Once you blow something up in space, the debris lingers. It isn't like a sea battle where the remains of two warships sink to the bottom. The last anti-satellite weapons test was carried out in 1985 by the United States. We took aim at an old, dying Air Force satellite -- just as a test -- and it created 200 pieces of debris that were large enough to track. The last piece of debris finally left low Earth orbit 17 years later, and one of the pieces came within 1 mile of the International Space Station and could have done significant damage. Debris is the single greatest threat to the space shuttle. This is why the Air Force prefers to jam or dazzle satellites rather than blowing them up. But once we go down this road, there are no guarantees that other countries will play by our rules. It is a lose-lose situation if space warfare happens. The United States will still win wars, but we will win with more casualties and more destruction.

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Krepon, Michael. "Seven Questions: Space Weapons." Foreign Policy. (July 2005). [ 3 quotes ]