[AR] Re: More Open Source Stuff...
- From: rclague@xxxxxxxxx
- To: arocket@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Thu, 12 Feb 2015 21:54:50 +0000
It is not an approval, but it is an official written opinion from DDTC, vetted
by their counsel and signed by a Director of DDTC's parent office. That's
significant.
Also significant is that they turned Graham's letter around in a few weeks. The
advisory opinion process used to take months to years to never. DDTC is making
the reforms they said they would, and it's taking about as long as they said it
would take.
Relying on a regulated's assurances is not unusual. That's how a launch license
works; it's based on the applicant's representations as to what they will do,
how they will do it, and what they will do it with. The license terms and
conditions require the licensee to do what they said in their application. If
they materially change something, it may invalidate the license.
Sadly, I am of the opinion that DDTC's letter is a will-not-prosecute
determination in name only. They're saying the CAD drawing is not subject to
ITAR, but they're also saying that the moment someone uses that drawing to make
a working igniter, the drawing becomes technical data, and posting it on the
web becomes providing a defense service, subject to ITAR.
So if Graham posts the CAD drawing, the actions of people Graham cannot
control, and may not even know about, could subject him to criminal
prosecution. That's a vulnerable position to be in. If DDTC was in the habit of
sending cease-and-desist letters, like BXA does, that would lower the risk.
But they don't. A DDTC cease-and-desist letter is called a felony indictment,
and they send Federal Marshals to hand deliver it. The Federal Marshals do
other inconvenient things too, like throw you in jail and shut down your
business.
You could go to the next round, as DDTC suggests, and get a commodity
jurisdiction determination. That's as close to an approval as you can get
without paying a fee. A CJ would say, in effect, that the CAD drawing is not
technical data even if someone uses it to make a working igniter.
A CJ can take a year or two to process if you hire an ITAR expert to craft it
and bird dog it, probably longer if you don't. But after the initial
submission, the work is very intermittent. A lot of back and forth with State,
many weeks apart, a few hours work each time.
It's a lot of work, and they could always say no. But if they said yes, it
would be a small victory on the road to rational export controls.
-R
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry
-----Original Message-----
From: Norman Yarvin <yarvin@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sender: arocket-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Date: Thu, 12 Feb 2015 11:53:58
To: <arocket@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Reply-To: arocket@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [AR] Re: More Open Source Stuff...
Graham wrote:
>Ok, here is a copy. I blacked out references to names or personally
>identifiable information but the whole of the content is there.
That doesn't really count as an approval. They say that they are
relying on your assurances that the rocket engine is not flyable,
which means that if anyone were to fly it, they could turn around and
try to jail you on the grounds that you misrepresented it.
(My guess is that it would, with minor modifications, be 'flyable' in
the sense that someone could get a rocket off the ground with it; it's
just 'not flyable' in the sense that this is never what you'd choose
to fly with. Unless somehow a big concrete anchor plays an
irreplaceable role in its functioning...)
--
Norman Yarvin http://yarchive.net/blog
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