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> But that might just be my German upbringing where media is being required by law to disclose at least the company and the editorial board/staff.

Did you miss that it's a republished DW article?

Wow. I missed that. But that would explain my feelings towards the article.

If I want to know what the neocons in the US think about things, I always turn to dw ...

Couldn't agree more. Sadly paid with my tax Euros.

But I believe the less I care the less it impacts me directly. There is actually nothing I could do as there is not one viable political alternative promoting defunding DW.

Original link (and maybe the submission URL should be changed to this, per HN policy): https://www.dw.com/en/chinese-space-cleaner-spotted-grabbing...

Ok, changed from https://science.thewire.in/spaceflight/chinese-sj-21-satelli.... Thanks!

Propaganda aside, I feel there's a wasted opp here... what if it was 'launched' at the moon, maybe even pinpoint launched, to something near the moon that slowly pushed it towards a big incinerator or something that disassembled, sorted the materials and burned it down to minerals and eventually someone could bring those back home to earth or use them up there in a space factory to build stuff...

I think it'd be cool AF if we built a space city on the moon that actually handled the majority of space mission builds and even launches. We'd still need to launch from here to get materials and people there, but once there ....astronauts could train etc....perhaps the building people live in could spin or something to give the guise of gravity, and everyone could wear waited outfits too, it'd also be a place for scientists to experiment w/ anti-gravity tech maybe...

I really think space mining should also be a thing, and would love to see drones that build more drones for mining, and building stuff as well as bigger and bigger telescopes further and further from earth and in places that are better blocked out by the Sun, like orbiting Saturn or something so maybe when it's facing the sun it refills it's battery and when it's in the dark zone it is taking photos...

I was going to say we don't recycle satellites by launching them to the moon for the same reason we don't recycle things on earth by sending them to the other side of the earth, but we do actually do that by sending recycling in the US to China. The real barrier is cost - the delta v you need to shoot something to the moon is much larger than what you'd need to de-orbit something

Surely if you wanted to take down an enemy satellite there would be easier ways than sending a robot arm satellite out after it.

Every modern army is completely reliant on military satellites. I think the idea is a surgical strike that doesn't leave space clogged up with debris for the next few hundred years.

other methods kind of leaves a mess that pisses off other people.

Just blowing them up creates debris that are a risk to your own satellites and has more chance of reprisals from other nations because it's a more broadly destructive and you might hit other satellites. Selectively deorbiting enemy satellites is a much cleaner way, like the difference between carpet bombing and a GPS/laser guided precision bombing. In space there's an incentive to be careful about widespread destruction because the debris spread out over time and fall through lower orbits risking a lot of other satellites that weren't the target.

GPS laser guided precision bombing, like with drone strikes? With teams of highly trained people at every step of the decision?

When actual numbers were leaked about use of drones and "precision" bombing by the US, arguably the most competent, rigorously trained, elite military on the planet, directly answerable to elected leadership, the rate of "bystander" to "target" kills was 5 to 1. Biden bombed a car full of children during his Afghanistan debacle. Oops.

It's probably not a good idea for non space agency leaders, military or otherwise, to have tools that physically interact with stuff in space. There's not an institution on the planet competent and responsible enough to avoid unintended catastrophe once military conflict escalates to orbit.

The strikes are pretty accurate, the use of them and the planning behind it is where the unintended deaths come from, the weapons go where they're pointed they're just wielded by people who don't care about the people directly nearby or getting it wrong. The analogy holds for the various types of anti-satellite weapons, among them this is a very precise tool.

> It's probably not a good idea for non space agency leaders, military or otherwise, to have tools that physically interact with stuff in space. There's not an institution on the planet competent and responsible enough to avoid unintended catastrophe once military conflict escalates to orbit.

I think the technological cat is out of the proverbial bag on this one.

As a non-destructive method, a robot arm satellite actually seems pretty effective. If you destroy the satellite, a bunch of debris gets sent out in that orbit and others nearby, poisoning those orbits.

I'm curious, what other non-destructive methods are there?

You could give it a retrograde kick so it descends into atmospheric drag.

You can instead refuel it or attach a new maneuvering unit to revitalize its mission.

Doesn't this provide the information you need?

https://thewire.in/about-us

I was not able (on mobile) to find that link. I looked at DuckDuckGo and read up on them.

The disaster that is mobile "optimizations" strikes again. Sigh.

> China’s space tug: A service or a threat?

"China is providing mitigation against Kessler syndrome. Here's why this is Bad."

Disingenuous take. The threat is the potential dual use of the technology — civilian and military. Are you saying there is no harm use of such technology? You are committing the very misinformation sin you are bashing the media for.

How is that disingenuous? It is precisely what is going on here. Between 2 recent bills, the US govt has earmarked nearly a billion dollars explicitly for funding anti-China propaganda in the global media. That's a lot of articles.

Anything can be weaponized or misused; it's a common framework for negative propaganda. "Our civilized technology, their barbaric weapons". It is also not a free pass from scrutiny.

I know the COMPETES Act, but what is the other one?

Strategic Competition Act of 2021 - $300,000,000 towards propaganda

COMPETES Act of 2022 - $500,000,000 towards propaganda

Is there any way to tell exactly what was actually paid for with these funds?

Indeed, it's not propaganda. I hear from my Indian friends that The Wire is a great outlet and trustworthy source.

>Wow. In the beginning I found the article interesting before (in my subjective eyes) it turned into a thinly veiled Anti-China propaganda piece.

Domain is .in, you didn't have to open it.

Wouldn't that imply that every single published thing under the .in-TLD is just pro US propaganda. I wouldn't go so far and discredit a whole TLD as a prior in my mind.

Not necessarily pro-US, but definitely anti-China. It's analogous to pro-Russian news coverage in mainstream American media. Not gonna happen.