Open Skies - Military Regulation

Military Regulation

The Treaty on Open Skies, signed in Helsinki in 1992 is a multinational sacrifice of air sovereignty to enhance military transparency and build confidence by permitting observation flights over almost the full territory of each signatory state:

• except for areas of hazardous airspace and a ten kilometer zone along the state borders of non-state parties; and
• subject to a maximum flight distance.
• Each aircraft is fitted with a sensor suite including optical panoramic and framing cameras, video cameras with real-time display, thermal infrared imaging sensors, and imaging radar (SAR). To ensure that each suite conforms to the Treaty specifications, there is an initial seven-day certification of each Open Skies aircraft by a short demonstration flight, and by analysis of the imagery recorded during that flight.
• Each state to be overflown has the choice of either certifying the aircraft of the observing state or of providing an aircraft with full sensor equipment of its own for the observing state (the so-called taxi option);
• the flights are undertaken by joint teams; and
• the image data can be shared among all signatories to support the monitoring of compliance with existing or future arms control treaties.

To illustrate the scope of the Treaty, Germany and Italy have to accept 12 overflights per year, while Russia (including Belarus) and the United States must permit 42 overflights each.

There is also a bilateral Open Skies Agreement between Hungary and Romania. In a tacit but persistent way, the United States has been promoting the idea of bilateral or trilateral Open Skies arrangements between states in South America. Similarly, there are many bilateral treaties and Memoranda of Understanding that permit military aircraft mutually to train in or transit through their airspace. For example, Singapore has such arrangements with the United States, France, and Australia.