‘Antenna farms’ sprout on tropical landscape

Press, 19 April 1986, Page 6

‘Antenna farms’ sprout on tropical landscape

NZPA-AP Washington The needs of twentiethcentury diplomacy are adding a distinctly hightech image to the lush green of American Samoa, where “antenna farms” are sprouting on the tropical landscape. The clusters of antennae are part of a SUSS million ($9.5 million) relay station that is the key link in a satellite communications network that will provide a diplomatic channel between the United States and islands in the western Pacific, officials say. The centre in Pago Pago will provide “rapid, reliable and secure” communications between Washington and United States plants that are or will be established on the strategically situated islands, they say. “The development of these posts ... is a significant indication of United States policy to increase

diplomatic, economic and cultural relations with Pacific Island nations,” said Frank Matthews, a State Department spokesman. The system will also provide a means of communications for United States weather and aviation services of the Federal Aviation Administration and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and emergency communications in the event of a natural disaster such as an earthquake, he said. The islands include Fiji, Western Samoa, the Solomon Islands, New Caledonia, the Marshall Islands, the Northern Mariana Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia and Palau.

The SUSS million price tag covers the cost of equipment and construction of buildings at the transmitter and receiver sites in Pago Pago as well as the “antenna farms,”

said a State Department official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. "If our Government is going to go to the expense of providing official United States representation any place in the world, there has to be some form of rapid, reliable and secure means of communicating policy issues, economic reports, political reports (and) dealing with emergencytype situations,” the source said. “You have to have a link to whoever is the (U.S.) representative out there, a rapid link with the headquarters back here in Washington, so they can receive instructions for dealing with the daily works of diplomacy,” he said. The cost of installing and improving posts on the other islands will depend on the extent of service required, which “cannot be determined until the level of (U.S.)

representation is determined for the post.” The Pago Pago facilities, called the Pacific Service Centre, have been completed, said Eric Hauser, a spokesman for Fofo Sunia, the non-voting delegate in Congress representing American Samoa, an unincorporated territory of the United States. It was not clear when the island posts would be built

The facilities planned for Fiji would improve the United States Government’s existing communications system in the capital of Suva, where the United States maintained an Embassy, Mr Matthews said.

The Northern Mariana Islands, the Marshal] Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia and Palau were administered by the United States under a United Nations Trust, Mr Hauser said.