THE START OF COMMERCIAL SATELLITE COMMUNICATIONS

The article following is perhaps unique among the many papers published thus far in this column. It covers not only the development of some of the technology required to turn the dream of commercial satellite communications into reality, but describes the policy decisions and politics involved in making this happen in the United States and elsewhere in the world as well. Policy questions raised and discussed include, first, the question of whether satellite communications in the United States should be government-run or a commercial enterprise; followed by the issue of how control should be manifested in international communication satellites. These policy questions in modern times are probably unique to satellite communication systems. Joe Pelton, the author, is well positioned to write an account of the early days of satellite communications in all of its ramifications, in both the policy and technical areas, having been present and working at Comsat Corporation, as well as later at Intelsat, during much of the period under discussion. We plan to follow this article with one focusing more on the communication technologies developed at Comsat during the early days of satellite communications. That article will be written by one of the engineers working at Comsat at the time. In the meantime, I am sure all readers will enjoy this article. Note that a number of readers of previous articles in this column have responded with letters to the editor commenting on, or expanding on, those articles. We urge you to send in your comments and or/questions about this article or any of the earlier articles as well. © 2010 IEEE.