Comment by mzw_mzw | Hacker News Reader

Comment by mzw_mzw | Hacker News Reader

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> When China does it, it's bad, right? And the same done by the U.S. good? Or is it the other way around?

Neither.

Instead of flashing an applause light (on HN, that would be "The United States Government is evil!" but, to be fair, in lots of other places it would be yelling about the evil Chinese) we can look at the situation as it develops and why. It would depend on how the war came about, it would depend on the different actors' behaviors and motives. It would require thinking, and honesty.

That whole world-weary "well, who knows what the distinction is between patriotism and terrorism really?" is quite foolish in general, and an excuse to avoid making hard moral choices or, worse, to avoid siding with people who are unpopular in one's social milieu. Yes, there are gray areas. There are also areas which are quite black and white. Should satellite warfare ever happen, something we should all hope is not the case, there's every chance will be able to figure out who was right and who was wrong.

Neither side will make a move without a decade of preparation, and every act during that decade needs to be judged against a common moral standard.

Also we need orbital brooms, even second-class powers these days can trigger a Kessler syndrome. Several powerful laser installations, maybe on ships, will do fine.

We're pretty much at the point were private companies can trigger Kessler Syndrome.

Hmm, I've never heard that proposal before. Is anyone seriously investigating the use of ground-based lasers to clear orbiting debris? It's plausible that a powerful and well-controlled laser could damage large satellites, but could that be done carefully enough to safely deorbit them instead of breaking them apart? And would the lasers be capable of clearing smaller pieces of debris?

Apparently, yes. [0]

Lasers would not be used to destroy the debris. Instead, they would be used to burn off particles from the space debris causing them to prematurely de-orbit and burn up in the atmosphere.

[0] www.space.com/29271-space-station-laser-cannon-orbital-debris.html

That's fantastic, thank you. Obviously the researchers are going to be optimistic about their own project but if it's even a tenth as good as they claim, this could genuinely solve the problem.

It might be another case of MAD, where satellite warfare "could" happen but without any reasonable defense, even major power satellites would be vulnerable. Then some crazy dictator in northeast Asia who has developed some satellite attack missiles with nothing to lose is the USA and China's biggest problem.

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