[bigboris]

First, GPS is the US, not "governments". The US owns it, period. There's only one reasonably functional alternative and that's GLONASS which is Russian. There is no communal body or activity supporting GPS other than the US (and by extension US taxpayers). The US can deny access to GPS anytime it wishes through a feature called Selective Availability (SA). This was turned off in the early 2000s and the official US position is that it "has no intent" to turn it on again but there's nothing preventing it. Second, access to GPS (the receivers) is further regulated by the US under certain conditions (ie those that would provide a military advantage) and require an ITAR license from the US. Third, GPS was developed and is maintained specifically for defense/military purposes. Public GPS is less capable and the more capable military signals are encrypted. Sure, it is used by the public, but that is not the primary use case. Granted, this is evolving as the US is at the forefront of things like autonomous vehicles and vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V) communications which require precise positioning data but the intent was and is to support US efforts primarily military. Any global benefit is purely incidental.