Other Satellite Navigation Systems - Understanding GPS: Principles and Applications - page 616

tion of 14-30 satellites under the BeiDou-2 Program. The Chinese did not plan to
finalize the design for BeiDou-2 until 2005.
11.2.3 Program History
The BeiDou program was first proposed by Chinese academic Chen Fangyun in
1983 to provide navigation support to Chinese marine vessels. The program was
originally named Double Star Positioning and Communications System. The Chi-
nese government, including the military, initially rejected the concept. The proposal
resurfaced in 1985 at a meeting where Chen was an invited speaker. The second pro-
posal attracted the interest of the Central Committee of the Peoples Liberation Army
Mapping Bureau. In March 1986, Chen and three other prominent Chinese scien-
tists authored a letter to the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China,
suggesting ways to acquire Western technology to accelerate China's science and
technology development, giving China time to develop its own technical industry.
Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping accepted the suggestion, which became the famous
Chinese “863 Program.” Chen's involvement in suggesting the 863 Program very
likely secured and accelerated the development of BeiDou, due to his newly gained
prestige. The program entered the advance research phase in 1986. The first major
scientific paper on the proposal was published in the June 1987 issue of China Space
Science and Technology magazine. In September 1989, the Double Star concept was
demonstrated by using two DHF-2 geostationary communication satellites. The
success of the experiment was reported in the Chinese press. In 1993, the Double
Star Positioning System program officially entered the development phase in the
Chinese budgetary process in 1994 [37, 38].
At the same time as Chen developed the Double Star Positioning System, the
RDSS concept was patented by Professor Gerard O'Neill in November 1982.
O'Neill founded Geostar Corporation in 1983 to implement the RDSS concept.
Geostar envisioned seamless worldwide coverage and attempted to set up various
cooperative arrangements with other possible service providers, including China. By
1985, Geostar applied for patents on the specific RDSS implementation planned for
the Geostar in both the United States and China simultaneously. In May 1987, at the
first Global RDSS conference, the Chinese presentation touted the close working
relationship China had with Geostar and predicted an optimistic future for their
cooperation. In a July 25, 1988, interview, Martin Rothblatt, then Geostar's chief
executive officer, told Aviation Week that Geostar Corporation planned to seek per-
mission from the U.S. government to enter into a formal agreement with the Chinese
Academy of Space Technology (CAST) after the terms of the agreement became
mature. Under the draft agreement, Geostar planned to supply U.S.-built RDSS pay-
loads for CAST to host on unspecified Chinese geostationary satellites. In 1991,
Geostar was declared bankrupt. In a 1993 conference paper, the Chinese mentioned
their plans to continue pursuing an RDSS constellation despite the bankruptcy of
Geostar Corporation. Further evidence on this can be found in Chinese papers,
theses, and journal articles from 1984 to 2000, which make numerous references to
Geostar [39-41].
The BeiDou program was established in 1994 under sponsorship of the General
Staff of the CCPLA Mapping Bureau after completion of the developmental phase of