computer science

GLOBUS

GLOBUS is a computer science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand GLOBUS rather than just read about it. In short: GLOBUS is a radar system in the town of Vardø in Vardø Municipality, Finnmark county, Norway. It is operated by the Norwegian Intelligence Service (NIS) and its official uses are primarily space observation and Arctic airspace monitoring for Norway's national interest, though the site's close proximity to known Russian naval bases as well as U.S. involvement in construction and funding have fueled suspicions that it…

Key takeaways

GLOBUS belongs to computer science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect GLOBUS to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of GLOBUS from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

GLOBUS is a radar system in the town of Vardø in Vardø Municipality, Finnmark county, Norway. It is operated by the Norwegian Intelligence Service (NIS) and its official uses are primarily space observation and Arctic airspace monitoring for Norway's national interest, though the site's close proximity to known Russian naval bases as well as U.S. involvement in construction and funding have fueled suspicions that it also serves as part of an American missile defense system.

History

Cold War and Globus I Norway and the United States, both founding members of the newly-formed NATO, began cooperation on the GLOBUS project during the Cold War era of the 1950s. By 1988, the Globus I radar array was built and operational in the town of Vardø, just 50 km (31 mi) from the border between Norway and the Soviet Union and within visible range of the Kola Peninsula, which is known to contain high-security Russian naval bases. This came within the same year that the U.S. condemned the deployment of a large Soviet radar array near Krasnoyarsk, claiming that this violated the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.

Globus II

Originally known as HAVE STARE, the Globus II radar was built by the Raytheon Company at Vandenberg Air Force Base, California and became operational in 1995. It is designated AN/FPS-129 according to the U.S. military's Joint Electronics Type Designation System, as it is the 129th design of an Army-Navy “Fixed, Radar, Search” electronic device. Although the cost of the radar is classified, it is believed to have cost more than US$100 million. In 1999 Raytheon moved the array to Vardø, Norway in fulfillment of a US$23.5 million contract with the U.S. Defense Department and operations resumed under Norwegian control in 2001.

Globus III In 2016 construction began on a new array dubbed the Globus III to replace Globus I and work in concert with Globus II. The new radar was estimated to cost US$121 million. On 13 February 2018 it was reported that the local population felt misled about the size of the radar. The construction work was shrouded in secrecy, and many locals were critical, but they were reluctant to speak out because the project brought sorely needed employment to the community. Testing was set to begin in autumn of 2018 with an expected operational date of 2022.

Purpose and controversy The site is administrated by NIS and operated by Norwegian personnel only. Their website officially states that the radar is used to:

Monitor, track and categorize objects in space Monitor our national area of interest in the north Carry out collection of data for national use in research and development The installation is included as a dedicated sensor in the world-wide United States Space Surveillance Network for tracking objects orbiting Earth. Raytheon, the company that built Globus II, previously described it on their website as a radar "originally designed to collect intelligence data against ballistic missiles". The website has since been removed by request of the US DoD. In April 1998, a Norwegian journalist, Inge Sellevåg, from the daily newspaper Bergens Tidende discovered that NASA had no knowledge of a new radar being added to the system, despite the Globus II nearing operational condition. This led her to suspect it had other purposes, and Sellevåg discovered that it was also going to be used for national purposes such as intelligence gathering. In 2000, during a storm, the radome was torn off and uncovered the Globus II radar dish. At that time it was pointing directly towards Russia. A local newspaper editor commented: "I'm not an expert, but I thought space was in the sky." Official comments claimed that the radar was still being tested and that it being pointed towards Russia was a pure coincidence. NIS official Tom Rykkin stated "if you use a small part of the brain, you know this also has an intelligence mission. ... In the intelligence business, there are certain things you don't make public. It is the nature of the business." The Russian Defense Ministry raised complaints that the radar installation violates the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty and were supported in this claim by missile defense expert Theodore Postol of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In March 2017, nine Russian bombers took off from Russia's nearby Kola Peninsula and executed a mock air strike against the radar station, flying in attack formation and turning back just before breaching Norwegian airspace. Then in February of the following year, a very similar mock strike was carried out by eleven Russian fighter jets. Regarding the GLOBUS system, Russian spokesperson Maria Zakharova stated in 2019 "There is every reason to believe that the radar will monitor precisely the territory of the Russian Federation and will become part of the US missile defense system" and added "It seems obvious to me that military preparations near Russian or any other borders cannot be ignored by our or other countries. We presume that we will take response measures to ensure our own security." Shortly after these statements Russia deployed a Bal missile system to the Sredny Peninsula, just 70 kilometres (43 mi) from Vardø.

Technical description According to the U.S. Department of Defense in 2022, "The GLOBUS program is a dual band ground-based radar system consisting of an S-band solid state phased array, an X-band dish antenna, an Integrated System Controller (ISC), and a Mission Communications Suite (MCS) hosted at an Outside Continental United States (OCONUS) location. The S-band sensor is mounted on an azimuth-only pedestal, housed in a new facility. The X-band sensor is a large aperture dish mounted on an elevation/azimuth pedestal. Each sensor may operate independently or cooperatively under the control of the ISC."

References

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with GLOBUS

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what GLOBUS claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In computer science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to GLOBUS before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about GLOBUS ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of GLOBUS

In research: GLOBUS appears in computer science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses GLOBUS in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: GLOBUS is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Military electronics of the United States, Military equipment introduced in the 1980s, Military installations established in 1988, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for GLOBUS outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study GLOBUS in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what GLOBUS means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain GLOBUS out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is GLOBUS in simple terms?

Why does GLOBUS matter?

Because it connects several computer science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study GLOBUS?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on GLOBUS.