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ESA has a commercial launch strategy, but will member states pay?
Late this year, European governments will have the opportunity to pay up or shut up.
"What we expect is that these companies will make a step in improving and upgrading their capacity with respect to what they’re presently working," said Toni Tolker-Nielsen, ESA's acting director of space transportation. The administration of French President Charles de Gaulle made this determination during the Cold War, around the same time he decided France should have a nuclear deterrent fully independent of the United States and NATO. Startups across Europe, primarily in France, Germany, the United Kingdom, and Spain, are developing small launchers designed to carry up to 1.5 metric tons of payload to low-Earth orbit.
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