Federal Computer Week reports on a recent talk by Air Force Secretary Michael Wynne, in which he discussed the strategic thinking going on in Washington since China showed early this year they had the capability to target satellites with missiles.
It's a good read, and a somewhat depressing one. The military has to take into account the possibility that their fleet of intelligence satellites will be targeted in any conflict, and given the level of reliance on these today, that could be catastrophic.
Wynne laid out the problem that China's action presented: A $1.5 billion satellite can now be taken out by a $100 million missile. The economics don't work to the satellite operator's favor. Thus the military must come up with responses – either fast relaunches, or a fleet of cheap satellites that can fill the gap in a conflict.
But does this kind of pronouncement make anybody feel good about the prospects for peaceful co-existence:
Myself, I prefer the discussion that's happening in India this week, at the 58th International Astronautical Congress there. Minister of State
Prithviraj Chavan is getting press in that part of the world today calling for international rules that would help prevent turning space into the "battlefield of the future."
Here's Chavan, from the Statesman News Service, albeit speaking in bureaucratese:
Translation: Give peace a chance. In space.
Air Force 'shocked' by Chinese actions in space [Federal Computer Week]
Don’t make space a war zone: India [The Hindu]
(Photo:
A Delta II rocket sits on the launch pad with a payload of satellites. Credit:
NASA)
