well then you shouldnt have quoted both
Anyways, heres a very insightful article on the issue:
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/OPINION/Editorial/Wars_in_space/articleshow/1738286.cms Close on the heels of the Chinese anti-satellite (ASAT) test comes the news that the first test of the US airborne
laser, designed to shoot down missiles, is scheduled for 2009.
The US and the erstwhile Soviet Union had revealed their ability to attack satellites in space during the eighties. The US still maintains a counterspace techno-logy aircraft squadron to undertake defen-sive and offensive operations, like jamming enemy satellite communications.
China, too, had earlier used a ground-based laser to illuminate an American satellite, which heralds its working towards deploying laser weapons on earth to attack space-based assets in future.
War in space has moved from the pages of science fiction to the realm of impending reality. Space has already been militarised.
Communications and reconnaissance satellites have for long been used by armed forces to direct operations and acquire intelligence, highlighting the intrinsic dual-purpose nature of high technology.
The New York Times had recently estimated that some 845 active satellites were orbiting in space, more than half belonging to the US.
A war in space would cause incalculable damage to civil society; but three special dangers need highlighting.
First, it is impossible to distinguish between civilian and military satellites. As a result, all of them would be targeted in conflict.
Since satellites have several non-military uses like communications, scientific research, and entertainment, their damage or destruction would seriously disrupt civil society.
Second, satellites used for military or civil purposes tend to be integrated systems; hence destruction of any of its parts could dislocate the entire system, emphasising how easily satellite systems could be disrupted.
Third, the debris from China's ASAT test has scattered across the expanse of space and would remain as litter for decades.
High-tech systems like satellites being extremely vulnerable to damage, this litter could prejudice the future use of space by satellites.
Technological means are available to clean up this litter by nudging it into lower orbits to burn them out, or by using lasers to burn them up in their present orbits, but these measures are both challenging and costly.
The military implications of China's ASAT test have, quite expectedly, caused a knee-jerk reaction in defence establishments.
They now stress the need to develop countermeasures like equipping satellites with defensive systems, and
deploying similar ASAT capabilities to deter China from threatening national assets in space.
Several of these technological solutions are embedded in the missile defence programmes of the US. The US defence community anticipates that future programmes, impelled by the Chinese ASAT test, would yield billions of dollars for research and development of exotic counter-ASAT capabilities.
A linkage between war on earth and in space, however, portends the horrific dangers of conflict being ignited by
accident or misperception, since all weapon systems would need to be placed on hair-trigger alert.
For years, the negotiation of an international treaty to address the growing militarisation of space has been stalled
by the US. Indeed, a new space policy unveiled by the Bush administration in August 2006 states that it would unilate-rally "deny, if necessary, adversaries the use of space capabilities, hostile to the US national interests".
A confrontation with China seems inevitable in these circumstances. What can be done? An international convention must
be urgently negotiated embodying a positive assurance by signatories that satellites in space would not be attacked.
Their numbers and orbital paths should be dec-lared to an agency established under this convention. The United States, Russia and China, as the three recognised ASAT-capable powers, need to take the initiative to negotiate this
convention. The international community must participate in this process in its own self-interest.
The issue of littering and polluting space with satellite and related debris could lead to the denial of space for
future use.
A code of conduct is urgently required to ensure that more debris in space will not be created. Technological means to clean up space in a cost-effective manner also need exploration through a joint international effort.
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Topic: US could shoot down satellitte tomorrow night. (Read 4772 times)
