Space Communications

Archive Report

Case for Space Communications System

Overloading of Overseas Telephone Facilities

American-made satellites, able to relay voice messages to any point on earth, may link the nations of the world in a space communications network within a decade. Scarcely more than a dream five years ago, communications satellites now are not only feasible but also urgently needed. If overseas telephone calls continue to increase at the current rate of 20 per cent a year, existing cable and radiotelephone facilities will be seriously overloaded by 1965 if not sooner. Extension of these facilities, it is argued, would be more costly and time-consuming than establishment of a satellite communications system. Such a system, moreover, would make possible world-wide television broadcasts.

A committee composed of representatives of 10 international communications carriers1 ...

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