Found this amusing graphic, detailing the “Ten Most Important Satellites Orbiting Earth Now” or, the ten best targets for a good ol’ fashioned space shoot-em-up. The list itself is debatable with the exception of the “GoldenEye” satellite which clearly warrants far more congressional posturing than it has received.

A new Air Force recruitment video emphasizes their role in protecting the nation’s critical space assets from attack:

The scenario is a little ridiculous as they argue a single missile could take out our entire space infrastructure (maybe a reference to the Chinese direct-ascent ASAT?). Noah Shachtman does a thorough job refuting this argument in the DangerRoom blog but here’s another good on-point response from the database:

A scan of a Modern Mechanix article from December, 1951 shows how orbiting satellites will be able to police the world. Kinda. The article itself focuses solely on military advances in rocketry — there is no discussion of how these Space Cops would be able to keep the peace beyond the assumption that being able to launch a satellite would give a nation the capacity for global tyranny. Still a great find.

(Via boing boing).

Ad astra has a new special report covering the renewed attention being paid to Space Based Solar Power as a solution for a range of strategic and environmental issues:

One quick highlight was this amusing anecdote on the reasons behind the subtle shift in nomenclature for this concept from “Space Solar Power (SSP)” to “Space Based Solar Power (SBSP)” (which I missed earlier on the Space Solar Power (SSP!) blog):

Many people familiar with the concept of space solar power (SSP), or solar power satellites (SPS) wondered where and why after 40 years of consistency, the Pentagon would decide to rechristen it “space-based solar power,” or SBSP.

If one is trading many e-mails, typing space solar power gets tedious. So like any good military organization, abbreviations become the language of choice. But in the early stages, one of the core study members had a firewall that would kick-back or “disappear” any e-mail with “SSP” in it. Apparently some monetary, provocative, or medical scam had used the acronym, and it was thus blocked by a spam filter. Despite pleadings to allow these official e-mails, the IT powers-that-be would not relent. Therefore the recipient begged for a re-title of “SSP” to “SBSP” so the e-mails could get through. So, a four-decade history of common nomenclature was replaced because of IT inflexibility, or alternately, because of some illicit spammer that had an alternate definition of SSP.

A few months back, the Space Review did a helpful survey of the platforms of the leading presidential contenders to see what they had to say about the U.S. role in space. Not surprisingly, their space platforms were underdeveloped compared to the more salient issues in the race and none of them had anything specific to say about space weaponization.

However, in a new press release, Barack Obama laid out his space policy plan which includes the plank:

To my knowledge, Senator Obama is the first 2008 candidate to specifically address the U.S. military role in space in their space policy though the other candidates would likely break down along party lines if pressed. However, this is unlikely to become a significant election issue unless China resumes testing during the campaign, forcing the candidates to address how they would handle the threat from China.

Updated, February 25, 2008: Just saw this on Global Security Newswire: the Council for a Livable World sent a questionnaire to all of the candidates at the time and received these responses from the Democratic candidates:

Or something like that..

It has been a year since China tested its direct-ascent anti-satellite weapon against one of its own satellites and pundits are mining the anniversary for any significance they can find. Geoffrey Forden has a detailed three-part essay on Wired.com where he argues that with their current capabilities, China is incapable of delivering a knock-out, “Pearl Harbor”-esque blow to U.S. space assets:

On the opposite side of the spectrum, Bill Gertz headlines the Washington Times with news that U.S. satellites are having to change course because of space debris caused by last year’s test.

While not wanting to downplay the unprecedented level of space debris following China’s test, Gertz ignores that such satellite maneuvers are a common occurrence anymore, partly due to the accumulated space debris from similar Russian and U.S. ASAT tests during the 70s and 80s.

James Clay Moltz has an optimistic new article in the latest Space Policy (sadly, not currently available online without subscription):

His argument is that a careful review of the past three ‘high risk’ periods in space security show that governments have consistently pursued the goal of preserving “safe access to space”, despite their rhetoric to the contrary:

This article first analyzes in greater detail the histories of the three “high risk” periods in space security mentioned above: 1962, 1983, and 2001. It examines the stated intentions and expectations of key actors, what factors led them to change their plans, and what actual results followed. Next, it draws on these cases to develop a series of lessons from the first 50 years of space security. Overall, it makes the argument that while national leaders may have talked tough, they have actually behaved more or less consistently with the aim of protecting “safe access to space” as their highest priority, rather than pursuing unilateralist aims of “space dominance.” This is not to say that some highly influential thinkers and politicians did not entertain such views. But other national and international factors prevented such courses of action from being followed. This suggests that outcomes in the arena of space security–whether contemporary decision makers pursued this objective consciously or not–might best be understood as stemming primarily from calculations of “environmental security,” rather than mainly from traditional military-strategic factors.

The four common elements that he identifies are:

• Risks of collective bads that would threaten the use of outer space for all parties (i.e. space debris, HAND);
• Fear of igniting a space arms race;
• High monetary cost and low survivability of space weapons compared to conventional means;
• Transparent nature of outer space increases risks of getting caught developing covert space weapon programs.

His argument is very encouraging, especially as it predicts a peaceful future for outer space, governed by collective security agreements and emerging international organizations. However, I am still cautious about his conclusions as his article is imprecise on the definition of space weapon programs. For example, he is right to point out that the space-based missile defense programs and kinetic anti-satellite weapons have ran into political difficulties recently, due to several of the common elements he identified. However, other counterspace programs like the Counter Communications System are thriving because they can avoid these same environmental factors.

The U.S. military is well aware of the political and environmental risks from kinetic-kill ASATs and is researching counterspace methods that would allow them to temporarily jam, dazzle, or disable an adversary’s satellite to avoid these. I’m not convinced that there is an inevitable trend towards greater international cooperation in Outer Space, especially with the current administration’s aversion to any kind of international agreement including the environmental regimes he cites. Clay Moltz’s article appears to be a preview of his forthcoming book The Politics of Space Security, 1957-2007, and I’m looking forward to exploring his full argument.

Two other articles from the same issue of Space Policy that are worth checking out:

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Updated: March 22, 2008: I’ve created a new argument for this as a supporting argument to the the argument that “Space Weapons are not Inevitable”:

There is an Inherent Norm against the Use of Space Weapons

Arms Control Wonk Jeffrey Lewis and Gregory Kulacki of the Union of Concerned Scientists gave a talk at the Carnegie Endowment on China’s ASAT test in January. They argued, in a preview of a forthcoming paper, that the test was not meant as a show of force and could possibly have been averted if the U.S. had demarched the Chinese government for previous attempts (a point that was hinted at in an earlier New York Times article). From a summary on the Carnegie site:

There is also a writeup in Global Security Newswire, and an apparently less than accurate writeup forthcoming in Space News.

A new report from the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments looks at the cost-effectiveness of deploying space-based weapons for each of the proposed goals:

The Register has a snarky writeup on the report online (”U.S. Doesn’t Need Orbital Battlefleet“). I’m still working on processing new quotes into the system but they will be available here:

Updated March 18, 2008
I’ve created an argument based on this report here: