Everything is dual use if you look at an economy holistically. Also like as a weapon it’s kind of terrible. You fire it once and your enemy retaliates with MAD, completely destroying geosynchronous orbit with debris.
You fire it once and your enemy retaliates with MAD, completely destroying geosynchronous orbit with debris.
I was thinking about this specific project’s geopolitical implications more from a perspective of “how will the paranoiacs in the US upper echelons react?” I agree that it’s supremely unlikely that the Chinese government would actually weaponize it. But the American establishment would freak out at the possibility, due to projection. They’ve had dreams of orbiting energy weapons for as long as they’ve had spaceflight, often in the form of solar collectors powering microwave transmitters.
Wouldn’t even need to do a MAD really, if this was even a threat they could debris up an orbit pretty quick. Probably real easy to point a spy satellite at another satellite too
Everything is dual use if you look at an economy holistically. Also like as a weapon it’s kind of terrible. You fire it once and your enemy retaliates with MAD, completely destroying geosynchronous orbit with debris.
I was thinking about this specific project’s geopolitical implications more from a perspective of “how will the paranoiacs in the US upper echelons react?” I agree that it’s supremely unlikely that the Chinese government would actually weaponize it. But the American establishment would freak out at the possibility, due to projection. They’ve had dreams of orbiting energy weapons for as long as they’ve had spaceflight, often in the form of solar collectors powering microwave transmitters.
Wouldn’t even need to do a MAD really, if this was even a threat they could debris up an orbit pretty quick. Probably real easy to point a spy satellite at another satellite too
What if I say, I had a creative work where china defeats the us by using orbital laser weapons?
I’d take a look at it