In 1610, Galileo Galilei focused his telescope into the night sky, and focused on a set of light strands.  He concluded that the Greek philosopher Anaxagorus had been correct about the Milky Way Galaxy containing stars, almost two thousand years before. Four hundred years after Galileo's discovery, NASA is almost ready to send the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) over one million miles from Earth, and answer questions that could shake the very foundations of both scientific and philosophic knowledge.

The James Webb Space Telescope will be launched on a French Government Ariane 4 ECA on October 2018. Its shareholders include Airbus Safran Launchers, the French space agency CNES, and all European space companies, representing 10 European countries. As of January 1, 2015, the company had 329 employees, at corporate headquarters in Evry, at the Guiana Space Center (CSG) - launch site for Ariane 5, Soyuz and Vega - and at local offices in Washington DC, Singapore and Tokyo. Arianespace relies on the Russian built Soyuz medium-size launcher. The French government refuses to deliver on a billion dollar contract on the Russian Mistral-class amphibious assault ships and continues to promote sanctions against Russia.