WEBVTT - How Politics Will Expand Into the Final Frontier with Author Tim Marshall 0:00:03.120 --> 0:00:15.160 Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, radio News. 0:00:17.560 --> 0:00:21.159 Hello Votonomics listeners. It's Alegristratton and it is time for 0:00:21.360 --> 0:00:26.040 another edition of our Summer Reading special. While Adrian, Stephanie 0:00:26.079 --> 0:00:28.920 and I are off for a portion of the next month, 0:00:29.240 --> 0:00:31.640 we thought it'd be good to offer up a useful 0:00:31.680 --> 0:00:35.440 summer reading list. We each selected an author whose nonfiction 0:00:35.520 --> 0:00:38.600 work we felt was relevant and informative on the state 0:00:38.640 --> 0:00:42.520 of politics and economics right now. Last week Adrian spoke 0:00:42.560 --> 0:00:47.239 with Varied Zakaria about his latest release, The Age of Revolutions. 0:00:47.600 --> 0:00:49.720 It is a great listen, of course, so please check 0:00:49.720 --> 0:00:52.479 it out if you haven't already. But this week I'm 0:00:52.520 --> 0:00:55.880 bringing you a conversation with Tim Marshall. He is the 0:00:55.960 --> 0:00:59.360 author of Prisoners of Geography The Power of Geography. You've 0:00:59.360 --> 0:01:03.000 probably read those on previous summer holidays, but now more 0:01:03.040 --> 0:01:07.520 recently The Future of Geography. Now this is the addition 0:01:07.560 --> 0:01:11.480 where Votonomics goes astronomic. When I'm not at Bloomberg, I 0:01:11.600 --> 0:01:15.200 helped run the UK's first spaceport, sax of Ord, which 0:01:15.280 --> 0:01:18.360 is based in the Shetland Islands. What has been striking 0:01:18.400 --> 0:01:21.240 to me week after week of recording Voteronomics with Stephanie 0:01:21.240 --> 0:01:24.560 and Adrian is that all the dynamics of diplomacy that 0:01:24.600 --> 0:01:27.440 we discuss can also be seen in the space domain. 0:01:28.120 --> 0:01:31.760 Space has the capacity to impact voters' lives and boardrooms too, 0:01:32.200 --> 0:01:34.920 but despite the best efforts of Elon Musk etal, it 0:01:35.080 --> 0:01:40.000 still remains a weirdly liminal area, very far away from 0:01:40.080 --> 0:01:45.399 mainstream discourse. So to help bring space into votonomics, I 0:01:45.520 --> 0:01:49.480 wanted to bring in author and geographer broadcaster Tim Marshall, 0:01:49.520 --> 0:01:52.520 who wrote the best selling Prisoners of Geography and a 0:01:52.560 --> 0:01:55.080 number of other best sellers, and has now applied or 0:01:55.160 --> 0:01:58.320 rather published a book last year applying his signature erudition 0:01:58.960 --> 0:02:02.360 and wit to space. Welcome Tim, very kind of you. 0:02:02.440 --> 0:02:03.360 Thank you. 0:02:03.480 --> 0:02:05.800 I'm a big fan, always have been when you were 0:02:06.280 --> 0:02:08.200 Sky News diplomatic editor. 0:02:07.960 --> 0:02:10.320 When I was at Newsnight that sort of thing. Yes, 0:02:10.960 --> 0:02:14.600 it does feel because you did the big brain stuff 0:02:14.760 --> 0:02:15.080 they did. 0:02:15.200 --> 0:02:17.040 They did cross though I was trying to remember there 0:02:17.120 --> 0:02:19.040 was a summit, wasn't there where I think we both 0:02:19.440 --> 0:02:21.639 almos raised eyebrows and had our head in our hands 0:02:21.639 --> 0:02:25.000 at some point. Look, Tim, in your book, you are 0:02:25.080 --> 0:02:28.200 clear that we are now to quote you we're now 0:02:28.200 --> 0:02:31.240 in the era of astropolitics. Tell us what that means. 0:02:31.800 --> 0:02:36.880 Astropolitics is when geopolitics moves out into space. Geopolitics is 0:02:36.880 --> 0:02:44.000 where you look at resources, populations, people, well everything really 0:02:44.720 --> 0:02:48.239 and there is a geography to space which is not 0:02:48.840 --> 0:02:53.000 properly explained usually, and that geography does inform part of 0:02:53.040 --> 0:02:57.320 the decision making that the big countries and indeed companies make. 0:02:57.720 --> 0:03:00.520 And so we're now deep, I would say, into the 0:03:00.560 --> 0:03:04.320 era of astropolitics and also what I would call space 0:03:04.400 --> 0:03:08.120 race two point zero, because there are many similarities with 0:03:08.160 --> 0:03:11.160 the sixties and seventies, but there are also major differences. 0:03:11.639 --> 0:03:14.760 They are well, in those days, there were no such 0:03:14.800 --> 0:03:18.600 things as lasers. There were no commercial companies in space. 0:03:20.040 --> 0:03:23.600 We weren't shooting basically things of the size of fridge 0:03:23.600 --> 0:03:26.639 freezers asteroids to see if we can deflect them. We 0:03:26.760 --> 0:03:30.960 never dreamt of mining the Moon, and the commercial aspects 0:03:30.960 --> 0:03:34.920 of it were I wouldn't say peripheral. I mean, you 0:03:34.960 --> 0:03:38.320 know Boeing and Lockheed Martin. Of course they always had 0:03:38.320 --> 0:03:42.400 a relationship with NASA. But one of the biggest differences 0:03:42.480 --> 0:03:44.560 in space race two point now is just how front 0:03:44.600 --> 0:03:47.720 and center commercial companies are and I don't just mean 0:03:47.960 --> 0:03:51.760 elon musk. You know, there's a raft of companies who 0:03:51.920 --> 0:03:55.200 are pumping billions of you know, it's a billion more 0:03:55.240 --> 0:04:00.240 than billions of dollars industry, and it's growing rapidly, very 0:04:00.280 --> 0:04:03.400 high risk industry in many ways. So you know, it 0:04:03.520 --> 0:04:06.080 is different to the first iteration. 0:04:06.560 --> 0:04:10.280 So, Tim, let's talk about low Earth orbit, which people 0:04:10.280 --> 0:04:13.640 call LEO for short. There's lots of definitions for it, 0:04:13.720 --> 0:04:17.880 aren't there, But essentially it's anything under one thousand kilometers up. 0:04:18.240 --> 0:04:21.000 This is another problem. You know I mentioned earlier about 0:04:21.160 --> 0:04:24.240 the differences between space race and space rates two point oh. 0:04:24.600 --> 0:04:27.599 Another problem is we don't have the legislation or even 0:04:27.600 --> 0:04:30.760 the guidelines for space rates two point oh because the 0:04:30.760 --> 0:04:33.720 space regulations and guidelines are written in the nineteen sixties. 0:04:33.960 --> 0:04:36.039 Out of Space Treaty is nineteen sixty seven, and we 0:04:36.160 --> 0:04:39.440 can't even agree exactly where space starts. But you asked 0:04:39.480 --> 0:04:42.680 me about LEO. It's very worrying talking to someone who 0:04:42.720 --> 0:04:45.240 really knows more than you do about this. I had 0:04:45.240 --> 0:04:45.679 no idea. 0:04:46.560 --> 0:04:48.760 The Scottish the same, Tim. 0:04:48.800 --> 0:04:52.800 The Scottish version of Cape Canaveral low Earth orbit is 0:04:52.839 --> 0:04:55.600 where a vast majority of the satellites are. There are 0:04:55.640 --> 0:04:58.560 about eight and a half thousand working satellites, about three 0:04:58.600 --> 0:05:02.279 thousand defunct satellites, which is a lot. And you know, 0:05:02.400 --> 0:05:04.560 my generation grown up in the sixties and seventies, there 0:05:04.560 --> 0:05:07.200 were only really two space powers at two people who 0:05:07.279 --> 0:05:10.039 really had a presence in space that we were all 0:05:10.120 --> 0:05:14.159 aware of. There's eighty countries in space now, and I 0:05:14.240 --> 0:05:17.560 know there's a lot of space up there, but it 0:05:17.640 --> 0:05:21.800 is getting crowded. And the conservative estimates are that there 0:05:21.839 --> 0:05:25.960 will be at least thirty thousand satellites by the end 0:05:26.000 --> 0:05:29.400 of this decade. That's a conservative estimate. The Chinese will 0:05:29.400 --> 0:05:33.160 probably put up twenty thousand, musc will put up ten thousand, 0:05:33.240 --> 0:05:37.240 and that's just two examples. And although the satellites are 0:05:37.240 --> 0:05:39.400 getting smaller and smaller, some of them the size of 0:05:39.400 --> 0:05:43.240 a Rubik's cube CubeSats as they're known, it's getting crowded, 0:05:43.560 --> 0:05:46.599 it's getting competitive. He said in the introduction about how 0:05:46.839 --> 0:05:49.159 you know it's pretty sort of out there and not 0:05:49.279 --> 0:05:51.680 part of our lives. And it's true we don't think 0:05:51.720 --> 0:05:56.280 about them, but it's absolutely integral to all of our lives. 0:05:56.360 --> 0:05:59.760 Every time you put petrol in a car, every time 0:05:59.839 --> 0:06:02.120 you get on a plane, every time you do a 0:06:02.160 --> 0:06:06.920 bank transaction, and thousands of other examples. They are connected 0:06:06.960 --> 0:06:08.800 to space, and it's a growing industry. 0:06:09.040 --> 0:06:12.599 You've summarized the companies and the money to be made, 0:06:12.640 --> 0:06:14.960 the big business that is being made out of satellites 0:06:15.080 --> 0:06:18.200 up up in space right now. But you also alluded 0:06:18.240 --> 0:06:21.240 to if we've got thirty thousand satellites going up in 0:06:21.279 --> 0:06:23.880 the near future, twenty thousand of those will be Chinese, 0:06:23.960 --> 0:06:26.640 and then some of those will be Musk and American. 0:06:27.360 --> 0:06:29.840 Right there in that sentence, you've given us the kind 0:06:29.880 --> 0:06:36.200 of great Game of Earth transposed to space. Just talk 0:06:36.279 --> 0:06:37.920 us through and this is I think probably what your 0:06:37.920 --> 0:06:41.960 astropolitics is all about. Us talk us through how geopolitics 0:06:42.040 --> 0:06:43.320 is playing out right now. 0:06:44.000 --> 0:06:47.719 Go back to the beginning of the last century when 0:06:47.720 --> 0:06:51.120 everyone realized that oil was going to replace coal in 0:06:51.160 --> 0:06:54.919 the military terms, economic terms. You would not find a 0:06:55.040 --> 0:06:58.880 major company or country that, when a massive oil discovery 0:06:58.960 --> 0:07:01.560 was made, said you know what, we won't bother. We're 0:07:01.560 --> 0:07:04.000 not sure about this one. They had to go, They 0:07:04.000 --> 0:07:06.919 had to compete, and it's the same and so you 0:07:07.040 --> 0:07:13.120 cannot leave this newish domain to your rivals, whether it's 0:07:13.160 --> 0:07:18.480 the satellite industry, whether it's experiments scientific experiments in space 0:07:19.160 --> 0:07:22.640 or the big one and the most difficult at the moment, 0:07:23.000 --> 0:07:26.280 mining space for the very minerals that we need for 0:07:26.600 --> 0:07:28.840 renewable energy here on Earth, which of course is a 0:07:28.920 --> 0:07:33.840 very finite resource. And so the great powers and the 0:07:33.880 --> 0:07:37.280 big companies are competing against each other. Now, obviously the 0:07:37.360 --> 0:07:40.960 American companies are in bed with the American space companies, 0:07:41.280 --> 0:07:44.960 and ditto the other side of the Chinese and the Russians. 0:07:46.520 --> 0:07:48.680 But if you look in broadbrush terms, there is a 0:07:48.720 --> 0:07:52.280 block going up led by the Americans via the Artemisa courts. 0:07:52.480 --> 0:07:55.280 Forty two countries have signed on. And then there is 0:07:55.320 --> 0:07:58.000 a block going up led by China, which is the 0:07:58.160 --> 0:08:01.520 senior partner, with Russia as its dune a partner played 0:08:01.880 --> 0:08:06.240 Iran and North Korea clutching onto their coattails. And that 0:08:06.440 --> 0:08:11.600 is exactly the two blocks that we see dominating the 0:08:11.640 --> 0:08:15.720 global picture on Earth. It is absolutely mirrored with what's 0:08:15.720 --> 0:08:16.600 going on in space. 0:08:17.160 --> 0:08:20.520 And then there was great excitement because the Europeans put 0:08:20.640 --> 0:08:25.920 up Arian six listeners can't see, but has just smiled 0:08:26.080 --> 0:08:29.040 on the camera that I'm talking to him on. So 0:08:29.600 --> 0:08:32.320 what's the impact going to be of for the first 0:08:32.320 --> 0:08:35.760 time in a wild Europeans returning to be able to launch. 0:08:36.480 --> 0:08:39.480 It's positive if you believe that this a is our 0:08:39.520 --> 0:08:44.880 future and B on balance or adventures in space are 0:08:44.920 --> 0:08:46.640 a good thing, and I do fall down on that 0:08:46.679 --> 0:08:50.680 side of the argument. The Europeans in the shape of 0:08:50.720 --> 0:08:55.200 the ESA European Space Agency, but also in the individual countries. 0:08:55.640 --> 0:08:58.880 The UK is a major space player in the second tier, 0:08:59.320 --> 0:09:02.200 the EU in the second tier, which is folded into 0:09:02.240 --> 0:09:06.080 the ESA. Germany I think you could argue was the 0:09:06.120 --> 0:09:10.280 second tier of space power of France, definitely, Italy definitely, 0:09:10.559 --> 0:09:14.200 along with people like the UAE, Japan and Israel. So 0:09:14.280 --> 0:09:18.200 these second tier companies they can't do what the Americans 0:09:18.200 --> 0:09:22.640 and the Chinese do, mostly because of budget constraints. But 0:09:23.360 --> 0:09:27.800 the French, by by launching out of French Guiana that rocket, 0:09:28.360 --> 0:09:30.880 have sort of nailed their colors to the mass that 0:09:30.960 --> 0:09:33.680 you know, we're not going to get left behind. I mean, 0:09:34.080 --> 0:09:37.199 the Europeans accept they can't match the Big two or 0:09:37.200 --> 0:09:39.640 the Big three actually because Russia's in the top tier 0:09:39.640 --> 0:09:42.560 as well. But it is a statement of intent and 0:09:42.600 --> 0:09:44.200 the Europeans really are a player. 0:09:44.440 --> 0:09:46.880 But this matters, doesn't it. It's not just sort of 0:09:47.440 --> 0:09:49.880 the Europeans showing that they have the toys too, it 0:09:49.960 --> 0:09:52.960 is the Europeans showing that they have the access the 0:09:53.000 --> 0:09:55.199 ability to get to space. So that means that they 0:09:55.200 --> 0:10:01.640 can access their lucrative, important, vital infrastructure relying on satellite systems. 0:10:02.080 --> 0:10:05.480 So in the event that they cannot at some point 0:10:05.679 --> 0:10:06.960 ask the Americans. 0:10:06.480 --> 0:10:11.520 To do it. Yeah, I mean, there's many historical echoes 0:10:11.559 --> 0:10:15.800 there because one of the reasons the French really ventured 0:10:15.840 --> 0:10:17.960 out on their own, I mean, there's a whole bunch, 0:10:18.040 --> 0:10:23.839 including the Forster Frapp. Then their independent nuclear capabilities is that. 0:10:23.960 --> 0:10:26.480 And this goes all the way back to the seventies 0:10:26.520 --> 0:10:28.280 when there was a coup in one of the North 0:10:28.320 --> 0:10:31.560 African countries that France takes a great interest in still 0:10:32.920 --> 0:10:36.480 and they were invited to intervene on the basis of 0:10:36.559 --> 0:10:39.640 some American satellite information and they just didn't trust it. 0:10:40.280 --> 0:10:43.120 And it is murky whether the Americans sort of fed 0:10:43.200 --> 0:10:46.839 them the best bits of the satellite information to try 0:10:46.880 --> 0:10:49.760 to drag them into taking some action in the African country. 0:10:50.160 --> 0:10:52.480 And this was one of the triggers France thought we 0:10:52.679 --> 0:10:56.240 need our own independent eyes on via the satellite. I mean, 0:10:56.280 --> 0:10:59.160 this is the military aspect of it, and off they 0:10:59.240 --> 0:11:01.960 went with you know, as well as their independent nuclear force. 0:11:02.400 --> 0:11:05.920 They needed their independent satellites because they do not wish 0:11:06.000 --> 0:11:09.520 to be reliant upon the United States, as so many 0:11:09.600 --> 0:11:12.439 Western countries are. So that's the sort of genesis of that, 0:11:12.640 --> 0:11:16.280 and it continues to this day. And of course there's 0:11:16.320 --> 0:11:20.000 the commercial aspects to that. You don't want to be 0:11:20.080 --> 0:11:28.040 reliant upon American technology when your own industry you will 0:11:28.080 --> 0:11:30.400 be harmed by that. I mean we're seeing a little 0:11:30.440 --> 0:11:33.120 bit of this at the moment in the defense industry. 0:11:33.760 --> 0:11:38.120 The new Labor government is very keen to forge links 0:11:38.200 --> 0:11:40.560 back with the EU countries and actually get a place 0:11:40.640 --> 0:11:43.960 around the table and talking about the European defense industry. 0:11:44.000 --> 0:11:45.559 I'm not talking about you know, how many soldiers you 0:11:45.640 --> 0:11:49.520 have armaments. And it's the French that is leading the 0:11:49.720 --> 0:11:52.600 fight back within the EU saying hang on a minute, 0:11:53.000 --> 0:11:55.040 do we want to let Britain into the decision making 0:11:55.160 --> 0:11:57.600 process when it's not in the EU of the European 0:11:58.080 --> 0:12:01.080 defense arms industry. Sorry, I've gone off at a bit 0:12:01.080 --> 0:12:03.240 of a tangent, but it is related back to why 0:12:03.320 --> 0:12:04.800 the French insist. 0:12:04.640 --> 0:12:07.880 On that but it's central to what we're looking at 0:12:07.960 --> 0:12:12.080 right here, which is that these are terrestrial geopolitical tussles 0:12:12.120 --> 0:12:15.360 and relationships that are sort of having an amplified or 0:12:15.440 --> 0:12:17.960 expression in the space domain. 0:12:18.000 --> 0:12:20.599 Of your sovereignty in a way. And that will go 0:12:20.760 --> 0:12:23.480 even further on the moon. About sovereignty on the moon, 0:12:23.520 --> 0:12:25.600 I mean, nobody's going to use that word and say 0:12:25.720 --> 0:12:30.960 we have sovereign rights, but they will certainly stake their claims, 0:12:31.720 --> 0:12:33.160 they just won't use the word sovereignty. 0:12:33.400 --> 0:12:35.160 Let's come on to the moon in a second, which 0:12:35.240 --> 0:12:36.960 is a sentence you don't often. 0:12:37.160 --> 0:12:41.319 Utter, well, not for about about fifty years in fact. 0:12:42.080 --> 0:12:45.760 A the suggestion we could saunter onto the moon, but 0:12:45.920 --> 0:12:48.160 b just the sentence let's move on to the subject 0:12:48.200 --> 0:12:50.600 that is the moon. That's not something I have said 0:12:50.720 --> 0:12:53.160 often in my journalistic career. But before we do, just 0:12:53.320 --> 0:12:56.840 switching focus slightly, which is Elon Musk Starlink was critical 0:12:57.040 --> 0:13:00.880 in supporting Ukraine and giving it access to the Internet 0:13:01.040 --> 0:13:05.199 and the rest during the Russia's invasion. Clearly that was 0:13:05.520 --> 0:13:09.720 benign and something to be celebrated. But is there any 0:13:09.760 --> 0:13:12.840 queasiness around the idea that it is a private company 0:13:12.960 --> 0:13:17.720 that has that kind of power, and you know, at 0:13:17.760 --> 0:13:20.040 some point which is not yet on the horizon, but 0:13:20.120 --> 0:13:21.719 at some point is they can turn it on and 0:13:21.760 --> 0:13:22.520 they can turn it off. 0:13:23.200 --> 0:13:26.439 I'll accept your use of the word benign. In the 0:13:26.559 --> 0:13:31.679 original effort by Musk he sent the Starlink terminals into 0:13:31.920 --> 0:13:35.640 the urban region, thousands of thousands of them to link 0:13:35.679 --> 0:13:39.000 to his Starlight satellite system to deliver the Internet to them, 0:13:39.040 --> 0:13:41.439 and that was benign. Then it was good. But of 0:13:41.640 --> 0:13:44.640 course the Ukrainian military jumped on it and used it 0:13:44.760 --> 0:13:47.599 to target Russian soldiers and kill them. It was inevitable. 0:13:48.120 --> 0:13:50.720 So I put it to you, members of the jury, 0:13:51.200 --> 0:13:55.000 does that make Starlink a legitimate military target for Russians 0:13:55.200 --> 0:13:59.760 to fire upon? Discuss because I referred earlier to the 0:14:00.360 --> 0:14:03.040 the treaties of the sixties. Are they out of space 0:14:03.080 --> 0:14:06.560 treat in nineteen sixty seven? It doesn't cover this because 0:14:06.600 --> 0:14:09.079 you couldn't do anything in those days, whereas now you 0:14:09.120 --> 0:14:11.319 can fire a ballistic missile from the surface of the 0:14:11.360 --> 0:14:13.199 Earth and you can hit a satellite and knock it out. 0:14:13.240 --> 0:14:17.600 That has been done to test by four countries Russia, USA, India, China. 0:14:17.800 --> 0:14:21.840 They haven't done that this time. You can spoof the satellites. 0:14:21.880 --> 0:14:25.200 You send up packets of information which can fuse the chipboard, 0:14:25.480 --> 0:14:28.080 put them out of action perhaps, and you can dazzle them. 0:14:28.160 --> 0:14:31.280 You send up direct energy beam so much light floods 0:14:31.320 --> 0:14:34.440 into it it blinds the camera. And those last two 0:14:34.480 --> 0:14:36.960 the Russians have been doing. They have been taking military 0:14:37.000 --> 0:14:40.520 action against an American company in space because it has 0:14:40.600 --> 0:14:43.320 been used by their Ukrainian foes on the ground. This 0:14:43.520 --> 0:14:46.480 is new territory and we don't have the rules and 0:14:46.520 --> 0:14:52.240 regulations required because it's hardly going to stop there. We 0:14:52.400 --> 0:14:55.320 now have weapon direct energy weapons that cannot drones out 0:14:55.360 --> 0:14:58.200 at a range of about seven kilometers. The Americans have 0:14:58.240 --> 0:14:59.920 perfected them, the Brits have got them, so you can 0:15:00.120 --> 0:15:03.760 find it fired a laser beam at a drone several 0:15:03.840 --> 0:15:06.920 kilometers away, knocking out the sky. What happens if somebody 0:15:06.960 --> 0:15:09.240 sticks one of those on a satellite in order to 0:15:09.720 --> 0:15:13.560 target other satellites. The moment one country does, every country 0:15:13.600 --> 0:15:19.680 will have them. So we urgently need I hesitate to 0:15:19.760 --> 0:15:24.160 say laws because international law is an oxymoron sometimes, but 0:15:24.280 --> 0:15:25.680 we definitely need guidelines. 0:15:26.480 --> 0:15:29.640 Any prospects of those coming no, everyone. 0:15:29.400 --> 0:15:33.120 Knows we need them. Everyone suspects they will eventually come. 0:15:34.600 --> 0:15:37.440 Go back to the early days of the nuclear race, 0:15:37.720 --> 0:15:40.520 when the Americans had the bomb, the Russians got the bomb, 0:15:40.680 --> 0:15:42.720 and the immediate response was both sides built more and 0:15:42.840 --> 0:15:44.320 more and more of them until they had tens of 0:15:44.360 --> 0:15:46.520 thousands of warheads. And then at that point they thought, 0:15:47.080 --> 0:15:48.840 we really need to talk to each other about this. 0:15:49.400 --> 0:15:51.000 And I think that will be the case in space. 0:15:51.800 --> 0:15:54.760 There is an arms race going on in space. Many 0:15:54.840 --> 0:15:57.960 countries now have space commands. China got the first, Trump 0:15:58.080 --> 0:16:02.720 introduced the second. UK has won, France, Germany, India, et cetera. 0:16:03.680 --> 0:16:06.720 These space forces, and so it is inevitable. But I 0:16:06.720 --> 0:16:10.280 think we're going to go through this period of x 0:16:10.520 --> 0:16:13.680 years before we realize how dangerous it's got because and 0:16:13.720 --> 0:16:16.400 then we realize, hang on minute, all these satellites are 0:16:16.560 --> 0:16:18.120 integral to the world economy. 0:16:19.320 --> 0:16:19.520 You know. 0:16:19.800 --> 0:16:22.200 The last thing we need is people knocking into them 0:16:22.320 --> 0:16:24.760 or firing at them. And then we will have treaties. 0:16:25.440 --> 0:16:28.520 And the people are working on the texts already, but 0:16:29.280 --> 0:16:33.600 hasn't percolated to the senior levels of industry and politics. 0:16:33.960 --> 0:16:34.840 The urgency of it. 0:16:35.200 --> 0:16:39.000 You just mentioned Donald Trump yourself. What does President Trump 0:16:39.240 --> 0:16:41.160 two point zero mean for the space race. 0:16:41.480 --> 0:16:44.080 It's difficult, isn't it, Because it all comes down to budgets. 0:16:44.360 --> 0:16:46.160 The budgets are actually smaller than they used to be. 0:16:46.440 --> 0:16:49.160 People think you must spend, spend. These countries are spending 0:16:49.320 --> 0:16:52.040 more in real terms. They're not the USA for the 0:16:52.120 --> 0:16:54.480 space race, which was part of a war, the Cold War. 0:16:54.600 --> 0:16:56.120 You know, they had to win that as part of 0:16:56.160 --> 0:16:58.400 winning the Cold War. I think it was zero point 0:16:58.440 --> 0:17:01.240 five percent of GDP well, and I think the budget 0:17:01.320 --> 0:17:04.760 now at state level is zero point three percent roughly 0:17:04.800 --> 0:17:08.080 of GDP. So it was Trump that introduced space force 0:17:08.160 --> 0:17:11.920 amid much mirth, which you know, for me, I'm not 0:17:12.000 --> 0:17:15.480 a supporter of him, but when when you use something 0:17:15.600 --> 0:17:19.600 like that to make fun of him, it betrays that 0:17:19.680 --> 0:17:23.560 you're not understanding him. He too bously trying to laugh 0:17:23.640 --> 0:17:25.920 at him, and it's an issue that has been gone 0:17:25.920 --> 0:17:30.360 on for years now. So he realized space force good 0:17:30.440 --> 0:17:33.720 idea in the context of China's got one. Everyone's going 0:17:33.800 --> 0:17:36.800 to have them. We need to up the game. Trump 0:17:36.920 --> 0:17:39.720 is aware of how much the Chinese are spending on 0:17:39.880 --> 0:17:42.119 space and doesn't want to get left behind. 0:17:42.640 --> 0:17:45.520 But Musk helps him. I mean, Musk has helped him 0:17:45.600 --> 0:17:47.880 in the number of ways. In the last in the last, 0:17:49.200 --> 0:17:53.440 he'll make the case. Yeah, indeed, but Musk helps him 0:17:53.640 --> 0:17:56.639 in that his company space X is doing a lot 0:17:56.640 --> 0:17:59.000 of the heavy lifting and they've got billions and billions 0:17:59.040 --> 0:18:02.320 of pounds of US funding. So it's a kind of 0:18:02.640 --> 0:18:05.080 you know, an ecosystem where the one is scratching the 0:18:05.119 --> 0:18:08.160 back of the other and assisting the space effort. 0:18:09.040 --> 0:18:12.000 It is and just as you'll know the I think 0:18:12.000 --> 0:18:15.879 it's something like ninety percent of the US budget that 0:18:16.080 --> 0:18:19.560 goes on armaments for Ukraine is spent in the United 0:18:19.640 --> 0:18:23.680 States first building them. You know, it is very beneficial 0:18:24.119 --> 0:18:27.280 to American industry. But it's a similar argument when it 0:18:27.320 --> 0:18:30.240 comes to space. And yes, Musk has his ear because 0:18:30.240 --> 0:18:32.680 he's such a big player in the space industry. But 0:18:32.800 --> 0:18:34.600 also a lot of the things we've been talking about 0:18:34.640 --> 0:18:37.680 come together here space Marase two point zero, and the 0:18:37.800 --> 0:18:43.439 centrality of private enterprise because, as I said, Boeing, lockeed Martin, 0:18:43.560 --> 0:18:46.160 many other companies, yet NASA went to them and said 0:18:46.160 --> 0:18:48.560 can you build me that widget or that, But it 0:18:48.680 --> 0:18:53.680 was very much a government driven It's now a rough 0:18:53.760 --> 0:18:57.320 percentage fifty percent is private enterprise and that's the same 0:18:57.400 --> 0:19:01.160 in China, although all companies are controlled by the CCP, 0:19:01.359 --> 0:19:04.719 but there's a lot of startups there. So private enterprise 0:19:04.760 --> 0:19:08.159 in America is a major, major part of this. Private 0:19:08.280 --> 0:19:11.280 enterprise across the world is a major part of this. 0:19:11.880 --> 0:19:16.480 I just wonder whether governments have had the conversation with 0:19:16.680 --> 0:19:20.040 the electorate about everything we've just been discussing, the role 0:19:20.119 --> 0:19:23.240 that it plays in people's lives. The centrality the you 0:19:23.320 --> 0:19:26.920 know it is, if any of these satellites were taken down, 0:19:27.040 --> 0:19:30.840 it's many billions of pounds of economic damage per day, right, 0:19:31.000 --> 0:19:33.439 and so in order to make sure that they are 0:19:33.600 --> 0:19:36.359 safe and protected and so on, there probably will in 0:19:36.480 --> 0:19:39.479 these years ahead need to be greater money spent on them. 0:19:39.520 --> 0:19:43.120 So I wonder, given we'd never have that conversation whether 0:19:43.240 --> 0:19:45.159 it's a sort of going to be a shock to 0:19:45.359 --> 0:19:47.879 prime ministers and their you know chances and so on 0:19:48.080 --> 0:19:53.000 when the economic impact of them being vulnerable is fully understood. 0:19:53.680 --> 0:19:56.080 It's very striking in your book that passage where you 0:19:56.160 --> 0:19:59.159 talk about how once America had put a man on 0:19:59.200 --> 0:20:02.760 the moon, not long after they can the funding for it. 0:20:02.920 --> 0:20:06.040 Because once you've done the kind of TV gold and 0:20:06.160 --> 0:20:09.160 the historic moment. You know, we're we're in a different 0:20:09.200 --> 0:20:11.080 area now, and so there is there is plenty more 0:20:11.119 --> 0:20:13.639 to do. But at the time they made a different decision. 0:20:13.680 --> 0:20:15.760 They made a decision that there were there were you know, 0:20:16.400 --> 0:20:19.200 terrestrial policy programs they wanted to put that money into. 0:20:19.720 --> 0:20:23.800 That I think would be relatively easy if you came 0:20:23.880 --> 0:20:26.680 to the military side of it, people kind of understand 0:20:27.480 --> 0:20:32.720 that protecting satellites from debris by cleaning up space, which 0:20:32.800 --> 0:20:35.760 is a huge, huge issue. I thought war was going 0:20:35.800 --> 0:20:38.920 to be the biggest issue, and then the experts explained 0:20:38.920 --> 0:20:40.560 to me that what keeps them awake at night is 0:20:40.600 --> 0:20:43.959 debris because in case the systems go down and as 0:20:44.000 --> 0:20:45.760 you said, cost economy is billion. 0:20:45.800 --> 0:20:48.240 Well this is just to explain, this is just all 0:20:48.400 --> 0:20:51.840 bits of old satellite and junk from stations and so 0:20:52.000 --> 0:20:55.800 on flying through space and knocking out satellite. 0:20:55.680 --> 0:20:58.040 Which then knocks out of satellite, which then knocks out 0:20:58.080 --> 0:21:00.639 of satellite, et cetera. So yeah, it's in the film gravity, 0:21:01.200 --> 0:21:05.159 which they nicked off the Kesseler syndrome, which was the 0:21:05.280 --> 0:21:07.560 sort of worst case scenario where they all crash into 0:21:07.600 --> 0:21:09.760 each other in the world, economy collapses and goes dark. 0:21:09.960 --> 0:21:12.960 So I think you can make those cases. It gets 0:21:13.040 --> 0:21:17.000 harder when you just talk about exploration. You know why 0:21:17.200 --> 0:21:20.240 you cutting budgets here so we can go and explore there. 0:21:20.320 --> 0:21:25.120 That's much harder. But I think as we gradually become 0:21:25.200 --> 0:21:27.440 more and more aware of how important space is to 0:21:27.560 --> 0:21:31.480 our economic livelihoods, and also if you can make the 0:21:31.640 --> 0:21:35.240 very contentious case that it is worth burning all that 0:21:35.400 --> 0:21:38.879 fuel and taking all those risks to go and mine 0:21:39.720 --> 0:21:43.320 for and despoil the Moon. Yes, for the metals we 0:21:43.440 --> 0:21:47.240 need for renewable energy. That's a hard sell as well. 0:21:47.720 --> 0:21:50.200 But no, we're not really having these arguments. But I 0:21:50.240 --> 0:21:52.080 think we'd be having more of them if it wasn't 0:21:52.320 --> 0:21:54.720 private enterprise making so much of the running. 0:21:55.200 --> 0:21:57.560 Just to explain to the listeners, I mean there's a 0:21:57.640 --> 0:22:00.520 lot of the scientific exploration on the Moon that is. 0:22:01.440 --> 0:22:04.640 I mean, do you think it's pointless? I don't think 0:22:04.640 --> 0:22:07.440 you do think it's pointless trying to use the Moon 0:22:07.560 --> 0:22:09.720 as a stop ahead to Mars and so on. 0:22:10.080 --> 0:22:12.000 I go back to what we said at the beginning, 0:22:13.200 --> 0:22:16.920 and the race for oil, you can't afford not to 0:22:17.040 --> 0:22:20.760 be there. The background to this is the Indians proved 0:22:20.840 --> 0:22:22.880 there was water at the south pole of the Moon, 0:22:23.480 --> 0:22:25.480 and they're the ones, the only ones who landed a 0:22:25.520 --> 0:22:28.520 craft there. It's very hard to land the South Pole. 0:22:28.520 --> 0:22:32.960 It's very rugged terrain, caves, mountains, boulders, and they've done it. 0:22:33.240 --> 0:22:37.840