New presidential directive calls for U.S. to deploy weapons in space

Finally!, this will bring low cost access to space..


Herm
Astropics http://home.att.net/~hermperez

MrPepper11 wrote:

New York Times
May 18, 2005
Air Force Seeks Bush's Approval for Space Arms
By TIM WEINER

snip

The Air Force's drive into space has been accelerated
by the Pentagon's failure to build a missile defense
on earth. After spending 22 years and nearly $100 billion,
Pentagon officials say they cannot reliably detect and
destroy a threat today.

"Are we out of the woods? No," Lt. Gen. Trey Obering,
who directs the Missile Defense Agency, said in an interview.
"We've got a long way to go, a lot of testing to do."

The much younger Major Trey Obering whom I knew was among those in the
Air Force who were responsible for what was proposed to have been the
first space shuttle mission from the Vandenberg Launch Site. I had
little or no respect for much of what Trey said to me then; and despite
his upgrade in rank, I have little or no confidence in him now.

Challenger's Ghost

http://blogcritics.org/archives/2005/05/19/114536.php

Manifest Destiny: Now in Crystal Meth Flavor
Posted by davenoon on May 19, 2005

The New York Times reported yesterday that the Air Force, just in time
for the release of "Episode III," is requesting President iPod's
permission to develop and deploy new offensive and defensive weapons in
space:

The Air Force believes "we must establish and maintain space
superiority," Gen. Lance Lord, who leads the Air Force Space Command,
told Congress recently. "Simply put, it's the American way of
fighting." Air Force doctrine defines space superiority as "freedom to
attack as well as freedom from attack" in space.

The mission will require new weapons, new space satellites, new ways of
doing battle and, by some estimates, hundreds of billions of dollars.
It faces enormous technological obstacles. And many of the nation's
allies object to the idea that space is an American frontier.

The awesomely-named Pete Teets, former COO of Lockheed Martin and
former acting secretary of the Air Force, told The Times that while
"[w]e haven't reached the point of strafing and bombing from space. . .
we are thinking about those possibilities." One of the new
capabilities, called "Global Strike," would involve a "space plane"
carrying up to a half-ton of munitions; according to Lance Lord -
where are they finding these incredible names? - Global Strike would
offer "an incredible capability" to reach targets "anywhere in the
world" in (no, Saddam, I'm not making this up) 45 minutes. It gets even
better:

In April, the Air Force launched the XSS-11, an experimental
microsatellite with the technical ability to disrupt other nations'
military reconnaissance and communications satellites.

Another Air Force space program, nicknamed Rods From God, aims to hurl
cylinders of tungsten, titanium or uranium from the edge of space to
destroy targets on the ground, striking at speeds of about 7,200 miles
an hour with the force of a small nuclear weapon.

A third program would bounce laser beams off mirrors hung from space
satellites or huge high-altitude blimps, redirecting the lethal rays
down to targets around the world. A fourth seeks to turn radio waves
into weapons whose powers could range "from tap on the shoulder to
toast," in the words of an Air Force plan.

Why are these new weapons necessary, you ask? Because bloody missile
defense doesn't work!

The Air Force's drive into space has been accelerated by the Pentagon's
failure to build a missile defense on earth. After spending 22 years
and nearly $100 billion, Pentagon officials say they cannot reliably
detect and destroy a threat today.

"Are we out of the woods? No," Lt. Gen. Trey Obering, who directs the
Missile Defense Agency, said in an interview. "We've got a long way to
go, a lot of testing to do."

The Times claims, erroneously, that these new proposals represent "a
substantial shift in American policy" away from the more "pacific" uses
for space imagined by the Clinton Administration. If anything, the Air
Force proposal affirms what many people have argued since 1967, when
Lyndon Johnson proposed the Sentinel program, the forerunner of what is
now called "national missile defense" - that the push for "defensive"
space weapons is little more than a cover for the full-on weaponization
of space. This is why the 1972 ABM Treaty and the lesser-known 1967
Outer Space Treaty were signed in the first place. With the cold war
long over, however, the US has spent the past 13 years developing -
under three successive presidents - a broad foreign policy demeanor
that brooks no opposition to its "full-spectrum dominance." In the
rejuvenated culture of American imperialism, treaties and conventions
are rendered "quaint," and so they may be violated, obeyed or ignored
as the situation requires. Got a problem with that? Suck on it, world!
We've got "interests" to protect.

There are, however, no "national interests" worth defending through the
deployment of weapons in space; the unsustainable expense of these
projects would quite likely make the nation even more vulnerable to
attack by diverting resources away from more worthwhile programs. (For
some perspective on this just ask all the people working at American
ports and nuclear plants how all that Homeland Security money is
working out.) Moreover, the laughable failures of "missile defense"
would lead a reasonable person to suspect that "Dildos from God" - or
whatever they're calling it - are probably more thrilling in name
than in practice.

None of this matters, though, when you've got a hard-on like Lance
Lord. "Space superiority is not our birthright, but it is our destiny,"
he told an Air Force conference in September. "Space superiority is our
day-to-day mission. Space supremacy is our vision for the future."

h (Rand Simberg) wrote:
Nothing in the Outer Space Treaty prohibits any of the weapons
proposed here. I don't know why people continue to perpetuate this
myth. Oh, wait--yes, I do.

Ahem. Text from http://www.oosa.unvienna.org/SpaceLaw/outersptxt.htm :

"Article IV

States Parties to the Treaty undertake not to place in orbit around
the earth any objects carrying nuclear weapons or any other kinds of
weapons of mass destruction, install such weapons on celestial bodies, or
station such weapons in outer space in any other manner.

The moon and other celestial bodies shall be used by all States
Parties to the Treaty exclusively for peaceful purposes. The
establishment of military bases, installations and fortifications, the
testing of any type of weapons and the conduct of military manoeuvres on
celestial bodies shall be forbidden. The use of military personnel for
scientific research or for any other peaceful purposes shall not be
prohibited. The use of any equipment or facility necessary for peaceful
exploration of the moon and other celestial bodies shall also not be
prohibited."

Now contrast the prohibitions in the first paragraph with one of the
weapons mentioned in the article:

"Another Air Force space program, nicknamed Rods From God, aims to hurl
cylinders of tungsten, titanium or uranium from the edge of space to
destroy targets on the ground, striking at speeds of about 7,200 miles
an hour with the force of a small nuclear weapon."

Orbital kinetic energy weapons of sufficient quantity or mass are probably
going to qualify as WMD - unless you have a good lawyer who can confuse the
issue or you are the leader of a super power that can safely discard or
ignore treaties on an ad hoc basis.

Spontaneous Kinetic Weapons

Do you suppose they plan on testing these kinetic weapons on some of them
moslem demonstrators howling for Yankee blood, or just use it like an
accidental meteor strike on those Syrian WMD storage areas?

If they manage it right, the huge explosion, the massive display of
lightning generated in the dust cloud and the awesome thunderclap ought to
instill the fear of the infidel's god into them once and for all.

On Thu, 19 May 2005 17:07:13 -0000, Jim Logajan
wrote:

cylinders of tungsten, titanium or uranium from the edge of space to
destroy targets on the ground, striking at speeds of about 7,200 miles
an hour with the force of a small nuclear weapon."
Orbital kinetic energy weapons of sufficient quantity or mass are probably
going to qualify as WMD - unless you have a good lawyer who can confuse the

Actually, I would call such a device a weapon of PINPOINT
destruction... since it carries neither a nuclear, biological, or
chemical warhead, the damage will be limited to the target.

You don't need to be a lawyer to recognize the difference - just an
elementary understanding of physics. ;-)

h (Rand Simberg) wrote:
Kinetic weapons are not WMD, and are not prohibited by the treaty.

Your statment leads to such absurdities that I'm not sure you are being
serious here. But assuming you a

The treaty specifically prohibits "weapons of mass destruction" - it does
not care how the energy is stored or the destruction is accomplished. All
that matters is whether the objects qualify as weapons and whether they
can cause "mass destruction".

I think any reasonable person would agree that, for example, an asteroid
striking a city and causing the death of millions and destruction in the
trillions of dollars was an event of "mass destruction" and that the
mechanism identical in form, if not scale, to that of the proposed "Rods
from God."

By the way, ironically, according to the rather liberal definitions of
the U.S. legal code it appears that many of the proposed weapons would
probably qualify as "weapons of mass destruction" if used against U.S.
nationals:

"the term "weapon of mass destruction" means-
(A) any destructive device as defined in section 921 of this title;"
(From reference [1])

And according to section 921:

"The term "destructive device" means-
(A) any explosive, incendiary, or poison gas-
(i) bomb,
(ii) grenade,
(iii) rocket having a propellant charge of more than four ounces,
(iv) missile having an explosive or incendiary charge of more than
one-quarter ounce,
(v) mine, or
(vi) device similar to any of the devices described in the
preceding clauses;"
(From reference [2])

[1] http://straylight.law.cornell.edu/us...2---a000-.html

[2] http://straylight.law.cornell.edu/us...1----000-.html

Len Lekx wrote:
On Thu, 19 May 2005 17:07:13 -0000, Jim Logajan
wrote:

cylinders of tungsten, titanium or uranium from the edge of space to
destroy targets on the ground, striking at speeds of about 7,200
miles an hour with the force of a small nuclear weapon."
Orbital kinetic energy weapons of sufficient quantity or mass are
probably going to qualify as WMD - unless you have a good lawyer who
can confuse the

Actually, I would call such a device a weapon of PINPOINT
destruction... since it carries neither a nuclear, biological, or
chemical warhead, the damage will be limited to the target.

For sufficiently large pinpoints, I suppose you are correct. You'd make a
fine lawyer.

You don't need to be a lawyer to recognize the difference - just an
elementary understanding of physics. ;-)

Feel free to lodge a complaint with the University of Minnesota - they
awarded me a BSc degree in physics where I presumably passed the freshman
physics exams.

Len Lekx wrote:
On Thu, 19 May 2005 17:07:13 -0000, Jim Logajan
wrote:

cylinders of tungsten, titanium or uranium from the edge of space
to
destroy targets on the ground, striking at speeds of about 7,200
miles
an hour with the force of a small nuclear weapon."
Orbital kinetic energy weapons of sufficient quantity or mass are
probably
going to qualify as WMD - unless you have a good lawyer who can
confuse the

Actually, I would call such a device a weapon of PINPOINT
destruction... since it carries neither a nuclear, biological, or
chemical warhead, the damage will be limited to the target.

Sorry?

You don't need to be a lawyer to recognize the difference - just
an
elementary understanding of physics. ;-)

Depends on the mass and the velocity and an elementary understanding of
physics. You know, 1/2mv^2?

Damage could be massive - it entirely depends on the velocity and mass
of the object.

Dave

Rand Simberg wrote:


Orbital kinetic energy weapons of sufficient quantity or mass are
probably
going to qualify as WMD - unless you have a good lawyer who can
confuse the
issue or you are the leader of a super power that can safely discard
or
ignore treaties on an ad hoc basis.

Not by any previously existing definition of it.

This has to be one of the most extremely silly things you've said in a
very long time Rand.

Sorry. Had to delurk to point that out.

Bye.

Dave