #13 per capita in global economic GDP but 7th in the measurement of global aerospace programming and development. Additional topics that were either mention or talked about included space tourism, private space station development and potential concern or even partnering with the Indian space program. We even had a listener inquire if there was any interest by the ROK in developing or obtaining nuclear weapons.
Please post your comments/questions for our guest on our show blog for this program. You can reach our guest, Nicholos Wood, through The Space Show.
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