China Tests Anti-Satellite Laser Weapon

[bradclark1]

Nothing much we can do about it but I'm sure this will make a few countries nervous.

http://www.aviationweek.com/avnow/ne...s/CHI01177.xml

http://www.armscontrolwonk.com/1359/chinese-test-asat

[Letum]

That's nothing new really.

There have been ways of shooting at satellites for a long time.

The real news story here is that China have filled earth's orbit with a new lot of dangerous space-junk that may knock out some other satellites.

But we can't blame China for space junk; the English, Americans and Russians have all shot down satellites at one time or another.

[bradclark1]

No, the real news is that China destroyed a satellite using a laser as the topic title says. Thats one up from their capability of attempting to blind satellites. That takes away an American advantage in event of an asian war.

[Kapitan]

I dont think american ground forces are going to be able to do much in china itself if a war ever came to it, the chinese populations is just too big even though the army is not well trained china can afford to loose a few million where as us lot can bearley afford a few hundred thousand.

Navy and airforce is a diffrent matter.

But the smaller weaker countries such as iran can still be a threat cause china could seacretly support them.

[CCIP]

I still don't think it's incredibly new. It's not a capability that the Chinese would not be able to develop - and then there's the fact that precisely for the reason of being at a disadvantage, they had the impetus to develop it quicker.

All in all, let's just hope that like all their other deterrents, it stays a deterrent.

[Kapitan]

Fact of the matter is a tomahawk can take out a satalite (apparently) but a laser is cheaper than throwing $2 million dollar missile at it.

And i realy wouldnt under estimate the chinese capibilites either.

[TteFAboB]

That's more than the blinding laser indeed. That one is fired from the surface of the planet. You can hide it under a big styrofoam rock or whatever. So it's a real advantage that can only be possibly countered if its location is discovered/known and prone to attack.

Relying solely on the information from these two links, I understand this thing as a "single-use" rocket-delivered mini-anti-satellite satellite. So if you can take the rocket down before it reaches orbit, say, with a laser-equipped 747, the thing won't be able to deploy and hit any satellite at all.

So you can certainly blind a satellite easily and for as long as you keep the emitting LASER source safe from aggression. But since this thing is launched by a rocket, there is a possibility of shooting it down. As far as I can tell from the two links it can only be used once, to kill a second satellite you have to launch another rocket, unless you can fit more than one unit in the same rocket or create a different model capable of hitting more than one satellite. Either way, this one kill per satellite means all you have to do is launch another observation satellite. You may loose one but that's no problem if you have a spare one. How much do these spy satellites cost anyway? Better leave this question unanswered. :rotfl:

I don't know how easy it would be to intercept a rocket before it can reach spy-satellite orbit, that's for the strategists to figure out. How well-protected the launching platform is, how close you'd need to get that 747 to be able to destroy a big rocket (or just melt the cargo if that kind of targetting is possible), for how long you can keep firing and shooting them down, etc.

Granted, if we're talking about war you might aswell keep Alert 5 on the launching pads and keep stuff ready to destroy them at the first sign of trouble. I guess the point would be to have a satellite destroyer up there already before any war starts, launched during times of peace, like this test. Then it's already too late and it would require a conventional rocket attack or another satellite destroyer to take it down, the anti-mini-anti-satellite satellite, which would probably arrive too late anyway, after the first satellite had already done its job. This seems by far the best option. Especially if you could disguise it as a fully-functional Weather satellite.

[tycho102]

Yeah, it was a "kinetic kill vehicle", which is just a fancy way of saying a guided rocket without warhead.

I'm not real happy with our ruling elite class, right now. With our education system being as poor as it is, there is less oversight through voting, allowing corporationism and fascism to hold too much power. I'm at the point where I'm ready to take some deadly risks, and as such, I currently welcome competition from China. America needs some serious reprioritization, and historically, it's only come through death and destruction.





So, I'm actually kind of pleased with this development. China (read: the Communist Party of China) has been making some good decisions.

[ASWnut101]

a really easy and inexpensive way is to burst a nuke near the satillite's orbit. The EMP will take care of it.

[peterloo]

Anyone knows the physics of laser (I don't know much, sorry) knows that laser is capable to burn a hole in a satellite... American owns similiar techology, I think

Don't be that panic... PLA is not going to shoot down your Spy-satellite mod for Silent Hunter 3 :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl: :rotfl:

[bradclark1]

Here's a piece from The Day about it.
http://www.theday.com/re.aspx?re=51c...f-85e7728be7c8

[Iceman]

Lasers..? This is old news....don't make me use mine.

[Kapitan_Phillips]

[Iceman]

Originally Posted by Kapitan_Phillips

LOL

[3Jane]

As undestand it they used a ballistic missile rather than a laser. From what I have read though they are developing such a system. Anyway, the pot is calling the kettle black as far as western nations complaining about such weapons is concerned.