[oasis-members] Which are the Current Spacefaring Nations?

[Craig Milo Rogers]

	Which are the current spacefaring nations?  To answer this
question, we have to nail down its terms, if we want to exclude, say,
nations that have purchased control of a satellite after some other
nation placed the satellite in orbit.  For this posting, I propose to
rephrase the question fairly narrowly:

	Which are the nations that have in the past, and still
maintain, the ability to launch and operate a satellite using launch
vehicles and launch facilities that have been built by and are owned
and operated by that nation's governmental or private national
entities?

	Under these terms, I believe the answer is, in chronological
order of first launch:

Russia (inheriting from the USSR)
United States
France (see below)
Japan
China
India
Israel

	I included France in this list, and not the United Kingdom or
the European Union.  Although the United Kingdom launched an
indigenous satellite in 1971, it soon lost the national technical
capability to continue to do so.  Some sources list the European Union
as the inheritor of the French and UK space programs, but I choose to
consider the Guiana Space Center a primarily French asset, due to: 1)
France's territorial control of the launch site, and 2) France, and
not the European Union, is a member of the United Nations.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satellite
http://cns.miis.edu/research/space/spfrnat.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Union

	Other complications in answering the question I posed include:

1)	Baikonur Cosmodrome is located within the borders of Kazakhstan.
	The Baikonur launch vehicles and the satellites they orbit are
	considered Russian products.

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

2)	Sea Launch launches from international waters, although it
	is primarilly based in the United States.  It is owned by
	companies from the Ukraine and Norway as well as Russia and
	the United States.

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

					Craig Milo Rogers