Second Time as Farce

[Monte Davis]

With Zaire's Mobutu in the news, and Blicero and Enzian pacing through their dance, 
I couldn't resist digging out this oldie but goodie from the Wilson Quarterly, autumn 
1980. Any echoes you may hear are, of course, irrelevant and prejudicial.

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PUTTING FIRE INTO HEAVEN

The spring of 1978 was not kind to General Mobutu Sese Seko, Presi-
dent of the Republic of Zaire, formerly the Belgian Congo. On May
11, Katangan rebels had invaded his nation's Shaba province. Then,
on June 5, flanked by guards, Mobutu watched as a small rocket
built by a West German firm called Orbital Transport-und-Raketen-
Aktiengesellschaft (OTRAG) rose a few feet off the Split Behind
plateau only to plunge 4,000 feet into a river valley below. It was
OTRAG's last hurrah and Zaire's last venture into the space race.

OTRAG had been founded in 1975 by engineer Lutz Kayser with
(ultimately) $60 million from 1,100 German investors seeking a tax
shelter. The rationale behind the world's first private space
enterprise was simple: With a low-cost "toy mouse" rocket. Kayser
hoped to siphon off Third World demand for satellite launchings
from Europe's sleek Ariane and the sophisticated U.S. space
shuttle. Using the shuttle to put satellites in orbit, Kayser was
fond of saying, "is like transporting bags of cement in a Rolls
Royce."

What came to be dubbed the "Volksrocket" resembled a bunch of
asparagus, with the number of "spears," or rockets, varying accord-
ing to the size of the payload. Whenever possible, OTRAG used mass-
produced, commercially available components. The motors for opening
the rocket fuel valves, for example, were ordinary $20 Bosch
automobile windshield wiper motors.

All OTRAG needed was a spacious launch site -- and a sponsoring
government to circumvent the United Nations' 1967 ban on "free-
lance" space travel. Zaire's Mobutu, eager to make his country the
"Cape Canaveral of Africa," stepped forward in 1976 with an offer
of 39,000 square miles of undulating plateaus and lush river
valleys -- a territory one-half the size of West Germany, within
which OTRAG would exercise virtual sovereignty. In return, Zaire
was to receive a $50 million annual rental (beginning in 1980), 5
percent of eventual revenues, and one free launch. By 1977, some
240 OTRAG personnel were settled in northern Shaba province. 
Whenever a launch was scheduled, the natives were evacuated to a
"big festival." The first two tests were successful, and Lutz
Kayser became known locally as "the white friend who puts fire into
heaven."

Neighboring Tanzania, Zambia, and Angola, however, were not
pleased. There were rumors, never confirmed, that OTRAG was in
fact testing Western military cruise missiles. Soviet
propagandists warned of "the German spear in the heart of
Africa." West Germany's Chancellor Helmut Schmidt regarded the
whole affair as "embarrassing." Facing diplomatic pressure from
all sides, and stung by the inglorious failure of OTRAG's third
launch, in 1979 Mobutu ordered the company to cease all rocket
tests. The white friend went home, his "Volksrocket" destined for
immortality as a write-off on 1,100 tax returns.

===

Ahh, Africa. Wasn't it Baroness Blixen who said "I love the smell of hydrazine in the 
morning"..?