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U.S. Air Force Plans for War In Space
arhca writes "Wired has an article about the U.S. Air Force's plans to put military weapons in outer space. Plans include firing hypervelocity rods from space to targets on the ground, space-based lasers and large mirrors to reflect the beams at targets on the ground, and a space-based radio frequency energy weapon to destroy or disable foreign satellites. The Air Force's PDF can be found here."
Ah the sheer scope of our commitement to killing each other is staggering.
Technology? Progress? Dude, nothing has changed since my ancestral parent kicked your acestral parent's ass with a bone club.
Web pages, blogs, palm pilots....big fucking deal.
So these weapons will float up there without an enemy (at the moment) but once a foreign nation is considered "evildoers" the U.S. can rain down destruction as their war-machine infrastructure is already in place.
Naturally the American taxpayers will be told that this will make the world a safer place.
Trolling is a art,
If you are wondering what country this might come in handy against in the future...
China
Casual Games/Downloads
Plans include firing hypervelocity rods from space to targets on the ground.
I'm not up to date on my space program figures. But it is expensive as hell to put a kilogram of material into orbit. I'd much rather pay for a plain old bomb, or even a reusable space laser. Carrying a rod into space to shoot it back down to earth is not cost effective.
Slashdot Syndrome: the sudden, extreme urge to correct someone in order to validate one's self.
White Sands is on the ground, not in orbit. HELTF doesn't violate UN Resolution 2222 overview, text, which the US has signed (but the Senate has not ratified). This would. So it's not mindless Bush bashing crap, it's an awareness of the fact that the Bush Administration is perfectly willing to do the same thing (violating UN Resolutions) that it considered to be a causus belli when Iraq did it. (And you can forget the arguments about how we went into Iraq to topple a vile dictator, if that were the real reason we'd be at war with N. Korea.)
Chance favors the prepared mind....our military has contingency plans for EVERYTHING. There are departments in every branch whose only job is to constantly think up the most outlandish scenarios, idea, plans, etc. With every possible variant of enemies, allies, strength of forces, technology. I once saw a detailed plan of battle in the event that Canada and Mexico ally and attack the US. This same philosophy applies to funding projects. If congress suddenly gets a bug under it's ass about space defense, the Air Force can whip out this portfolio and say "Well, with only $60 million, we can put these forces in place." What's funny is to watch the public react when some of these plans leak. All sorts of people freak out, like a few years ago when a contingency plan for invading China leaked out at the same time that there was tension regarding Taiwan. Now maybe this proposal for space has advanced beyond that wild ass idea phase, and if that's the case then it's because the Air Force thinks Congress might go for it.
---- El diablo esta en mis pantalones! Mire, mire!
Brief overview of a proposal in front of the UN to ban all space-based weaponry which the US is actively part of.
This, the nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament treaties, the anti-ballistic missile treaty, and the landmine treaty. Doesn't the US have ANY respect left for other countries let alone their own integrity? This is just getting disgusting.
This is not a sig.
true, definitely true. but the weary middle-aged male in me isn't looking forward to eating catfood out of a can with my fingers in my retirement, what with all the output of our economy whizzing around in space over our heads.
pr0n - keeping monitor glass spotless since 1981.
Yup. Just like nukes did. Just like smart bombs did. Just like cruise missiles did.
I hereby place the above post in the public domain.
The ABM Treaty had a clause in it that said that any party can withdraw from the agreement with six month's notice. Bush gave the six month's notice, and withdrew from the treaty.
Of course, the ABM treaty was also signed with a nation that no longer exists, the USSR. So...what's the problem?
The Space Treaty does not ban weapons in space, it only bans nuclear weapons in space. None of the weapons specified in this report are nuclear.
We don't have a state-run media we have a media-run state.
It makes you wonder : what is the next country with a 6% GDP deficit that is going to get bankrupted by bellicose technological developpment... oh, wait ...
By the way nice try propagating this worn out reaganite theory that the arms race in the 80s was a clever American plot to win the cold war. Interesting is that it comes in contradiction with the idea that communism as a system is unable to sustain its own people, if it took an artificial arms race to bankrupt it.
To the "I'm sorry I'm American" crowd
I suppose our militarization of the seas and the air was a mistake too? I suppose when China/Russia puts orbital weapons in space you won't mind? Aside from the sexier hookers and the better cafes, just what is it about "outside this stupid country" that you find so appealing?
Being able to drop MORE weapons on other nations does not do ANYTHING to "protect" the US citizens.
We already spend more money on our military than anyone else in the world.
What possible threat will this "protect" us from?
Back in the "Cold War" era, this might have been useful. Now it is just a waste.
Maybe if the Europeans didn't keep selling nuclear technology to nutjobs the US wouldn't feel the need to develop counter measures.
(I know I'm gonna regret this...) You know, it's not like the Soviet Union, with whom the treaty was signed, ever adhered to the ABM.
You are right, you are going to regret this.
The ABM (Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty) limited the number and type (non nationwide) of ABM systems a country could have.
The ABM treat was resigned, in 1992. The Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) signed the treaty with us, the US. Of course, the US pulled out of the ABM in 2002. But the ABM never had to do with the weapon systems that "evil do-er" ever were after...
You can read all about it Here
DJMD - The fourth man - Planetary
The bullet is cheaper (not 10 cents, but I'd think it'd be $5 or less)...but getting a sniper into position to fire it can be nearly as expensive as dropping a bomb. It's definitely more dangerous (for the sniper, anyway) if he's caught before he can complete his mission.
20 January 2017: the End of an Error.
well it began as a research project into a space-based missile shield, but once we realized it was impossible (can't shield satellites from a nuke exploding in orbit, aiming the lasers/depleted uranium projectiles accurately and fast enough to do any good...), it turned into a fake program that was PR for the American public and made the USSR flow money that they could not afford into trying to match the "superiority" of America's SDI that only existed in some cool little animated video clips and press releases...
Is that why the US managed to hit a clearly located Red Cross compound in Afghanistan not once but twice? Or why it managed to hit a Chinese embassy building in the Balkans?
It's not just about your bombs landing where they are aimed. It's about making sure that they are aimed in the right place as well. Without the latter, the former is pointless.
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
As opposed to the US giving technology to nutjobs? We supported Iraq long before anyone in Europe did.
Scenarion 2: A big motherfucking bomb drops out of the sky, blows your friend into tiny kibbles-n-bits sized chunks, and sends you ass over elbows into a crumpled heap some 20 yards away. Your reaction? "HOLY FLURKING SHNIT!" What ya gonna do about it? You'd instantly realize you're way the hell out of your league.
that just forces them not to fight against those with the big bombs directly.
they end up hiding among civilians, sending out suicide bombers and crashing passenger jets into skyscrapers. they are resorting to these tactics because they know they are out of their league and this is the only way they have to fight back.
also blowing up a city block to kill someone on their way to blow up a bus seems to fullfill their goals anyways. except any surviving victims of a bomb are going to hate us instead of the suicide bomber. of course the only way they will have to get back at us is to become terrorists themselves, since their army couldn't possibly fight us.
but whatever... just means that the inivisible army that we need to be protected from will just get bigger and we'll need bigger bombs to protect ourselves from them.
It will be a great day
when our schools get all the money they need
and the Air Force has to hold a bake sale to buy a bomber
Do we really need this stuff? I could see arguments for more communications hardware up there, but hypervelocity weapons and lasers? How many decades will pass before something even remotely workable is off the drawing boards? Ike must be rolling in his grave.
I didn't think the house band in Hell would play this badly.
Unless you consider "might makes right" the only thing you'll ever need to know about morality.
-- Repeat with me: "There is no right to profits".
from the article:
.... "This will certainly prompt China into actually moving forward" on space weapon plans of its own, she added. "The Russians are likely to respond with something as well."
...further driving the point home. Is it really worth it?
"I don't think other countries will be taking this lying down," said Theresa Hitchens, the vice president of the Center for Defense Information.
The Chinese, in particular are willing to spend a lot more on their space program. Despite being latecomer to the space game, they're playing catch up extremely well.
This year, the Air Force will spend hundreds of millions of dollars to find ways to track enemy satellites -- and, if necessary, blind those eyes in the sky.
What is to stop them from doing the same to us? I'd say we have a lot more to loose since we are so much more heavily invested in using space as a military resource.
But it's unclear whether putting weapons into space would provide much protection. The arms themselves could become sitting ducks in orbit -- giving the United States a new weakness, not a new strength. Satellites are already a weak "center of gravity" in American militarty planning, argues Bruce DeBlois, the editor of Beyond the Paths of Heaven: The Emergence of Space Power Thought. They're vulnerbale to electronic jamming, orbiting projectiles and nuclear detonations in near-Earth space. The space-based weapons would have all of the same vulnerabilities -- and would make that center of gravity a more inviting target.
My point exactly...
"America is the country with the most satellites, he explained. By developing anti-satellite weapons, "it legitimizes systems that the U.S. has the most to lose from." Other countries could start pursuing long-taboo space weapons efforts. And while countries like China don't have the technical sophistication of the United States, they already have the capabilities to hurt us in space -- medium range missiles, and nuclear warheads.
Wright added, "This could trigger a backlash that actually leaves the U.S. worse off."
Stay sentient. Don't drink bad milk.
( ok they aren't colonies they are client-states)
i think the move is primarily strategic. as noted in the article, you're able to deliver far less energy using weapons from space than from terrestrial sources. the problem for the US is that its traditional allies are starting to look more and more like strategic adversaries every day. space weapons allow the US to deliver military force *immediately* without having to worry about the next french/russian/german mutual masturbation festival, or what turkey's islamic parliament thinks about positioning infidel forces on its soil, or getting overfly rights from countries neighboring an enemy's territory.
also noted in the article: regardless of where the weapons are, there's a lot of communications stuff that *all* US forces depend on flying around up there. if it's possible, i imagine they want to protect that.
the US is in the unenviable position of being top-dog and being resented for it. china is playing it REAL smart, staying out of sight and biding its time as these global resentments and the resulting increased US military spending take their toll on the US economy.
oh well. i have no kids. if we can hold out another 30 years or so, i'm ok with that. i learned long ago that, even if you want to save the world, the world doesn't really give a fuck.
pr0n - keeping monitor glass spotless since 1981.
I suppose our militarization of the seas and the air was a mistake too? I suppose when China/Russia puts orbital weapons in space you won't mind? Aside from the sexier hookers and the better cafes, just what is it about "outside this stupid country" that you find so appealing?
... by American standards ... PPO now that is a pale and distant last place to the plans I had in Europe).
... American sailor hangouts excepted! ... go use the toilet, come back, and no one will have touched it).
... remember, they stop counting people no longer eligable for unemployment benefits even though many are not reemployed in order to keep the numbers artificially, and dishonestly, low; etc.) has been accumulating a great deal of minuses, and losing many of its pluses.
Speaking as one American who has, in the past, lived for several years in Germany (pre and post reunification), the UK, Hong Kong (pre-reunification), and Japan, there is no "one" answer that applies to everywhere outside of this stupid country.
However, in Europe there is a great deal more personal freedom than in the United States in most areas (try drinking a beer in a public park in the US vs. England or Germany, for example). There is a great deal of protection against the distribution of personal information in Germany (read: virtaully no junk mail or junk phone calls). I have never had better health care than I had in Germany (and I have an excellent
Crime is lower in all of the places I've lived outside of the United states. It is lower in Europe and so much lower in Japan that the mind boggles (for example, you can leave your wallet on the bar in most parts of Tokyo
The list goes on. Every place has its pluses and minuses, but the United States, in its inability to be self critical and its profound policy of self-isolation and absolute denial of things that are obviously and painfully going wrong (such as the healthcare fiasco here; the massive debt; rising violent crime; the wholesale corporate export of well paying jobs; spiralling unemployment
Contrast this to the rest of the world, which remains a reasonable mix of pluses and minuses, and the outlook for quality of life in the United States gets grimmer by the day. Seing Bush on the Television touting his latest lies, and the passivity with which so many Americans are willing to accept them (rather than confront unpleasant truths about what we as a country have become) and the prognosis gets even worse.
It is a pity. The United States once stood for some very beautiful ideals, and was once a very nice place to live.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
I don't know that there's any solid evidence of anyone who signed it violating the NPT; actually building a nuclear weapon isn't that difficult to do, if one can obtain the materials. Mining and enriching enough uranium or obtaining enough plutonium to build a bomb is the tricky part; once you've done that you just need a few halfway competent physicists to design the thing; the science behind it is more than 60 years old and not all that secret. This is why it's silly to start saying the problem was that Iraq having the technical knowledge necessary to build a bomb without having the materials was a imminent threat. You can walk into any university physics department and find a handful of graduate students with the "technical knowledge" necessary to build a crude bomb.
Don't blame me; I'm never given mod points.
I had the opportunity to hear Gorbachev speak back in 2000 in Florida. One of the quotes I took away was, "America tried very hard to lose the Cold War. The Solviet Union tried harder."
Fairly succinct summary one would think.
Uh no, any "aid" that our government hands out is at a price. Sometimes it means letting us put troops anywhere we want in their country, sometimes it means high interest rates on the "aid," and sometimes it means buying certain goods only from the US, or selling certain goods at a steep discount only to the US. For example, the Bush administration recently gave "aid" to South Africa in the form of millions of dollars to help fight the rapid spread of HIV. This money was not just given away, it was loaned at higher than market interest rates and the stipulation of the arrangement was that South Africa could only use this money to by AIDS drugs from US pharmaceutical companies at above market costs (rather than from South American companies selling the same drugs at a fraction of the cost). Now you tell me, is that a free handout? The free handout concept is a myth used by non-political (i.e. uniformed) republicans to place blame for our deficit. Much like how they whine about welfare as draining our pockets. In actuality foreign "aid" and welfare combined are less than 10% of our national spending, and defense (a misnomer, as it should be labeled "offense") is over 50%. So I ask, where are our priorities? And does the allocation of our national monies reflect the will of the people or just a few warmongering, wealthy, assholes who can never seem to accrue enough money to satisfy themsleves.
every time a republican dies a queer angel gets his wings
1. Kyoto protocol was voted against 95 to 0 in the senate, and therefore had no chance of being legally binding in the US. We don't live in a dictatorship a president signing a treaty is mostly symbolic.
2. The provisions of the ICC would have been unconstitutional in the US. Therefore any such treaty would be null and void, and a crime against the american people.
3. The EU has been breaking a judgement by the WTO about bananas that went through the full appeals system for quite sometime now. Don't here a lot about that now do we? Besides.. those tarriffs were lifted.
4. Awww... the rest of world honestly didn't understand what "serious consequences" was going to mean... get real!
5. The ABM treaty was ALLOWED to be broken, with notice. Russia said the same thing although they called it "regrettable"
Wow you've really being drinking the cool-aid.
Can you list the other countries that refused to ratify Kyoto or are you only interested in bashing the U.S.
Comments and attitudes like yours explain exactly why the U.S. didn't sign the treaty on the international criminal court. They are held to a different standard. Does anyone give a shit about numerous nrth vietnamese war crimes during vietnam both against the U.S. and the vietnamese people? I've never heard anyone complain.
When was the last time anyone like you posted a rant here about China's numerous civil rights violations or occupation of countries?
It's completely one sided even in the US media.
When you explain why Clinton never did the scores of sins by omission that Bush is bashed for you might have a case.
Here, here.
If you think that the US is the great philanthropist and the rest of the World is just stretching out its collective begging bowl then you've seriously got it wrong. As a percentage of it's GDP, the US gives less in foreign aid than most other developed countries.
I for one would happily love to see all US foreign aid stop overnight because it would mean that the $3-4 billion per year in military aid given to Israel would cease and Israel would have to seriously consider non-violent solutions to its problems.
I know saying this will get me labelled anti-semitic* but as long as Israel feels that the US is 100 percent in its camp then the situation in the Middle East will never improve. It will take a serious commitment by Israel, and by the US, as well as by the other parties to achieve lasting peace in the region. That commitment will never be made as long as Israel and hardliners like Ariel Sharon are allowed to dominate the politics of the region with bombs, rockets and tank shells.**
So, please cut US foreign aid to zero. Even if nothing changes in the Middle East, it would be interesting to see how many oppressive right-wing puppet regimes fall as a result.
(*Laughable when you consider I went to a school that was 90 percent Jewish, that most of my best friends whilst growing up were Jewish, my first two girlfriends were Jewish and that I went to at least 40 Bar Mitzvahs and Bat Mitzvahs as a kid.)
(**Yes I am aware of the devastation wreaked by Palestinean suicide bombers. But this discussion is about the influence that US aid has on the region, and that influence is solely on Israel. The one thing I will say about the subject is I don't see how escalating levels of violence can bring about the peace that both Israelis and Palestineans deserve. Sometimes, you have to be the one willing to break the circle of bloodshed: an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind, as Ghandi so eloquently put it.)
"Accept that some days you are the pigeon, and some days you are the statue." - David Brent, Wernham Hogg
We're talking here about people who are willing to let themselves be blown up by setting off a bomb strapped to their own bodies, just to make a point to the US.
Do you really honestly believe shock and awe will make them go "oh, sorry about wanting to destroy democracy, we'll just not bother you anymore"? If so, I have some land to sell you, at a very good price.
Shock and awe have zero longterm effect. The people you'd use it against are so motivated that once they get over their immediate shock they will start looking for weak spots, and there are always weak spots. In the end we're all human, and we all die just as easily. The soldiers in iraq are noticing this now.
I do think the only way to stop terrorists is to convince them they don't want to kill you, however I don't believe dropping bombs on them from outer space will do that.
the problem for the US is that its traditional allies are starting to look more and more like strategic adversaries every day.
Yes, but it's the US that has changed, not the allies. When all your friends suddenly stop liking and trusting you, the chances are that it's you that's the problem, not your friends!
Look, the military has plans for EVERYTHING. Part of being in the military means drawing up plans: "What would we do if XYZ happened?" So that in the odd chance that XYZ happens -- say, we get invaded by aliens -- then the military has a plan that they can execute.
And it's not just about plans for war in space. It's about plans for how chocolate-chip cookies should be made in the mess hall. Or for how clothes must be made, right down to the stitching, type of thread, precise colors and sizes.
It's part of the military's duty: Create a plan that any idiot can follow and execute given existing equipment, along with several acceptable alternatives, for any given scenario -- be it making a bunk bed for a training facility or the threat of Earth being mowed down by Vogons to build a hyperspace bypass.
Just because the military has plans to do something, doesn't mean they're going to do them. Because having plans they're not necessarily going to execute today is just part of what they do, so that if something DOES happen, they are prepared for it.
I guess I should be happy that the word was "adversary" and not "enemy" -- but it shocks me how many of my compatriots seem ready to abandon the Western alliance just because the Europeans had a difference of opinon with us. My God, look at what history usually produces and how closely aligned the nations of Western Europe and North America are, and you'll be more careful before flinging around accusations of adversarial intent.
The Mongrel Dogs Who Teach
This is neither news nor a surprise.
As a general rule, in combat, he who holds the high ground wins. Space is the new high ground.
Military organizations do endless contingency plans covering any possible threat they can see and how it might best be countered. The U.S. military is no exception. If they _didn't_ do this, they wouldn't be doing thier jobs.
An absolute essential in any combat situation is communications, command, and control (known as "C cubed"). Troops on the battlefield need effective intelligence on what they face, communications with thier fellows to coordinate responses, and communications from thier superiors about what those responses should be.
Satellites provide all of those things. If you can take out the other guy's satellites, you effectively blind him, and leave him at a severe disadvantage.
This doesn't even count the possibility of actual _weapons_ platforms in space, which are a whole other set of problems.
I'm not upset that the US military is looking at this area. It's part of thier job. I'm concerned with thier ability to get it right.
______
Dennis