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U.S. Considers Anti-Satellite Laser
SpaceAdmiral writes "The U.S. government wants to develop a ground-based weapon to shoot down enemy satellites in orbit. The laser will be much more powerful and sophisticated than a similar endeavor a decade ago. From the article: '... some Congressional Democrats and other experts fault the research as potential fuel for an antisatellite arms race that could ultimately hurt this nation more than others because the United States relies so heavily on military satellites, which aid navigation, reconnaissance and attack warning.'"
It'll be ready when Kent gets back from the cleaners to finish mounting the optics.
Nothing says 'Peace' like the United States blasting another country's satellite out of the sky. I can't see how doing so would help prevent attacks on the U.S. Perhaps the idea is to disable communications and espionage capabilities, but there are other, more conventional means of warfare, as ineffective as they may be.
The other theory, give countries warnings about removing satellites? Countries love ultimatums too. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying that I'm against this (or for it, really) but I'm suggesting that perhaps the political and diplomatic repercussions might need to be investigated more thoroughly.
From a sci-fi point of view, its Spies Like Us all over again! Sounds interesting and technological to say the least.
And they said zombies weren't real!
A mirror.
As the USA concetrates on the development of these so called lasers, al-Qaida and its affiliates will enter the USA through the porous southern and norther borders and do greater harm.
Folks, do not be suprised to hear in future that this project has corruption and greed behind it. Remember that the USA spent US$5.99 billion on the shuttle which was never value for money!
Far more likely it's to protect America's "intellectual property economy" when it's cheap enough for private individuals to launch their own satellites to disseminate information under any laws they see fit.
Wow. There's my first good laugh of the day.
No, this is more of a paranoid-delusional fantasy of the Pentagon and some bureaucrats who don't want competition from China and maybe Russia. The key to U.S. military dominance is our excellent satellite intelligence. While HUMINT helps with the social engineering aspects of war, nothing but a satellite combined with proper munitions can blow up a tank underneath a bridge without hitting the bridge. From 40,000 feet. Our satellites give our military and NIMA a detailed view of pretty much every square meter of the planet, and we use this to blow shit up. No other nation on the globe has this capability to the extent we do. The United States government wants to keep it this way.
So, we're in a hypothetical future conflict with China. They have satellite capabilities similar to ours. Maybe not as good, but similar in ability. We use these lasers to blow up their satellites, removing their capability to deliver precision guided munitions. We retain that capability. We win the fight. Maybe not the war, as Iraq is teaching it takes more than bombs to do that, but at least the U.S. isn't the country blown to bits with an occupying force.
24 beers in a case, 24 hours in a day. Coincidence? I think not!
Regarding your comment...it's a bit pointless to work on a defense measure for a military threat AFTER it has been deployed or its deployment is iminent. While it sure is popular to bash the US these days, I'm sure there is all kinds of research going on around the world to counter perceived threats that might seem silly now, but may become dead serious 10 years from now.
That's because the primary purpose of this program, like so many others, is to transfer vast amounts of money from the federal treasury to certain politically cooperative industries. Like Star Wars before it, I doubt that there is anyone in the Bush administration that cares one iota whether it has any real military value or even whether it ever "works" or not. The real (political) value is in the spending itself.
An object in a stable orbit cannot be "shot down". Its not an aircraft.
You can destroy it but all that will happen is that the pieces will
spread out from the point of explosion/impact and eventually become
space junk that could cause problems from friendly satellites.
Hopefully the laser would only disable a satellite and not cause its
fuel tanks to detonate , since if they do then the US will simply
be causing problems for itself , its allies and all space farers in
the future.
Hmmmmn,
I do agree with your post to a certain extent, but the US hasn't entered a hot war with an equivilant (or even close) power for over fifty years (and arguably never)
The hot wars of the future will be with countries like iraq, where the US can absolutely dominate in air & space.
This project seems more likely for cold/economic wars of the future. Think about the damage to the US economy if Chinese satellites rebroadcast everything that could be rebroadcast (from entertainment through economic/political/military secrets to proprietary source code/ blueprints/ etc).
The US has always used its military to protect its economy - there is no reason this project should be any different.
There are shills on slashdot. Apparently, I'm one of them.
(The sarcasm was meant to be somewhat teasing, but not cruel. Apologies if feelings were bruised.)
Of course no feelings were bruised!
You can't be a whiney mac fanboy without having a thick skin!
There are shills on slashdot. Apparently, I'm one of them.
Umm, read some history. There's even a picture of one National Socialist German Labor Party nuke design.
Imperial Japan had nuclear bomb programs too.
Personally, I'm glad America got there first.
The Soviets took the easy route. They had some Useful Idiots steal the technology.
The Soviets had ASAT programs too. ASAT weaponry is old news, it's just that now they're using lasers rather than missiles. Heck, even that's not all that new, though making it work would be.
Don't you think the way for the US to really ensure its population's security would be to try to track down the arsenal of the former USSR?
Don't you think Putin ought to take nuclear security more seriously? The Russians built the damn things and they're not so poor that they can't deal with them if they want to, especially with high oil prices pouring hard currency into Russian state coffers.
My response to reading the article: duh!
Here are some recent articles on the developments in China. The US is not starting this race, but it'd be nice to keep up regardless.
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/space/2005-07 -27-china-satellites_x.htm m l
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/China/HD20Ad03.html
http://www.house.gov/coxreport/chapfs/ch4.html
http://www.spacedaily.com/news/china-01c.html
http://www.taiwandc.org/twcom/84-no3.htm
http://www.afio.com/sections/wins/1998/notes48.ht
The world is, a dangerous place. As with Sudan and Iran, the UN is no deterrent to aggression. Enlightened self-interest directs us to investigate these types of systems for the same reasons we investigate lethal pathogens. Surviving them requires understanding them even if we never intend to use them.
#-#
Ad Astra Per Aspera
A rough road leads to the stars
All you'd need is a large rotating mirror and a tracking system, and you could vaporize a human targ -- er, I mean, Intellectual Property Thief from space!
"Ladies and gentlemen, my killbot features Lotus Notes and a machine gun. It is the finest available."
Not sure why this is modded at zero ... I think the AC is onto something here! Take this to its logical conclusion, ie otherwise totally powerless citizens against a superpower, and you end up with terrorists, as that is the only apparent way to strike back!
Of course, the US has historically had the benefit of being physically remote from the people they wage war on - no V1 or V2 flying bombs flying over the channel in US history (discounting the Japanese balloons of WWII I guess). The threat of ICBMs brings this a little closer to home, but we know who has these, and "we" tend not to wage war on them so much! But now we have the age of the bomb in a backpack and all bets are off!
Eclectic beats from Leeds, UK
handmadehands.co.uk
The US is not starting this race, but it'd be nice to keep up regardless.
From your SpaceDaily.com link above: "China will become the third nation after U.S. and Russia to possess an ASAT system." China can make arguments identical to yours about enlightened self-interest. They could make the same argument about WMDs -- and Saddam Hussein, Kim Jong Il, and the regime in Iran have all done just that. Deterrence, etc.
"Fundamentalism" isn't about divine morality. It's about human authority.
I'm sure the French thought something similar when they built the Maginot line - "Now we're safe from the Germans, all wars will be small colonial ones".
The world can change pretty quickly, as Pearl Harbour or 9/11 show. If you want to survive, you need to prepare for all possible sorts of wars, not just the ones that seem likely at the moment. And a war with China is all two possible. I'm not suggesting that either side want it, but if you look at the regular standoffs over Taiwan, it's always possible that an accident could esacalate into a very dangerous situation. To a lesser extent, it's possible that North Korea could drag the Chinese and the US into a conflict.
And a war between China and the US would be much more evenly balanced in a sortf of Zerg vs Protoss way. It would also be marked by extreme ruthlessness, and it's hard to imagine that shooting down satellites would be regarded as particularly unacceptable.
And there are other possible conflicts where the US would be evenly matched, e.g. against Russia or even Iran. Whilst it's unlikely that Iran would be able to launch satellites, they would be able to buy coverage & GPS like services from European or Russian ones.
Even if none of this happens, shooting down satellites with a ground based laser is a cool trick. AFAIK, the US does have anti satellite weapons already - there was a cold war program to fire missiles from an F15. Looking at that link, the Russians experimented with a load of anti satellite techniques from kamikaze 'figher satellites' to a ground based laser that fry satellite's image sensors.
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
Militarizing the space in near-earth orbit and creating a military highly dependant on satellites is just stupid.
Oh, wake the hell up.
News flash: Reconnaissance satellites are *weapons*. They are also *not new*. They've been around for decades, so space has already been 'militarized.' The Russians had a working anti-satellite program back in the *late 1960s*. We were succesfully killing satellites with missiles back in the mid-80s. The notion that this 'militarization of space' is anything that has its roots in the current administration bespeaks a woeful ignorance of recent history.
A few missles that blast millions of ball-bearings into to orbit, and the entire planet will be locked out of space for hundreds, or even thousands of years
No, it wouldn't. There are any number of ways to deal with that scenario, ranging from heavier armored satellites to different target orbits to cheap pop-up satellites that you can launch from submarines and don't have to survive for more than a fraction of an orbit. None of these are as good an option as what we do now, but the suggestion that all someone would have to do to prevent all access to space for millennia is set off a few rockets full of ball-bearings is absolutely ridiculous.