"It is an extremely serious problem because the repeated failure of H-2 rockets showed Japan's space development is swerving from the course," the Asahi Shimbun said in an editorial Tuesday. (Editors Note: This is actually the first critical failure of a NASDA rocket ever.)

The H-2 rocket and satellite were exploded Monday when it veered off course after liftoff.

"Since we are spending a huge amount of state money, the government and the space development committee are responsible for a thorough review of their space development system," the influential daily said.

"Technological development is always accompanied by failure, but there is a limit," it said.

The explosion was the second successive failure in the costly H-2 rocket project after a 36-million-dollar satellite was lost in space despite a successful separation from the rocket in February 1998.

The latest launch was the seventh blast-off since 1994 of the Japanese H-2 rocket, supposed to be a fully-Japanese built rival to the successful European Ariane-4.

"It has been said that Japan (earlier) avoided suffering a major failure because Japan introduced key parts from the United States," the editorial said.

But the accident may have shown Japan's immaturity in space development, it said.

Additional Editor's Notes This editorial by the Asahi Shimbun, in of itself answers what's wrong with Japan's Space Program. From almost top to bottom the editorial is mistaken and factually inaccurate as to the problems, their causes, and their solutions.

The H2 along with all of NASDA's rockets have been remarkably successful, with excellent recoveries from any problems during the launch campaigns.

For example the second H2 launch in August 1994 saw the main engine on the first stage successfully shut down seconds before launch when the command sequencer for the solid rocket boosters failured to send the signal to ignite.

Both the first stage and second stages on the H2 are cryogenic engines which until recently were among the handful of such designs anywhere.

The second stage engine is designed to shut down and restart during flight. A feature that is meant to make the H2 cheaper to operate in volume.

While the first stage also has this capability to shut down and restart it is not required to do so during flight, and NASDA at the time was mighty pleased to find no damage to the internals of the first stage, leading to its subsequent successful launch two weeks later.

These events are testament to the high engineering quality of the H2 by NASDA's engineers and its builder Mitsubishi Heavy Industries and the consortium partners.

The string of space program failures has in fact been with spacecraft and their apogee kick motors which have all to often sent expensive satellites on unwelcome cruises of the Van Allen Belts. Which ironically began with the second H2 launch described above when ETS-6 ran out of gas on the way to GEO.

Like so many problems in Japan nowadays, the inaccuracy of Japanese media is just but one small example of Japan's failure to identify and correct deep structural problems within the decision making processes and the supporting management systems of Japan today.

In the 1950s Japan embraced the thinking of the American management philosopher Peter Drucker, who at the time was only able to find willing listeners among Japan's decision makers.

Decades later, the early management philosophy of Drucker and the success of Japan came as a shock to the US, but American management got with the progam absorbed Drucker along with much much more.

This in turn has led to radical new concepts in Western business thinking, that now seeks to collapse management structures and empower workers throughout an organization with the skills to make decisions themselves.

At it's heart, this is liberal democratic capitalism in its finest hour, but unfortunately for the much mooted but elusive concept of "Asian Values", this is anathema for anyone suggesting serious change; given the the paternalistic structures that underpins much of what is construed as Asian Values.

Until Japan works out its deep and complex structural problems its people, industry and science will wither, and the world will be a lesser place because of it.

Of course this is only a brief analysis of what is wrong with Japan's space program, but after nearly a decade of failure something is obviously deeply wrong and all bets should be off as NASDA rebuilds from top to bottom.

Postscript, NASA should now insist of a complete technology and production audit of the Japan Experimental Module before it is launched to the International Space Station.

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