Foreign Relations of the United States, 1964–1968, Volume XXXIV, Energy Diplomacy and Global Issues

100. Research Memorandum From the Director of the Bureau of Intelligence and Research (Hughes) to Secretary of State Rusk¹

RSB–46

Washington, March 25, 1968.

SUBJECT

• The Ambivalent Soviet View of INTELSAT

An assessment of the factors shaping Soviet attitudes toward the question of international satellite communications.

Abstract

Since the President invited the USSR and its allies to join INTELSAT last August, the Soviets—after a delay—have parried with vague counterproposals of cooperation between INTELSAT and MOLNIYA (the USSR’s satellite communications system), possibly under UN auspices. Moscow has been countering such proposals in one way or another since 1964 (when it rejected the first US invitation to participate in INTELSAT), proposing first UN control of communications satellite arrangements, later an international hookup based on MOLNIYA. Cooperative arrangements such as the Soviets now hint at, however, may well represent their first preference, for cooperation combines the best of two Soviet worlds: use of INTELSAT’s communications facilities without the drawbacks of joining what the Soviets see as a US-dominated organization.

Soviet Hints at Cooperation

In his message to Congress of August 14, 1967, the President urged the USSR and Eastern European countries to give serious consideration to membership in INTELSAT. This proposal was conveyed formally to the USSR on August 28, 1967, and repeated March 12, 1968. While the Soviets have not yet responded directly to these invitations or expressed interest in them, they have been dropping a few hints about their view of the future development of international Comsat (satellite communications):

• —In an interview published in Trud on December 27, 1967, Soviet Deputy Minister of Communications Sergeichuk stated that “questions of exchanges of television programs will constitute a substantial part of the activity of the international systems of satellite communications now being created—the joint system of socialist countries and the INTELSAT system. The regular intercontinental exchange of black-and-white and color programs will depend on cooperation between them.”
• —In mid-January, the USSR hosted an international conference on development of communications equipment. A TASS dispatch of January 17 reported that the main result was to establish close contacts between Western and Soviet specialists. It also quoted an ITT official to the effect that establishment of a global Comsat system required the participation of Soviet specialists.
• —A French official told us in early March that, during talks between French and Soviet space experts in February, the Soviets showed interest in participating in a global Comsat organization along UN lines, possibly as a UN-attached agency. (A few days later, a Yugoslav telecommunications official, in urging a more flexible US attitude toward Comsat arrangements, suggested that UNESCO was interested in this matter and should, if possible, be accommodated.)

Soviet Attitudes to INTELSAT

For Use of INTELSAT as Facilities. There are several reasons why the USSR would probably accept cooperation with INTELSAT, if conditions were right. In view of the actual direction of Soviet telecommunications development and the relatively high cost of establishing a worldwide Comsat network, MOLNIYA was probably intended from the outset mainly as a national system.² The USSR has launched 7 communications satellites and built 20 ground stations and appears well on the way to achieving a high level of domestic Comsat service. With this core of facilities, Molniya also has potential for expansion into a regional system, accommodating Eastern European and perhaps southern and Far Eastern border countries. In addition, the USSR reportedly concluded agreements in 1966 to construct ground stations in Egypt and Cuba. In none of these cases, however, has there been confirmation of follow-up action.

It seems doubtful that the Soviets ever seriously considered breaking out of a regional framework and mounting a self-sufficient world hookup competing across-the-board with INTELSAT. To be sure, the USSR for a while went through motions consistent with such a policy; while beefing up Molniya ground and space facilities, the Soviets proceeded to exchange color-television transmissions with Paris via MOLNIYA and last April got Eastern European regimes to sign a joint communiqué endorsing international development of MOLNIYA. These motions, however, may merely have been ploys designed to increase Soviet bargaining power in future negotiations on a deal with INTELSAT. The transmissions to and from Paris never passed the experimental stage and were probably aimed mainly at dramatizing the Paris-Moscow “dialogue” and advertising the French SECAM process. (Even in the latter sphere, Franco-Soviet cooperation has so far been stunted; mass production of color-television sets has been stymied by technical difficulties, and marketing prospects are dimmed by Eastern European malaise about SECAM’s cost and incompatibility with Western color-television processes.³

Lacking worldwide facilities themselves, the Soviets have little alternative but to sacrifice the convenience of future Comsat or to make a deal with other regional systems, which at this stage means INTELSAT. The time is appropriate for such a deal. INTELSAT’s 61 member nations are now developing definitive arrangement proposals for consideration at an international conference early in 1969. These definitive arrangements will, when they become effective, supersede the present Agreement on Interim Arrangements.

Against INTELSAT Organization as Presently Constituted. Soviet silence in the face of recent US invitations to join INTELSAT is consistent with the initial Soviet posture when the organization was formed in 1964. The USSR declined a US invitation on that occasion also, suggesting that any international Comsat system should come under UN control.

In the Soviet view, the main drawback to membership in INTELSAT is probably that it would, inter alia, amount to an official Soviet endorsement of an organization that seems to be dominated by the US. (The formula for allocating voting power among INTELSAT members—their share of international communications traffic—gives the US about 53 percent of the vote.) The USSR has consistently avoided such endorsements, as in the case of the Asian Development Bank (where the US subscribes the majority of capital). Vietnam of course makes the Soviets doubly wary of overt demonstrations of direct cooperation with the US. Furthermore, INTELSAT itself is currently undergoing some ferment which, in the Soviet calculus, no doubt appears promising and which might be discouraged by a sudden Soviet entry at this time. Moscow has no doubt gotten wind of various French proposals for either decreasing the US voting share or forming separate regional Comsat systems.

The Alternative of INTELSAT-MOLNIYA Cooperation. This probably represents the Soviet first preference in international Comsat arrangements. A cooperative setup might well involve the best of both worlds for the USSR, securing the advantages of INTELSAT service without the drawbacks of INTELSAT membership. Moscow could stay out of what it may feel is a US-operated club, yet at the same time plug Molniya into a world hookup and accordingly enhance its international standing and earnings. The Soviets would also probably obtain considerable leverage in international satellite-communications affairs if cooperative arrangements gave MOLNIYA a regional monopoly and if user countries came to rely on MOLNIYA as a link in the world system.

Soviet interest in Comsat cooperation has been demonstrated as well as referred to in recent statements. In 1967 the Soviets agreed to transmit two television shows to a global audience in conjunction with INTELSAT. Satellites of this organization were allowed to relay live telecasts between Moscow and Tokyo on the occasion of the inauguration of Japanese-Soviet air service last April. One MOLNIYA and three INTELSAT satellites were also scheduled to cooperate in a global television spectacular last June, but this agreement was not carried out because of Soviet reaction to the Middle East crisis; Moscow claimed that Western TV stations were “conducting a smear campaign against Arab countries.”

The Future. The USSR is no doubt still quite uncertain about the likelihood of Comsat cooperation and about Western views on this question. Soviet statements to date have been framed in low key and channeled through spokesmen of middling authority. Future Soviet tactics and postures in the Comsat game will doubtless be strongly affected by the emerging moves of Western players—and perhaps spasmodically by the East-West “political climate”—as the 1969 renegotiation date approaches. The main Soviet objectives, however, will probably remain fairly constant: a Soviet monopoly on Comsat over or near the USSR, plus close and regular telecommunications exchanges with other international systems—whether they remain one, INTELSAT, or become several.

1. Source: National Archives and Records Administration, RG 59, Records of the Department of State, Central Files, 1967–69, TEL 6. Secret; No Foreign Dissem.
2. See Research Memorandum RSB–26, “The Molniya Satellite of the USSR: Its Place in International Communications,” March 22, 1966 (Limited Official Use/No Foreign Dissem). [Footnote in the source text.]
3. See Research Memorandum RSB–132, “Signs of Eastern European Indecision about Adopting French Color TV,” December 12, 1967 (Secret/No Foreign Dissem). [Footnote in the source text.]