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Who wants to militarize space?Posted by Tim Johnson

Thu Nov 1, 10:00 PM ET
 

Since China showed its increasing space capabilities in January by using a ground-based missile to blast an aged weather satellite out of the sky, a parade of U.S. military officials have come to Beijing to express concern. They ask, “What are China’s intentions? Why is its military not more transparent about what it does?”


 Typical were the comments of Marine General Peter Pace, who came in March while he still served as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff:


“It wasn’t clear what their intent (with the test) was. When the intent isn’t clear, and when there are surprises and you confuse people, you raise suspicions. I think that is one area where we can work harder between the two militaries to make sure . . . we tell each other what we’re doing, why we’re doing it, how we’re doing it (and) what our intents are, so that it is clear.”


Just 10 days ago, a senior U.S. military officer charged with protecting U.S. space assets said the Chinese anti-satellite test heightened urgency to make improvements in the U.S. program.


“We’re very much in the discussion phases of how we’d respond to a variety of threats to our space systems,” said Maj. Gen. William Shelton, the head of the joint functional command for space, during a stop in Japan. “It’s a work in progress … (but) the Chinese ASAT test put us on a much more rapid path than before.”


I’m sure Defense Secretary Robert Gates may ask questions about the ASAT test as well when he comes to Beijing for two days, beginning Sunday.


So it might come as of some interest to note what occurred at the U.N. this week.


The United States was the only country out of 172 to vote against a resolution opposing the militarization of space on Oct. 29. Here is a U.N. description:


“Turning to the prevention of an arms race in outer space, the Committee approved a draft resolution that would have the Assembly call upon all States, in particular those with major space capabilities, to contribute actively to the objective of the peaceful use of outer space and of the prevention of an arms race in outer space and to refrain from actions contrary to that objective and to the relevant existing treaties in the interest of maintaining international peace and security and promoting international cooperation.  It was approved by a recorded vote of 170 in favor to 1 against (United States), with 1 abstention ( Israel).”


As the China Matters blog notes, even key U.S. allies like Britain, Australia and Japan wouldn’t “hold their noses” and vote with Washington on this one.


So who is it, again, who is responsible for the militarization of space? Surely, the Chinese military brass must have some questions about that.


It seems to be another example of U.S. “exceptionalism,” the belief that the United States is qualitatively different from other nations.

Do you realize that our whole satellite communications system and GPS could be destroyed by a low tech attack from a country with a few missiles blasting a few loads of plain gravel into the satellites' orbit?

Militarization of space makes no sense as using the weapons would create so much "space junk" it would ground us to earth forever.

I can understand your first augument, but "grounding us to earth" would be a problem because.......?

Have you heard of an electronic impulse weapon?
If it was to be detonated over America?
All of our Electronical stuff would QUIT working...(it would be total devestastion for America in 1 hour)

China shot a satelite out of its orbit a couple months ago....

"Space junk" is ONE of the reasons(maybe the main reason) that the Heavens shall be melted, So God can get rid of ALL that Stuff that's up their!
You know He's not going to have ALL that stuff floating around when he comes to rule...
That's always been my thought on that anyway!

If it came to that it would be the same world wide. While life would be more difficult than it is now it would not be the end of life with just that sort of an event. It would take much more and that much more will be forthcoming.

Hi Pastor
I did'nt mean to imply that it would end all life or all life in America...
However millions upon millions would die in America it would seem...
Just by the water that comes from the Colo. River to Calif. would kill 1000's if not 1,000,000,000's.
The wide spread panic that would accure, Look what happens during a little riot...
Factories & Daries that process foods for us & Farms that grow our food, All these require electricity & Fuel.
NO GAS for the masses...
ALL Air Defensive mechanizims not working properly.
NO Eyes or Ears that we use for our Defense or Offense.
Just think of ALL the people in Hospitals that depend on elect. to survive...
Food not being delivered to stores quick enough if @ all.
NO more fast foods places. Except at a good neighbors :)
Katrina times a 1000 over...
And whatever else someone could think of that requires elect. or fuel. ect.
It's quit possible that God would allow something like this to happen to America, if that's what it would take for him to get MORE people to turn to him, Why not? would'nt be the 1st. time...
You know what he thinks about nations that turn from him and his ways & what he says he'll do to them...

$97.00 for a barrel of oil right now,
and with the sanctions the U.N "might" impose on Iran, Iran has promised to devastate the oil market.
Did you read about China's Shortage of fuel the other day,
These people are sucking it up like water and why not?
China and Russia are getting fuel from Iran for about 23 cents a gal.
That's true God is the finisher of ALL things...
Your Loving Brother Duane

It always is a possibility. Many of the younger generation don't know how to survive without electricity and many of the older generation has forgotten. I remember an ice storm that hit Memphis. They normally don't get such ice. It took down a lot of trees and power lines. People were out of power for 4 to 6 weeks. The people just didn't know how to handle it all. A number of people died because of no heat even though the gas lines to their homes were not effected they didn't know how to get their furnaces to work without electricity.

As for the Defence systems they have all those backed up. The back up systems are powered down. Systems that are powered down are not effected by electronic impulse weapons. In addition to that the backups have non-electrical backups. Our Military is well at the ready for such an incident. Yes, there would chaos if it were to happen.

I could be very wrong but I don't think this will happen. There are many other things that will and no one is or can be ready for them. I thank God that as Christians we do not have to be overly concerned with it as we are in the Lord's hands.

Also remember that an EMP blast will not effect "electricity" but electronics.  A lightbulb will still light if electricity is applied.  However your cell phone will not even though the battery is actually good.  A classic '63 Corvette will still probably run but your new '08 model will die...one has a computer to run everything, the other does not. 

What an EMP blast will effect are things that run off of solid state devices, older devices will be more resilient to EMP because they typically use larger voltages to operate.  It is basically like taking a magnet and moving it over your VHS tape or floppy disk.  And EMP pulse does not generate any heat or any other factor like that.  It is simply a huge magnetic pulse.  And what it does is create a spike of voltage down conductors.   

And if one knows how to do it even the newer car can run without the computer. It isn't hard to by-pass the computer system and make it work.

Actually it impossible on most cars as both the fuel injection and ignition require computer control to work. You would have to somehow equip the vehicle with a carburetor and a distributor that fit the engine. Most people don't have those hanging around.

An EMP attack has never actually been tried, so no one knows for sure what the effects would be. Some places might escape due to natural shielding.

Our military probably has systems hardened against such an attack, but they have become totally dependent on GPS and satellite communications. Predator drones and such use both to operate, as do "smart weapons" and even manned aircraft. Taking the satellites out by launching a few truckloads of gravel into their orbit is a much cheaper way than EMP to nearly destroy US military capability, as we rely on high tech rather than manpower.

Here I would have to disagree completely. In the 1980's it was already noted the danger of relying on high tech systems alone. Because of this the Military implemented backup systems to backup systems so that they would be able to function in the event of a catastrophic event happening to those high tech systems. They are consistently holding exercises today that involve events that supposedly knock out those systems.

Well I would have to say yes and no.  Yes the core infrastructure would be protected.  However we do not keep our aircraft and things of that nature in hardened bunkers and such.  And strong enough EMP would damage their components as well.  I would say it would put our capability back a few years.  Yes the AR's would still fire bullets.  But the jet fighters would be in trouble initially.

I've heard that they can be detonated miles above our capability of detecting them too?

Now that I would have to say I do not believe.  We have the ability to monitor missile launches all over the world.  So to get a missile up in the air and us not notice it is a bit of a stretch to me.

The Military has known of EMP concerns since before the 1980's. It was a big scare during the Cold War. I worked with a lot of satellite equipment while in service, both for weapons and communication systems. There is such a thing as EMP proof equipment and it has been employed into Military systems including jets. As I was saying earlier it is the civilian populace that will have a problem with this not the Military as this "proofing" is too expensive to put into all the products that consumers use. In addition to this there are many backups used. Some of these backups use older equipment that has no computers or EMP sensitive components in them. There are backups also to the satellite systems. Even if the satellites are knocked completely out there are means for the Military to use as a backup to them. Our nation will not be defenseless in such a situation. The tin-hat wearing people that came out with this EMP scare did not know of this and probably wants to still deny it's existence. I somehow get the feeling it was started by some of the anti-war crowd that was trying to scare people into backing off away from the war.

What i heard was that they can launch it into orbit like a satelite,
and then have it re-enter our airspace and detonate it?
I'm not into all this, It's just something that i've heard about..
You all seem to know alot about it, Thank You

Yes, that is pretty much they way it works but we have the technology to "see" such a weapon being launched from it's launching pad and knowing approximately where it is going and being able to track it along it's path.

But, do we have the capability to stop it once it re-enters over us?
I don't think we have the same tech as china does, able to shot satellites out of their orbit,Or do we?
IF not, that means we would have to try and shoot it down once it re-enters and that would be to late...
I'm sorry i'm not trying to keep this going, just trying to get all the bugs out...

Hopefully you guy's are right and our Gov. has thought of all this stuff,
with our Gov. track record though i doubt it!

Yes we do have interceptor missiles that can intercept a missile in the upper atmosphere. We have the patriot missile for one that has taken great strides in it's capabilities.

A little more on the EMP protection.

Electrical equipment is "hardened" to protect itself from an EMP. The basic concern of protection is cutting down the outside EMP level. Metallic shielding (such as a Faraday Cage) is used to route EMP fields away from vital electrical components. Multiple shielding is sometimes used for extra protection. Individual components are designed to withstand higher bursts. If it is also connected to a cable, transient protection like surge protectors, wire termination procedures, screened isolated transformers, protective enclosures, spark gaps, and filters are used to protect at the point of entry.

Speaking of "having no idea what you just said"...... (http://i191.photobucket.com/albums/z29/kimr9499/dope11.gif)

Wow you know alot on this thanks...
I knew of the patriot missles but some of the other stuff, cool, there barking up the wrong tree then, huh?
AMEN!

That's alright. Sometimes I don't either.   :D :D

Only because I used to work with a lot of this equipment.

They can still cause a lot of problems for the U.S. but as I said it would be in the civilian area. That alone would cause a lot of chaos and an economic disaster.

China plans to launch space station Wed Nov 7, 5:47 AM ET
 


BEIJING - China said its lunar probe had entered its final orbit around the moon Wednesday, but an official backed away from reports of launching a space station by 2020.

 
The probe — called Chang'e 1 after a mythical Chinese goddess who flew to the moon — made final adjustments at the end of a two-week journey and entered its final working orbit of 125 miles from the moon Wednesday where it will explore its surface for the next year.

The first photo of the moon should be sent back later this month, officials said. By early next year the probe will have measured the whole surface of the moon at least once, officials said.

China attaches great prestige to its ambitious space program, seeing it as a way to validate its claims to being one of the world's leading scientific nations. The country has sent astronauts into space twice in the past four years and launched its moon probe about a month after rival Japan. In 2003, China became only the third country in the world after the United States and Russia to send a human into orbit.

But officials denied state media reports Wednesday that China was planning a space station by 2020.

"So far, according to the plans already published, there are no plans for a space station," Li Guoping, spokesman of the China National Space Administration, said at a news conference.

The China Daily newspaper, said China's planned space station would be "a small-scale, 20-ton space workshop," quoting Long Lehao, a leading designer of the Long March 3A rocket that carried the Chang'e 1 into space.

Chinese space officials have said previously they wanted to build a space station in the next 10 or 15 years, but the target date of 2020 was the first time a schedule has been made public, Long told China Daily.

The report did not say how many people the station would be able to hold. But its weight is about one-tenth that of the International Space Station, which currently has six people on board.

The probe's launch raised the prospect of a space rivalry between China and Japan, with India possibly joining in if it carries through on a plan to send its own lunar probe into space in April.

But Chinese officials have played down talk of a space race, saying Beijing wanted to use its program to work with other countries.

Li said China was willing to participate in the International Space station, joining the 16 countries involved.

China has not participated in the project in part because of U.S. unease about allowing a communist dictatorship a place aboard.

 Inflatable Moon Base Prototype Heads to South Pole Jeremy Hsu
Staff Writer
SPACE.com
Thu Nov 15, 6:45 PM ET
 


An inflatable habitat designed for explorers on the moon or Mars is headed for an Antarctic test run, NASA said Wednesday.

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The habitat – built by ILC Dover and resembling an inflatable backyard bounce for children – will make its South Pole debut early next year. NASA demonstrated the inflatable prototype on Wednesday at ILC Dover's Frederica, Del., facility.


"We deflated [and inflated] it in about ten minutes," said Larry Toups, habitat lead for NASA's Constellation Program Lunar Surface Systems Office, in an interview.


Toups and several other habitat designers from NASA's Johnson Space Center and ILC Dover will attempt to deploy the structure in the Antarctic this coming January. Their goal: to use just four people and deploy everything in four hours. Working in bulky cold weather gear will also make the deployment more analogous to the challenges facing astronauts clad in cumbersome spacesuits on the moon.


The habitat prototype will eventually serve as a multilayered test platform for new technologies such as health monitoring systems, self-healing materials, and protective radiation materials. When not inflated, the habitat can save on space and weight during transportation. It's just one of several models, including another prototype that stands on eight legs and has two pressurized cylinders connected by an airlock door, under scrutiny by NASA engineers.


Other researchers at McMurdo Station in Antarctica will use the inflated habitat as a staging area from January 2008 to February 2009, allowing the designers to monitor its performance using human reports as well as data from embedded sensors. NASA and the National Science Foundation hope to learn how the habitat material behaves in a cold environment and how well the structure retains heat and atmosphere.


Toups said the field demonstration will show that the structure can be "packaged in a small volume" but still "expand to a usable, habitable volume," even in an extreme environment. If NASA likes what it sees, a second or third generation inflatable habitat could deploy to the moon as early as 2020, with four-person crews making weeklong trips to get a lunar base operational.


The U.S. space agency is not alone in considering inflatable living modules. A private company, the Las Vegas, Nev.-based Bigelow Aerospace, has already launched two inflatable modules into Earth orbit in anticipation of assembling a new space station by 2012.