Space: The Final Military Frontier

Caption: Satellite surveying Earth (©iStock.com/Daniela Mangiuca)

 

Dependence on satellite technology has turned Star Wars into strategic reality.

…

Right now, unmanned killer robots hover in the skies above the Middle East, ready to rain down death from above on America’s enemies. They are guided by pilots sitting hundreds of miles away, bouncing their instructions off satellites. Smart bombs are guided within inches of their targets using America’s gps satellite-navigation system. When America’s special forces take out a high-value target, their commanders and even the president in the White House can watch and respond in real time, thanks to satellite communication. American commanders view the battlefield and watch their soldiers move across it using American surveillance and positioning satellites. They rely on this information to coordinate attacks and avoid friendly fire. American missile-warning satellites are watching the atmosphere of the entire planet for any possible missile attack on the United States or its allies.

China aims to go deeper into space

As China’s exploration of the moon progresses, its space experts have begun considering going deeper into the solar system – to Mars, asteroids and Jupiter – and a manned deep-space mission.

At a recent conference on deep-space exploration in Harbin, capital of northeast China’s Heilongjiang Province, an official urged scientists and technologists to have a pioneering spirit.

“When exploring the unknown, we should not just follow others. China should be more creative,” said Liu Jizhong, director of the lunar exploration program and space engineering center under the State Administration of Science, Technology and Industry for National Defense.

World War Three in SPACE? Fears over rise in anti-satellite weapons created by Russia

The United States remains the undisputed dominant power in space, but Russia and China are aggressively seeking to challenge the country’s superiority with space programmes of their own.James Clapper, the US director of national intelligence, stressed his concerns as he accused Russia and China of “developing capabilities” to take out American satellites.

He said China in particular, had demonstrated the “need to interfere with, damage, and destroy” US satellites, referring to a series of Chinese anti-satellite missile tests that began in 2007.

Pentagon Rushing to Open Space-War Center To Counter China, Russia

 

Prepping for war in orbit, the military is honing tactics and building a new center to coordinate defense and development.

The Pentagon and intelligence community are developing war plans and an operations center to fend off Chinese and Russian attacks on U.S. military and government satellites.

The ops center, to be opened within six months, will receive data from satellites belonging to all government agencies, Deputy Defense Secretary Robert Work said Tuesday at the GEOINT symposium, an annual intelligence conference sponsored by the United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation.

Russia says it uncovered spy satellites disguised as space debris

The station hosted Major General Oleg Maidanovich, of the country’s Aerospace Defense Forces (ADF), in a program entitled “Special Operations in Space”. Maidanovich told the program that specialists in the ADF’s Intelligence Center uncovered “a newly deployed group of space satellites” that were designed to collect signals intelligence (SIGINT) from Russian telecommunications and other electronic systems. However, the satellites had been disguised to appear and behave like “space junk”, he said. By “space junk”, Maidanovich was referring to rocket stages, old and defunct communications satellites, and various other fragments of manmade devices that have ended up in outer space since the 1950s and are endlessly orbiting the Earth.

Military Gears Up for Space Warfare

New command structures, satellite defenses outlined

Pentagon, military, and intelligence officials outlined plans on Wednesday for warfare in space and warned China not to attack U.S. satellites in any future conflict.

“The threats are real, they’re technologically advanced and they’re a concern,” said Air Force Lt. Gen. John “Jay” Raymond, commander of the Joint Functional Component Command for Space, in testimony before a House subcommittee. “We are quickly approaching the point where every satellite in every orbit can be threatened.”

US military satellite explodes above Earth

It’s plausible that somewhere in China, a PLA officer is laughing.

 

A US military satellite exploded after detecting an unexplained “sudden spike in temperature”, sending dozens of chunks of debris tumbling into different orbits around Earth.

Civilian company CelesTrak was first to notice the explosion of the once-secret weather satellite and the US Air Force subsequently confirmed that it had been lost.

Beijing tests anti-satellite missile: Voice of Russia

China has taken another step towards challenging US supremacy in the space race after successfully testing a “non-destructive” anti-satellite missile on July 23, reports the Chinese-language website of the Voice of Russia, the Russian government’s international radio broadcasting service.

According to China’s official Xinhua news agency, the country’s Ministry of National Defense announced a successful missile intercept test that “achieved the preset goal,” which sources from the US State Department confirmed with “high confidence” was an anti-satellite missile that aims to destroy targets through impact and does not cause an explosion.

Russia charging NASA $A68m per rocket seat

It’s taken only thirty years for the United States in its golden years to go from keeping the Evil Empire in check to becoming reliant upon it — as well as beginning to give them the already-domestically-produced rope from which they will hang USA with. As long as the American shopping mall regime still has plenty of Apple stores from which to purchase a new iPad and plenty of Kardashians to follow, there is no problem or real news to be concerned of.

NASA will pay $US70.7 million ($A68.50 million) to Russia for each astronaut Moscow’s space agency ferries into orbit in 2016 and 2017, the US space agency said.

NASA and Roscomos signed a $US424 million agreement to bring six US astronauts aloft for long-term mission aboard the ISS. The deal would cover all training, launch preparation, flight operation, landing and if needed rescue efforts.

The previous agreement had set the price at $US62.7 million per seat through 2015.