Pentagon Chief Chides FCC on Ligado Approval as GPS Threat
Pentagon Chief Chides FCC on Ligado Wireless Deal as GPS Threat
(Bloomberg) -- U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper said regulators had used incomplete data in approving Ligado Networks LLC for a mobile network that the military says threatens interference to GPS.
The Federal Communications Commission relied on Ligado-funded test results that used 14 receivers, but U.S. agencies examined 80 devices and found Ligado’s operations would cause harmful interference, Esper said in a May 1 letter to Senator James Inhofe, an Oklahoma Republican and the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
“The FCC, by disregarding the numerous objections based on hard data and analysis, and industry, could compromise national security,” Esper said in the letter, which was sent with the approach of a hearing. “America deserves a better alternative.”
Ligado said the tests Esper referenced used a “flawed methodology.”
U.S. officials “tested all of those 80 devices in one room at the same time, and, as a result, a lot of uncertainty was created. In this instance, it seems more was not better,” Ashley Durmer, a Ligado spokeswoman, said in an email. The FCC decided that the “test cannot be relied upon to show harmful interference to GPS from Ligado,” Durmer said.
Esper dismissed one of Ligado’s selling points, saying the proposal doesn’t meaningfully bolster U.S. capability in fast 5G networks. The Defense Department is moving “aggressively” to identify other airwaves it can share for use by 5G, Esper said.
“Ligado’s test, with the limited number of units utilized, is not reflective of the negative effect Ligado’s amended proposal would have on both government and commercial use,” Esper added.
Durmer said other companies and the FCC regard Ligado as advancing 5G.
Inhofe and other lawmakers have called for the FCC to withdraw its April 20 approval of Ligado’s plan and resolve Defense Department concerns, and said Congress might otherwise act.
The company says its mobile network would operate at a low power level and won’t pose a threat to the precise navigation enabled by GPS.
The Armed Services Committee has set a May 6 hearing on the impact of the FCC’s decision.
Tina Pelkey, an FCC spokeswoman, didn’t immediately reply to an email and telephone call.
At the end of February, Ligado hired David Urban, a longtime ally of President Donald Trump who runs the lobbying firm American Continental Group and has been a vocal defender of the president as a CNN political commentator, to work on its behalf. Despite only working for the company for a little more than a month, the company paid American Continental Group $100,000, according to an April 20 disclosure form.
Urban was a member of the West Point class of 1986 along with Esper and is a personal friend. Urban lobbied the White House, the Pentagon and the State Department, according to disclosures.
Secretary of State Michael Pompeo, another member of the class of 1986, called approval of Ligado’s plan “vital to our national security.”
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