[Sixstrings]

Rogozin Threatens to Deactivate GPS Stations in Russia

Deputy Prime Ministry Dmitry Rogozin has threatened to deactivate all Global Positioning System, or GPS, infrastructure operating on Russian soil if the U.S. does not agree to allow Russia to place Glonass stations on U.S. soil.

At a news conference Tuesday, Rogozin lashed out at the U.S. by calling it an "unreliable partner" and said it has until May 31 to begin negotiations on the placement of Russia's Glonass stations in the U.S. If this does not happen, he warned, then "on June 1 [Russia] will suspend the operation of these [GPS] stations on its territory," he said.

There are currently 11 such sites in Russia, established by agreements regarding the placement of GPS and Glonass infrastructure on each other's territory, and Rogozin said the U.S. had violated these agreements by stalling.

If the demanded negotiations fail, he said, GPS stations will be axed completely.

"I hope that these negotiations will find a way to restore proportional cooperation. If not, from Sept. 1, the operation of these stations will be stopped completely," he said.

Oleg Ostapenko, head of the Federal Space Agency, said the U.S. has been provided with all the necessary documentation required for the deployment of Glonass stations, and that "adequate measures will be taken with respect to U.S. stations on our territory."

Recently, the U.S. Congress requested that national security officials provide an assessment of the potential threat to national security infrastructure posed by the Russian Glonass stations if they were to be placed in the U.S.

Concerns over the threat posed by Glonass stations arose last November, when CIA and Pentagon officials alleged that they might be used for espionage.
http://www.themoscowtimes.com/business/article/rogozin-threatens-to-deactivate-gps-stations-in-russia/500083.html

Anyone know what's up with these "GPS stations?" I always thought they were just geosynch satellites, you don't need ground based stations. Why are ground stations even needed.

Anyhow, Russia's going to remove the 11 US GPS stations in Russia if the US doesn't agree to let their new Glonass stations go up in the US. Congress is concerned the Russian stations are for spying.

I guess we're in a cold war now, all cooperation breaking down. Americans getting kicked off the space station. Arguments about the open skies treaty. Now this GPS stations thing, which I've never even heard of before.

[Newfie]

Sometimes you set up a terrestrial station at a known fixed location to provide a " differential" signal. There can be errors in the satellite system, and the number of satellites, thus accuracy, varies at any given time. Having a reliable terrestrial base station allows for greater accuracy and reliability.

My best guess. I can't imagine it's a big deal.

[KaiserJeep]

It's actually a very big deal. The GPS and Glonass systems originated during the Cold War. Like the older LORAN-C and DECCA navigation systems, a built-in feature is "selective availability" which allows you to deny usage of the system to someone classified by the system owner as an enemy.

The GPS system is owned and operated by the USA (originally it was the US Navy "NAVSAT" system).

GLONASS is owned and operated by Russia.

COMPASS is owned and operated by the mainland Chinese.

The proposed Galileo system will be orbited by the ESA and used by EU members.

YES the ground stations supply enhanced accuracy, via differential signals. If Russia shuts down the ground stations, the local Russian GPS users - and anybody's cruise missiles flying in Russia - will not have enhanced accuracy.

Precision differential receivers are enough to allow a cruise missile with a conventional warhead to attack a hardened target, and destroy it with a "bullseye". Without the enhanced accuracy, you need either many conventional cruise missiles or one nuclear warhead.

[Pops]

This is pretty crazy sounding alright. But considering we are all so freaked out we're dribbling pee down our collective leg and we'd make Jack Bauer head of the CIA if he were real. We're so scared of our shadow we think it's prudent to listen in when Angela Merkel orders a pizza, ;o;. So I gotta believe that these stations can be turned off and the whole system jammed on a moment's notice.

In fact here ya go . . .

Truck driver has GPS jammer, accidentally jams Newark airport
An engineering firm worker in New Jersey has a GPS jammer so his bosses don't know where he is all the time. However, his route takes him close to Newark airport, and his jammer affects its satellite systems.

http://www.cnet.com/news/truck-driver-h ... k-airport/

[KaiserJeep]

I use GPS and love it on my off-road excursions in my Jeep. But,being untrusting of governments in general, I always buy paper maps and gazetteers.

The same comment could be made about cellphones, by the way. Did you note that cellphones are being used by rebels in China, the 'stans, the Arab states, Crimea, etc.?

Having an "off" switch in place for a cellphone has nothing what-so-ever to do with disabling the phone when stolen, and everything to do with disabling all cellphones in any given area except those used by various local, state, and federal governments.

[Lore]

This may affect civilian GPS more than military. How is the Ukrain going to find its way back in the arms of Russia if they do this?

Military (M-code)
A major component of the modernization process is a new military signal. Called the Military code, or M-code, it was designed to further improve the anti-jamming and secure access of the military GPS signals.

Very little has been published about this new, restricted code. It contains a PRN code of unknown length transmitted at 5.115 MHz. Unlike the P(Y)-code, the M-code is designed to be autonomous, meaning that a user can calculate their position using only the M-code signal. From the P(Y)-code's original design, users had to first lock onto the C/A code and then transfer the lock to the P(Y)-code. Later, direct-acquisition techniques were developed that allowed some users to operate autonomously with the P(Y)-code.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GPS_signals

And now for a brief musical interlude dedicated to our friends, the Ukrainian separatists.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PxyISsA0Oh0

[Pops]

I kinda like this better
Голос 2 - Елена Максимова

[Newfie]

Yeah, I'm still kinda trying to figure out the big impact of this.

I mean, I kinda think the Ruskies will disable our GPS in times of tension, and I kinda doubt we are seriously contemplating sending a cruise missile onto their sovereign territory.

So, the REALL BIG DEAL is ?????

[dissident]

Naturally not a single peep about the fact the USA refuses to have even a single GLONASS station on its soil. Reciprocity is fair. Another propaganda fail by Six$.

[KaiserJeep]

Don't misunderstand me. A "cheap" cruise missile, perhaps a single-engine plane packed with high explosives, might use GPS. Disabling GPS enhanced accuracy is enough to defeat such a "cheap" cruise missile attack. Accuracy would degrade to +/- 125m or so.

REAL military grade hardware uses inertial navigation, and terrain recognition software. If the missile hugs the ground, it's hard to intercept, and not susceptible to jamming.

GPS jammers disable all the GPS receivers in the area, both regular and enhanced accuracy, by preventing them from acquiring satellite signals.

As for reciprocity, the GPS system is 25 years older than GLONASS and has 250X the number of users as GLONASS, and 200X the number of users as all other systems combined. GLONASS is pretty much used by the Russian military and airlines, but even Russian airlines have GPS receivers.

This is all about Russian paranoia. They want a navigation system that the US can not disable their access to. Which is unlikely to happen short of war, since if the "selective availability" feature is ever enabled, only the US Military can use the GPS system, even your family car and your cellphone and other mobile devices would not function.

The Russians have devoted a third of their space budget to reactivating the (neglected since the Cold War ended) GLONASS system since Putin came to office. BEIDOU/COMPASS is being expanded to worldwide coverage, it was only a regional Chinese system before.

Both countries either do not trust the US to retain space launch capability, or plan to have a War with us. But still, as the oldest system in use, GPS has 99+% of the users, and all other systems total less than 1%.

This is not a hobby with me, it's a former profession. In the military I was a LORAN-C specialist, and while in uniform in the early 1970's, the "NAVSAT" system rendered LORAN-C obsolete. We kept the LORAN-C system online until 2010, because it had secondary uses, but it's gone now.

[Sixstrings]

Russia just did a GLONASS satellite launch, and it blew up (I had this in the space station thread then realized it's GLONASS related):

Rocket Carrying Russia's Most Advanced Communications Satellite Crashes During Take Off
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-05-15/rocket-carrying-russias-most-advanced-communications-satellite-crashes-take

U.S. Congress Seeks National Security Assessment of Russian Glonass Stations

The Glonass satellite navigation system is a Russian state-sponsored project intended to rival the U.S. Global Positioning System, or GPS, in commercial applications while providing the Russian military with independent navigation data.

GPS remains the more accurate navigation system, with an accuracy of 1.8 meters, while Glonass is accurate to 2.9 meters.

Controversy over the placement of 8 Glonass monitoring stations in the U.S., which would greatly improve the system's overall accuracy, erupted in November last year, when the Pentagon and CIA said they may be used to harm U.S. national security interests.

Russia plans on making the Glonass more competitive by building 50 ground stations in 36 countries, Kremlin chief of staff Sergei Ivanov said in April, though he did not specify if these plans included the U.S. Currently, Glonass only has monitoring stations in Russia, Brazil and Antarctica.

Glonass has been plagued with problems over the years. Most recently, the system suffered its second major glitch in a period of weeks when a number of the satellites malfunctioned during a system wide software update.
http://www.themoscowtimes.com/business/article/us-congress-seeks-national-security-assessment-of-russian-glonass-stations/499835.html

[Sixstrings]

Naturally not a single peep about the fact the USA refuses to have even a single GLONASS station on its soil. Reciprocity is fair. Another propaganda fail by Six$.

Well, why don't you post in the thread about that? Why are you waiting for someone else to talk about it?

I was actually going to post in here an open question, about what this means with the Pentagon and CIA saying GLONASS could pose a "national security risk."

I'm objective. So what are they talking about? If it's just GPS stations then what's the risk in that.

OTOH, all cooperation with Russia is breaking down lately.

But how do the GLONASS stations pose a risk? Is it just strategic risk, that they've only restarted GLONASS because they're planning on conflict with the US? I don't see how a GPS station could be "spying" or something, or dangerous, just because it's Russian and here in the US.

[Quinny]

It's in your original link. Do you not even read your own links?

[Newfie]

Q, now that's funny! Was it intentional?

Back on topic,

KJ..... Your post is technically correct, but how is it relevant?

What is the PRACTICAL impact of Russia's action?

[KaiserJeep]

If Russia deactivates the GPS differential ground stations inside their country, the GPS system accuracy declines from +/- 1.8m to +/- 125m, but only inside Russia. In the rest of the World, with intact ground stations, the GPS accuracy remains +/- 1.8m.

The present situation is ideal from the US standpoint, as we have a system that provides the precision navigation inside Russia, and they have no private system providing precision navigation within the USA.

So the exact situation today is that Russia is vulnerable to "cheap" aircraft-based cruise missiles today, along with every other country in the World. Being the system with the most users by far, the USA will be reluctant to deny access to all civilian users of GPS. (The lost delivery vans alone would snarl traffic, not to mention all the taxis.)

IMHO the USA should drag it's feet and prolong the existing situation as long as possible. It should be obvious to everyone that first Russia, then China, and finally the EU will eventually disable the GPS ground stations they have, denying terrorists the "first strike" capability of a cluster of "cheap" cruise missiles.

It should also be obvious that after the above changes come to pass, that the situation is reversed, and that the USA and other GPS users remain the only ones vulnerable to terrorist weapons guided by GPS. It is unlikely that the users of precision navigation features of GLONASS/COMPASS/GALILEO will ever include anybody except military users, since GPS already exists everywhere.

Take away thought: All of you who carry cellphones with GPS chips enabled, or iPADs, or Android tablets with such chips, are continuously leaving trails in NSA computer systems buried under the ground in certain secret locations throughout the US. Today, access to such locator data requires only a properly formatted request from another Federal Agency (or State or Local Law Enforcement). It is not impossible that in the future, such information would be available online to anyone who authorized a credit transaction. (This is why "burn" phones sell so well.)

Twenty years ago it would have been inconceivable that one could go online and buy access to real time satellite surveillance of anyone. Today that is easy and common, and even FREE through Google.

[Sixstrings]

It's in your original link. Do you not even read your own links?

Sigh. You pro-Russia people are impossible. I try to be conciliatory and objective with Dissident, and you're so used to jumping on me you jump on me anyway.

I read the articles, I didn't see any clarity about how exactly GLONASS is a "national security risk."

I imagine it's a little box probably looking like a cell tower or something, so okay if Russia has one in Peoria, how is it dangerous? Would it have a little camera and the Russians are watching us, or something?

Common sense, and what Kaiser had to say, suggests it's a strategic risk in general -- just them having GLONASS at all. It means they want independence from GPS. Same as what China is doing with their own GPS thing. Same as what China is doing with building airstrips on reefs and taking all the oil and not offering rational, reasonable revenue sharing with all these nations they encroach on.

Why are they doing this? Russia and China? Add it all up.. annexing.. airstrips on reefs.. not working with neighbors.. their own GPS.. nationalist expansionist talk / aggression.. it looks like getting ready for war with the USA.

(again Quinn I don't know for sure, the articles just say the Pentagon warned a year ago that GLONASS may pose a natl security risk, and now Congress has asked for a study or response or something about the natl sec threat of GLONASS, and the US -- for now at least -- turned down hosting the GLONASS stations, so Russia is taking out our GPS stations, and the latest is that their GLONASS system was hit with a big "software glitch" and their latest launch "blew up." That's the state of affairs, you figure it out.)

[Pops]

Everyone is always getting ready for war, usually the last one.

Turn off every digital device you own and every one you work with and every one you depend on for every thing you do, have, eat, drink, buy ...

That is how the next war will be look, we don't need no stinkin cruise missiles.

[Sixstrings]

Q, now that's funny! Was it intentional?

What are we talking about here, what ZH said?

ZH are just bloggers throwing crap in a fan. The question I'm posing is whether it's rational / reasonable / what is congress talking about that Russian GPS stations in the US may cause a natl sec risk.

ZH is suggesting sabotage from the US. That's paranoia.

But then I'm sittin' here reading the ZH article, I get down to NASA's analysis of their Proton rocket failure, and I see it mentions they were carrying *GLONASS*. So I'm not paranoid but that makes me wonder a bit..

You've got this GLONASS / GPS dispute going on..
Their GLONASS hit by a big "software upgrade glitch" recently..
Then their big GLONASS satellite blows up, on the Proton rocket launch..

I have to admit, it makes one wonder.

Knowing how politics works, and the state of things, I still doubt the CIA would have gotten approval to do something so hardcore as that. This stuff went on in the 80s -- Reagan approved the CIA selling them malicious software, and it blew up a huge Soviet pipeline. Explosion so big it was seen from space.

If we're in cold war, it just is what it is, and for all I know the Russians are doing stuff to us as well. What about that Target stores hack over Christmas? Something like 30 million Americans CC nums and identities stolen? Was that really "russian mafia," or did their intel have some hand in that? Average folks like we on this forum will never know, all this stuff is secret.

All I can say is that it's unfortunate, would be nice if Russia were a friend, it'll be a mess if we have a cold war with sabotage going back and forth.

(note: this could still be paranoid, just because dots connect does not mean something is necessarily true. Rockets do blow up sometimes, it happens. Maybe their software glitch problem is all their fault, not a stuxnet thing, and presumably the Russians would find out if it were, and make a big issue of that. And Russian mafia does things that may just happen to screw with Americans, no help from the Russian gov needed. Dots may connect and make one wonder, but it's not true unless there's some proof.)

[Sixstrings]

IMHO the USA should drag it's feet and prolong the existing situation as long as possible. It should be obvious to everyone that first Russia, then China, and finally the EU will eventually disable the GPS ground stations they have, denying terrorists the "first strike" capability of a cluster of "cheap" cruise missiles.

It should also be obvious that after the above changes come to pass, that the situation is reversed, and that the USA and other GPS users remain the only ones vulnerable to terrorist weapons guided by GPS.

Okay, that would be a rational strategic reason for Russia and China to get away from GPS. A threat from "cheap cruise missiles," that makes sense.

Yet, how can they get away from GPS? GPS is used by their civilian pop.

And if you're right, and the US remains the vulnerable one to cheap cruise missiles, what do we do about that. What's the answer here, regions all having their own GPS? Couldn't an adversary just slap a darn GLONASS / GPS / China's thing on their missile?

Only way to be safe is turn the system off and military use only (I guess during times of war threat), but really that can't ever be done whether it's US or EU or China or Russia -- the whole civilian world is using and relying on positioning tech, you can't just turn it off.

(and incidentally.. are you guys starting to see the problems of getting away from the American / Euro "new world order?"

It's gonna be a big pain in the ass. A return to blocs of empires putting walls up, less freedom, less unity in the world, less progress. We'll lose GPS. We'll lose the international internet.

But whatever don't listen to me, let's all go back to the 19th century with mercantile trade bloc wars and the "fierce power of patriotism," or whatever it was Putin said on Victory Day.)

[KaiserJeep]

It should be obvious that with the first strike still smoking, the selective availability feature will be activated and only the US military will have high precision navigation.

Otherwise the GPS system remains usable, with +/- 125m accuracy. That is all it had until May 2, 2000 anyway, when POTUS Clinton ordered "Selective Availability" turned off. The reduced accuracy was still usable for things like highway navigation, and was only questionable in tight urban environments.

Pending technical advances such as civilian aerial drones and driverless vehicles will cease to function, of course. But Russian, Chinese, and European Union civilians may be offered the option of high accuracy navigation via GLONASS/COMPASS/GALILEO. That decision is ultimately up to the countries that operate those systems, and probably depends on how secure they are.