[amsat-bb] Re: Question Re: Itar
Bob McGwier
rwmcgwier at gmail.com
Sun Aug 2 21:14:36 PDT 2009
The short version is, if you, a US person (in the broad definition),
talk to or write or transfer information or hardware to non US nationals
about things in a satellite system which helps them in anyway do
satellite work, and I do mean in almost any way, this is a "deemed
export" and requires an export license under the ITAR rules. To not get
this export license is a violation of federal statutes with truly
onerous possible penalties.
Many of us have been told by lawyers that we have paid entirely too much
money to (out of necessity) that it is simply not possible to follow the
rules to the letter if you are going to do this kind of business with
non US nationals. What you need is a worked out plan that State Dep.
puts a stamp of approval on as being "close enough" and this is called a
TAA, technical assistance agreement.
I hope from this simplified version you can see just how it is utterly
impossible as an individual to figure this out and to talk to your ham
buddies outside the US about satellite matters without violating the
rules. It is the single worst set of prohibition crap since banning of
Alcohol. You have foreign nationals to the US who want technology (the
Al Capones) and you have the rum runners here (the poor slobs who want
to do business or conduct intellectual exchange) and we are all
potential criminals. A big difference is the Al Capones are non US
citizens and cannot be subjected to our silly laws and put in prison for
income tax evasion. In fact, they just say and have said, screw you and
gone and done their own thing, including build up of really good
competitive satellite and space systems. The single worst feature of
ITAR and the technical assistance agreement is the imposition of our
laws on non US persons in order to work with us. Not many organizations
or individuals are willing to say yes to this stupidity. For many of us
here in the US, we have given up until somebody with some sanity changes
things since many of us just have entirely too much at stake to risk.
AMSAT-NA is trying its best to fix our internal problems but I would not
blame any non_US entity who said "Nuts" to working with us under these
rules. They just have to be changed at a minimum for educational
institutions and 501c3 like AMSAT-NA who have no interest whatsoever in
selling things for a profit. Under no uncertain terms in my opinion,
over the long term, these rules have damaged US interests much more
severely than transfer of technology (inadvertent or intentional). But
the problem I care most about fixing is not being able to have an
informal talk about amateur satellite service matters with my overseas
friends where NO ONE has bad intent.
Bob
N4HY
Jim Jerzycke wrote:
> Wikipedia has a good overview of what ITAR encompasses.
>
> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ITAR
>
> Jim KQ6EA
>
> --- On Sun, 8/2/09, Dave Marthouse <dmart at pure.net> wrote:
>
> From: Dave Marthouse <dmart at pure.net>
> Subject: [amsat-bb] Question Re: Itar
> To: amsat-bb at amsat.org
> Date: Sunday, August 2, 2009, 3:42 PM
>
> I have been reading the messages regarding the Indian heo satellite. What exactly are the Itar rules? Please fill me in.
>
>
> Dave Marthouse N2AAM
> dmart at pure.net
> _______________________________________________
>
--
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