Slashdot Mirror
Military Seeks Approval to Develop Space Weapons
ranson writes "The New York Times is reporting that U.S. Air Force officials are seeking Bush's Approval to begin researching and developing space arms. While analysts feel this move will be unwelcome in the international community, military officials believe that "Space superiority ... is our destiny, ... our vision for the future.""
It's to enable them to legally deploy them. From TFA:
With little public debate, the Pentagon has already spent billions of dollars developing space weapons and preparing plans to deploy them.
I'm wondering if perhaps this isn't also the military wanting to show off a little and provide the public a glimpse of yesterday's technology, similar to what happened with the F-117 circa 1990. Maybe they want to show us what the Aurora really looks like.
You can never go home again... but I guess you can shop there.
DefenceTech.org Times' shaky spacewar story:
"[Global Strike] -- which we first looked at back in November 2003 -- is legit, with a hefty $91 million invested into it over the last two years. But, by making so little distinction between this effort and more pie-in-the-sky plans, the Times does its readers a bit of a disservice."
Irene KHAAAAAAN!
This is not to say I support Mr. Bush, but as parent clearly indicates in the rest of his post, the 1967 treaty concerns WMD -- not all weapons. Quoth TFA: "no treaty or law bans Washington from putting weapons in space, barring weapons of mass destruction."
Moreover, the pentagon isn't stupid. Using (or threatening to use) nuclear weapons is not a central aspect of US security at the moment. The main threats come either from dictatorships (think N. Korea) or terrorism. Neither kind of enemy can be deterred with nuclear weapons. They are probably trying to revive SDI (i.e. place energy/kinetic antimissile weapons in space), but they may have plans for space-to-ground weapons that are not WMD.