Space Wars

There have been lots of interesting stories recently about the US's growing reliance on satellites to control gee-whiz weaponry and provide detailed real-time images to battlefield commanders. MSNBC has a story on the military's growing bandwidth crunch. The AP has a story about how many other nations are putting up their own spy and communications satellites, suggesting that the US edge in space imagery might disappear (unless we start shooting other satellites down, of course). And Bruce Sterling has a fun story in Wired (fun in writing style, not in its implications) suggesting that we're entering an age of Pax Americana, where the US military is so dominant that competitors exist only at our sufferance (though that might not stop people from trying).

Comments

Funny!

[Anonymous Coward]

This article make me laugh!

Space Wars?

[Anonymous Coward]

WTF?

Didn't they used to call Reagan's space-based anti-nuke program "Star Wars"?

Oh, I get it, only one Star Wars story a day.

Re:Space Wars?

[Anonymous Coward]

And George Lucas didn't sue??

Iridium

[Anonymous Coward]

Didn't US Dept. of Defense by Iridium network (for real cheap as I recall)? Seems like that would make a difference. Of course, maybe there are still trying to figure out how to integrate it with DoD systems.....

ph34r th3 U5

[Myriad]

"Huge American sums spent on space strengthen US economy by creating Tang instant orange drink and heat-trapping pizza delivery bags. US will commodify your discontent, sell it back to you on DVD."

Dear Customer,
Upon ordering your DVD make sure to order using the correct Region Designation. Should you plan to move from the caves of Afganistan to some other hidyhole you will need to re-order your DVD. Also, you may not sell, lease, transfer, display, view, listen to, or otherwise make use of any products purchased.

Thank you,
US Gov. ^H^H^H^H^H MPAA/RIAA Consortium

Predictions?

[Anonymous Coward]

I predict 650 replies, 1/5 of which will bash the United States. Anyone others?

Re:Space Defense Initiative (SDI)

[mobydobius]

Your view of the world is truly myopic...

Oh, wow. Thank you for pointing that out for me. I feel enlightened now. I think I will spend the rest of the day reading leftist conspiracy rags.

Wired

[Drath]

The Army should just use the font colors wired used in that article mentioned above as weapons, just about burned my eyes out reading it.

Shoot them down?

[quantaman]

Why go through so much trouble? Just get the other nations to run their satellites on Windows CE and use IIS. Those satellites will go down faster than a shashdotted err... umm... really really small server? Hey... Why even go through that much trouble, just post a link to the satellites on /.!