The basic space law went into force Wednesday, lifting a long-standing ban on the government use of space for defense purposes.

The headquarters for space development strategy, led by Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda, also was established with the enactment of the basic law. The law also stipulates that the government formulate a basic plan for space use.

On the same day, the Defense Ministry told the Liberal Democratic Party's joint conference of a plan to establish an office within the ministry's Technical Research and Development Institute to study technologies that could be used in space for defense purposes.

Diet resolutions had limited the use of space to nonmilitary projects. The new law sought to redefine the usage of space. It stated that space development should be carried out under the U.N. Outer Space Treaty's spirit of nonencroachment and the Constitution's philosophy of pacifism.

The basic space law allows the government to use space for defense purposes, such as launching early-warning satellites that monitor missile attacks around the clock and high-end reconnaissance and communication satellites.

In July, the Defense Ministry established the Space and Maritime Security Policy Office. It plans to establish a space-use promotion committee next month to create plans for the next midterm defense buildup program scheduled for next year. The committee will be led by the senior vice minister.

The ministry will request in its fiscal 2009 budget funds for studying space technologies that could be used for defense purposes.

The LDP has formulated a proposal on the use of space that includes the introduction of early-warning satellites, reconnaissance satellites and a communications satellite system by 2015.

Under the ban, the use of space by the Self-Defense Forces was limited to technologies for a missile-defense system and information-gathering satellites. The only other way the SDF was allowed to use space technologies was to receive information from commercial satellites as a customer, a senior Defense Ministry official said.

Experts have pointed out many problems caused by this limitation. For example, when the Ground Self-Defense Force was sent to Iraq in 2004, it took more than a year to build a secret communication network for exchanging operational intelligence and other important information.

Early-warning satellites monitor the launch of missiles targeting Japan, and are necessary for a functioning MD system. Japan currently relies completely on U.S. early-warning satellites for this function.

Takeo Kawamura, chairman of the LDP's special committee on space development, said: "Japan is a country that maintains armed forces exclusively for defense. That is exactly why we need to have a method to collect information related to defense at our own expense."

www.yomiuri.co.jp/dy/national/20080829TDY02305.htm