US Missile Defense Agency Seeks $10 Mil for Space-Based Weapons Research

While most of the time those of us who write about space get to look at pretty pictures and think happy thoughts about new scientific discoveries, there's not a whole lot that's stopping various government entities from militarizing space, besides the pesky Treaty of Outer Space.

In a hearing before the House Armed Services Committee yesterday, Lt. Gen. Trey Obering said that current terrestrial defense systems "could be greatly enhanced" if only we had a space-based system to shoot down missiles.

But given the sensitive nature of something like this, it's quite possible that there's a bunch of covert money being spent on this, according to an interview by New Scientist with Sam Black of the Center for Defense Information.

"My suspicion would be that there's black money (from the classified part of the budget) going into it," he told New Scientist.

In a report published online on 21 March, Black notes that the Bush administration originally planned to spend $1.2 billion on space-based interceptors between 2002 and 2007. This did not happen and, since then, public plans for space weapons have become less clear.

An
MDA spokesman insists the space program is "a very small thing for studies, modelling and simulation". But Black worries that the Pentagon may be further along in developing such technology. "We would like to see a debate before they go ahead and put something in orbit," he says.