The recent tension around the privately owned Starlink satellite system during the Russian invasion of Ukraine once again illustrated the importance of global satellite networks as key infrastructures of communication. That satellite communication could have unprecedented consequences was realized early on. Christine E. Evans and Lars Lundgren bring us back to these early days, opening with a quote from Hanna Arendt on Sputnik. They focus on broadcasting, a radio service distinctly different from many others in its public reach with overt political consequences, and combine the interest in networks with that of content. In a five-chapter, co-written volume they cover the 1960s and 70s, but also give a prehistory and an epilogue. Thus the book offers a comprehensive history of the integration of satellite communication during the Cold War, merging new archival material from Soviet and socialist sources with those of the US and international broadcasting institutions.
In the introduction and throughout, Evans and Lundgren bring together literatures that a few decades ago were separate, and draw simultaneously on, for example, science and technology studies, media- and communication studies, and history of technology with a particular focus on hidden integration and infrastructure, the latter underscored by the volume belonging to the infrastructures series of MIT Press.
The following chapters begin with a prehistory of satellite networks in the 1950s, offering dreams and visions as well as early collaboration. Ch. 2 details the preparations for a global live satellite broadcasting event, which eventually did not materialize as one but two events, one western with the BBC as the central node and the other Soviet and the eastern bloc. Then follows a rewriting of one of the key processes in satellite history, namely the US global ambitions with Intelsat, European discontent, and Soviet Intersputnik. Ch. 4 tells the story of the construction of the ground segment, offering a truly global perspective, and Ch. 5 finally explains how Intelsat and Intersputnik were integrated long before 1989, contrary to dominating narratives.
East-West collaboration and conflict on satellite networks can be viewed as techno-diplomacy, merging technological and personal networks, balancing changing political goals. Consistent with such an approach is to publicly claim that technology is neutral, exemplified by statements from Lyndon B. Johnson in 1967 on the conflicts around Intelsat. The authors, while not using the term as such, still balance back stage and front stage politics with the work of people close to the technology itself, avoiding a story at a distance. They also challenge the established narrative of western technological superiority, and nuance bi-polar stories primarily focused on conflict, by using original and contemporary sources which reveal a much more complex process.
One of the stated ambitions of the book is also one of the most rewarding, namely its internal integration of networks, paying close attention not just to the satellites but equally to the so-called ground segment. In doing so, the authors underscore not just the distributed materiality of these networks but also the way in which technological change is hardly ever revolutionary, but rather builds on and alters already existing systems. The ground segment included new and very large stations for reception and transmission of the signals over vast distances, but they also connected to already existing telecom infrastructures.
The book is well-written and integrates theoretically informed questions and analysis with concrete stories based on archival material. At times, Evans and Lundgren give us thrilling narratives, but just as stimulating are the multiple times when they offer corrections to existing historiography and show that our understanding so far has been poor. The images are a welcome addition and mostly help underline or explain particular features or present maps and positions. Alas, a few have poor quality, which might, however, be explained by the archival situation.
This book has an audience not just among academics but also in the classroom. The authors connect the integration and disintegration of infrastructure with varying degrees of detente and give the narrative and analysis a context that makes the book useful not just for students in the more obvious disciplines, but also in political science and history proper.
The epilogue ties the conclusions of the book to contemporary tensions. The most striking difference is yet to unfold as the global community is faced with regulating and managing privately owned encompassing infrastructures. Cold War actors were indeed not always predictable, but institutional and formal, with certain responsibilities. With today’s unprecedented concentration of private ownership and wealth, global governance of communication infrastructure seems even more pressing.
