3 November 2024

From the Space Age to the Anti-Satellite Age

Jim Cooper

We are so accustomed to the Space Age that we assume it will last forever. At least 5 billion people benefit from satellites every day—for internet, communications, shipping, banking, electric grids, and so on—and the remaining 3 billion want access. Everyone wants a smartphone, but those phones are dumb without satellites.

There is increasing evidence, however, that we are living in an Anti-Satellite (ASAT) Age, a time when nations are no longer confident that their satellites are safe, or that they can add as many satellites as they want. Today, nations fear that their satellites will be subtracted. Space is no longer a sanctuary. This is why Congress and the White House took the extraordinary step in 2019 of creating a new Space Force. Unfortunately, this was years late, after rival nations had created their own space forces.

Kinetic threats, those taken through physical means to destroy or damage, are the most obvious. China’s first ASAT launch in 2007, then its geosynchronous ASAT launch in 2013—not to mention its flagrant hypersonic test in 2021—prove that China is perfecting kill shots. Its first test was also the most irresponsible. That test put a target on every single satellite and sharply increased debris in low Earth orbit, putting all satellites at risk.

No comments: