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  The Quiet Crisis Above: Unveiling the Dark Side of Space Militarization

By Justin James McShane, GeopoliticsUnplugged, Nov 28, 2024

Summary:

In this episode, we examine the growing militarization of space, focusing on the development and testing of anti-satellite weapons (ASATs) by various nations, including the U.S., Russia, China, and India. We detail the history of space militarization, from the Cold War to the present, highlighting the dangers of space debris and the inadequacy of existing treaties like the Outer Space Treaty in addressing modern threats. Different types of ASATs are described, both kinetic and non-kinetic, along with electronic warfare systems used for disrupting satellites. We also discuss the lack of international cooperation and robust enforcement mechanisms to prevent an arms race in space, emphasizing the need for new agreements to ensure the peaceful use of outer space. Ultimately, we warn of the potential for space to become a new theater of conflict.  cooperation?”………………………………………………….

https://geopoliticsunplugged.substack.com/p/ep93-the-quiet-crisis-above-unveiling-ed9

January 5, 2025 Posted by | space travel, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Departing Air Force Secretary Will Leave Space Weaponry as a Legacy

msn, by Eric Lipton, 30 Dec 24

WASHINGTON — Weapons in space. Fighter jets powered by artificial intelligence.

As the Biden administration comes to a close, one of its legacies will be kicking off the transformation of the nearly 80-year-old U.S. Air Force under the orchestration of its secretary, Frank Kendall.

When he leaves office in January — after more than five decades at the Defense Department and as a military contractor, including nearly four years as Air Force secretary — Mr. Kendall, 75, will have set the stage for a transition that is not only changing how the Air Force is organized but how global wars will be fought.

One of the biggest elements of this shift is the move by the United States to prepare for potential space conflict with Russia, China or some other nation.

In a way, space has been a military zone since the Germans first reached it in 1944 with their V2 rockets that left the earth’s atmosphere before they rained down on London, causing hundreds of deaths. Now, at Mr. Kendall’s direction, the United States is preparing to take that concept to a new level by deploying space-based weapons that can disable or disrupt the growing fleet of Chinese or Russian military satellites………………………

Perhaps of equal significance is the Air Force’s shift under Mr. Kendall to rapidly acquire a new type of fighter jet: a missile-carrying robot that in some cases could make kill decisions without human approval of each individual strike.

In short, artificial-intelligence-enhanced fighter jets and space-based warfare are not just ideas in some science fiction movie. Before the end of this decade, both are slated to be an operational part of the Air Force because of choices Mr. Kendall made or helped accelerate.

The Pentagon is the largest bureaucracy in the world. But Mr. Kendall has shown, more than most of its senior officials, that it too can be forced to innovate.

“It is big,” said Richard Hallion, a military historian and retired senior Pentagon adviser, describing the change underway at the Air Force. “We have seen the maturation of a diffuse group of technologies that, taken together, have forced a transformation of the American military structure.”

Mr. Kendall is an unusual figure to be the top civilian executive at the Air Force, a job he was appointed to by President Biden in 2021, overseeing a $215 billion budget and 700,000 employees…………….

Mr. Kendall, who has a folksy demeanor more like a college professor than a top military leader, comes at the job in a way that recalls his graduate training as an engineer.

He gets fixated on both the mechanics and the design process of the military systems his teams are building at a cost of billions of dollars. Mr. Kendall and Gen. David Allvin, the department’s top uniformed officer, have called this effort “optimizing the Air Force for great power competition.”………………….

Mr. Kendall has taken these innovations — built out during earlier waves of change at the Air Force — and amped up the focus on autonomy even more through a program called Collaborative Combat Aircraft.

These new missile-carrying robot drones will rely on A.I.-enhanced software that not only allows them to fly on their own but to independently make certain vital mission decisions, such as what route to fly or how best to identify and attack enemy targets.

The plan is to have three or four of these robot drones fly as part of a team run by a human-piloted fighter jet, allowing the less expensive drone to take greater risks, such as flying ahead to attack enemy missile defense systems before Navy ships or piloted aircraft join the assault.

Mr. Kendall, in an earlier interview with The Times, said this kind of device would require society to more broadly accept that individual kill decisions will increasingly be made by robots……………….

These new collaborative combat aircraft — which will cost as much as about $25 million each, compared to the approximately $80 million price for a manned F-35 fighter jet — are being built for the Air Force by two sets of vendors. One group is assembling the first of these new jets while a second is creating the software that allows them to fly autonomously and make key mission decisions on their own.

This is also a major departure for the Air Force, which usually relies on a single prime contractor to do both, and a sign of just how important the software is — the brain that will effectively fly these robotic fighter jets………………………………………

Space is now a fighting zone, Mr. Kendall acknowledged, like the oceans of the earth or battlefields on the ground.

The United States, Russia and China each tested sending missiles into space to destroy satellites starting decades ago, although the United States has since disavowed this kind of weapon because of the destructive debris fields it creates in orbit.

So during his tenure, the Air Force started to build out a suite of what Mr. Kendall called “low-debris-causing weapons” that will be able to disrupt or disable Chinese or other enemy satellites, the first of which is expected to be operational by 2026.

Mr. Kendall and Gen. Chance Saltzman, the chief of Space Operations, would not specify how these American systems will work. But other former Pentagon officials have said they likely will include electronic jamming, cyberattacks, lasers, high-powered microwave systems or even U.S. satellites that can grab or move enemy satellites.

The Space Force, over the last three years, has also been rapidly building out its own new network of low-earth-orbit satellites to make the military gear in space much harder to disable, as there will be hundreds of cheaper, smaller satellites, instead of a few very vulnerable targets.

Mr. Kendall said when he first came into office, there was an understandable aversion to weaponizing space, but that now the debate about “the sanctity or purity of space” is effectively over.

“Space is a vacuum that surrounds Earth,” Mr. Kendall said. “It’s a place that can be used for military advantage and it is being used for that. We can’t just ignore that on some obscure, esoteric principle that says we shouldn’t put weapons in space and maintain it. That’s not logical for me. Not logical at all. The threat is there. It’s a domain we have to be competitive in.” https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/departing-air-force-secretary-will-leave-space-weaponry-as-a-legacy/ar-AA1wE4iS

January 1, 2025 Posted by | space travel, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

US Space Force conducts ‘simulated on-orbit combat’ training

SPACE, By Brett Tingley, August 25, 2022

The exercise brought together Space Force members with counterparts in the U.S. Army and Air Force.

The U.S. Space Force just completed a major joint training exercise that saw participants engage in simulated orbital combat. 

The exercise, known as Space Flag 22-3, took place from Aug. 8 to Aug.19 at Schriever Space Force Base in Colorado. Close to 120 Space Force personnel from multiple U.S. Space Force Deltas took part in the training alongside counterparts from the U.S. Air Force and the U.S. Army, according to a Space Force statement. The training was conducted by Space Force’s training and education component, Space Training and Readiness Command (STAR Command or STARCOM).

Space Flag 22-3 presented realistic training opportunities that “challenged players to consider complex astrodynamics while maneuvering and operating during simulated on-orbit combat engagements” in a “contested, degraded and operationally-limited environment,” the statement continues. …………………  https://www.space.com/space-force-space-flag-simulated-orbit-combat

December 20, 2024 Posted by | space travel, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

SpaceX Wants to Increase Launches at Boca Chica Without a Full Environmental Review

The Hypocrisy of Musk’s Anti-Regulation Stance

Despite Musk’s repeated calls for a smaller government and less regulation, SpaceX’s operations are heavily subsidized by the public,

If you are funded by the public, you should be regulated by the public. Musk’s calls, as the head of the DOGE to dismantle regulation are dangerously misguided.

Lynda Williams, December 12, 2024,  https://www.counterpunch.org/2024/12/12/spacex-wants-to-increase-launches-at-boca-chica-without-a-full-environmental-review/

On April 20, 2023, SpaceX’s Starship—the largest and most powerful rocket ever built—exploded just four minutes after liftoff from its Boca Chica spaceport in Texas. While CEO Elon Musk touted the mission as a success for clearing the launch pad, the environmental and community fallout painted a different picture. Scorched wetlands, debris scattered for miles, and fire damage underscored the risks of high-stakes experiments in a region rich with biodiversity and human history. Now, SpaceX seeks approval from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to increase its Starship launch frequency or “cadence” to 25 times per year—potentially 75 events annually when accounting for booster and spacecraft recovery attempts—all without completing the rigorous Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) required by law for projects of this magnitude. Instead the FAA only requires a weaker form of environmental review, an Environmental Assessments (EA).

Although Musk has accused the FAA of regulatory overreach and declared on Twitter that “humanity will never get to Mars” under such constraints, the reality is that the FAA has granted him every Starship license for he has sought at Boca Chica, never once requiring a full EIS. Now, as the Trump-appointed head of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), Musk has the power to push anti-regulation initiatives like Project 2025, which seek to dismantle critical environmental protections. Without swift action to demand accountability, Boca Chica could become not just a testing ground, but a sacrifice zone for Musk’s megalomaniacal pursuit of a world where neither people nor the planet stand in his way. Unless his plans are stopped or slowed, communities, ecosystems, and taxpayers will bear the cost of his unchecked ambitions. Submitting testimony during the FAA’s public comment period is an important way to hold Musk and SpaceX accountable and demand a thorough environmental review with an EIS.

Boca Chica: A Community Under Siege

Boca Chica is far more than a launch site; it is a vital ecosystem and home to diverse communities. The region includes the Laguna Atascosa National Wildlife Refuge, wetlands and endangered species such as the Kemp’s Ridley sea turtle and piping plover. It is also sacred land for the Carrizo Comecrudo Tribe, whose members have opposed SpaceX’s industrial encroachment on their ancestral lands. The Tigua Tribe, also known as the Ysleta del Sur Pueblo, has argued that the development of the SpaceX launch site at Boca Chica Beach has disrupted their traditional ceremonial practices, which include the use of the beach for sacred rites, thereby violating their First Amendment-protected religious practices. Advocacy groups like Save RGV and the Center for Biological Diversity have stepped forward to challenge SpaceX’s operations, highlighting the disproportionate burden borne by the local environment and residents. Both organizations have filed lawsuits demanding the FAA require a full EIS for SpaceX’s activities at Boca Chica. Save RGV has highlighted violations such as discharging untreated industrial wastewater into surrounding wetlands, while the Center for Biological Diversity’s lawsuit argues that the FAA has violated the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) by allowing SpaceX to operate under insufficient EAs. Ironically, SpaceX is required to do a full EIS for Starship operations at Kennedy Space Center (KSC) under the U.S. Space Force due to stricter regulations. Yet Boca Chica, with its more fragile ecosystem, is left without the same level of scrutiny. The people of Boca Chica deserve the same protections and oversight as those at KSC.

For local residents, the impact of SpaceX’s operations is impossible to ignore. Frequent road closures disrupt daily life and block access to public beaches. Loud rocket tests and sonic booms disturb both human and wildlife populations, and the April 2023 explosion left debris scattered across miles of sensitive habitat. Meanwhile, Indigenous and local voices remain sidelined in regulatory decisions. The FAA has failed to adequately consult with communities, treating them as collateral damage in Musk’s ambitious pursuit of Mars.


According to a recent NPR story, the situation has worsened due to SpaceX’s wastewater discharges. The company has been found to have violated the Clean Water Act, with both the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ) levying fines totaling over $150,000. Environmentalists, including local group Save RGV, have pointed out that this disregard for environmental regulations highlights the urgent need for a more comprehensive review of SpaceX’s impact on the region. Local activist Joyce Hamilton stated, “This is potentially really damaging,” emphasizing the significant environmental consequences of SpaceX’s unchecked operations.

Environmental Risks Ignored by the FAA

Although the FAA did complete an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the SpaceX Starbase in 2014, it was only for Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets—much smaller and less complex systems. Since then, SpaceX’s operations have expanded dramatically to include the much larger and more powerful Starship/Super Heavy launch system. The FAA has relied on a Programmatic Environmental Assessment (PEA) and tiered reviews, rather than conducting a full EIS specific to Starship operations. While the FAA completed a full EIS for Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy launches at Cape Canaveral in Florida, it has failed to apply the same standard to Starship’s vastly more powerful and experimental operations in Texas. The two systems are not comparable: Starship’s unique size, power, and planned recovery operations—along with its location in sensitive wetlands near endangered species—demand a new, comprehensive review. The FAA’s reliance on outdated assessments is grossly inadequate and leaves the area unprotected from significant, unexamined risks.

The environmental risks of SpaceX’s operations extend far beyond Boca Chica. The FAA has also permitted SpaceX to blow up Starship in the Indian Ocean, the Pacific Ocean off the coast of California, and north of Hawaii. Even in cases where the spacecraft are intended for “soft” landings in the ocean, the explosive charge used to destroy the spacecraft results in significant pollution, including harmful chemicals like rocket fuel residues, other contaminants, and debris that can endanger marine ecosystems. In the Pacific near Hawaii, it is dangerously close to the Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument, a UNESCO World Heritage Site that is considered sacred to Native Hawaiians. Despite its cultural and ecological significance, no cultural consultation has been conducted for permission to land or conduct operations near this sacred site. The monument is one of the largest marine protected areas in the world, home to over 7,000 species, many of which are endangered. The contamination of these waters from SpaceX’s operations further threatens the delicate biodiversity of this pristine marine environment. These crash landing sites are also in the direct path of humpback whale migration, potentially endangering their migratory patterns and jeopardizing their fragile populations.

In April 2023, SpaceX’s experimental launch license included a plan for Starship to crash into the Pacific Ocean just 62 miles north of Kauai. The EA claimed that fewer than one marine mammal would be harmed during the explosion, despite the spacecraft’s 100-metric-ton mass and the force of 14 tons of rocket fuel detonating on impact. The FAA’s “Finding of No Significant Impact” or FONSI ignored the area’s cultural significance and failed to consult with Hawaiian residents or agencies such as the Office of Hawaiian Affairs (OHA), which co-manages the marine sanctuary. Local experts raised concerns that even minor deviations from SpaceX’s “nominal” trajectory could cause debris fields to drift into the protected waters of Papahānaumokuākea.

Why the Current Reviews for Starship Are Totally Outdated and Inaccessible

Right now, SpaceX’s licenses for launching Starship at Boca Chica are based on a 2022 PEA. But here’s the catch: that review relies on the even older EIS from 2014 which wasn’t written for Starship at all—it was written for SpaceX’s Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets, which are much smaller and much less complicated. In fact, Starship isn’t even mentioned in the 2014 EIS.

The problem is simple: Starship is nearly twice the size of Falcon 9, ten times heavier, and far more powerful, with untested systems like mid-air recovery and deluge cooling that bring entirely new risks. While the 2014 EIS assumed far fewer launches, SpaceX now proposes up to 25 per year, with vastly greater environmental damage and disruption. The FAA’s reliance on this outdated framework ignores these realities and creates a confusing web of layered reviews that fail to provide a clear picture for the public or sufficient protection for local communities and ecosystems. It’s time to stop building on broken foundations and require a full, updated EIS that reflects the true scope of Starship’s operations.

Furthermore, the Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) which oversees NEPA have regulatins that include requirements for public participation and clear communication. The current FAA Revised Draft EA spans 75 pages and refers to over a dozen additional technical documents critical to understanding the full scope of SpaceX’s proposed operations. These referenced materials total about 1,200 pages, requiring over 80 hours to read and analyze. Written in dense, jargon-heavy language, the EA and its supporting documents are nearly incomprehensible to the layperson, effectively excluding the public from meaningful participation. NEPA mandates that environmental reviews be accessible and transparent, yet the FAA has failed to provide simplified summaries or plain-language guides. Finding the place to submit comments and testimony is ridiculously complicated. This inaccessibility undermines public input and compliance with NEPA’s core purpose, leaving communities without the tools to adequately challenge or engage with the review process. The FAA must extend the public comment period and provide simpler, more accessible documents so communities can meaningfully engage.

The Hypocrisy of Musk’s Anti-Regulation Stance

Despite Musk’s repeated calls for a smaller government and less regulation, SpaceX’s operations are heavily subsidized by the public, having received over $5 billion in federal funding for projects ranging from national security launches to satellite deployments. On top of this, SpaceX benefits from indemnities under the Commercial Space Launch Act, which caps its liability for catastrophic accidents at $500 million, effectively shifting much of the financial risk to taxpayers. As SpaceX pushes for an accelerated launch cadence, the potential for accidents—and the resulting financial burden on the public—grows. This stark contradiction highlights how Musk’s anti-regulation rhetoric is at odds with the significant taxpayer dollars and protections that sustain his company.

In addition to federal subsidies, SpaceX also benefits from generous incentives provided by the state of Texas and the city of Brownsville. Texas has offered tax breaks, land leases, and infrastructure support to encourage SpaceX’s development of the Boca Chica launch site. Brownsville, a city with one of the lowest median incomes in the U.S., has also provided SpaceX with significant tax exemptions and financial incentives to attract the company to the region. These subsidies not only reduce SpaceX’s operating costs but also shift the financial burden onto Texas taxpayers and the local community. While Musk criticizes government regulation, his company is essentially a recipient of state and local welfare, further illustrating the gap between his public persona and the reality of SpaceX’s reliance on public funds.

If you are funded by the public, you should be regulated by the public. Musk’s calls, as the head of the DOGE to dismantle regulation are dangerously misguided. Those who benefit from public money and protections must be held accountable to the same level of oversight that ensures the safety, health, and well-being of the public they rely on. The people who are regulated should not be in control of deregulation. Its a conflict of interenst.

Musk’s Mars Myth and Planetary Risks

Musk’s plan to make humanity a “multiplanetary species” reflects a childish understanding of the challenges we face on Earth. His rush to colonize Mars, driven by a naive belief that it offers a backup for human survival, overlooks the fact that Mars is a hostile, uninhabitable world that couldn’t sustain a colony without Earth’s support and resources. Using his X platform, Musk is pushing the Mars survival myth to convince the public to fund his childish dream of conquering the “final frontier” of space on the taxpayer dime, all while demanding the dismantling of public agencies that protect people and the planet. Instead of risking Earth’s biosphere for an uncertain future on Mars, we should focus on safeguarding our home planet.

In addition to SpaceX, dozens of private companies and countries are ramping up rocket launches to deploy satellites, explore the moon, and mine asteroids. With thousands of launches expected annually in the coming years, the environmental impact—particularly on the ionosphere—could be catastrophic. The ionosphere plays a critical role in protecting Earth from harmful radiation from the sun and space, and the long-term consequences of rocket chemicals on this protective layer are still not fully understood. These risks have yet to be adequately addressed in the environmental review process, either domestically or globally.

We must act before the unregulated rush to space spirals out of control, leading to catastrophic unintended consequences damaging the ionosphere and the ecosystems that sustain life on Earth. Musk’s goal of making humanity “multiplanetary” could become a self-fulfilling prophecy, where the push for Mars colonization leads to the destruction of Earth’s biosphere. The future of our planet is at stake, and yet this critical issue is being ignored. There is no Planet B, and it certainly isn’t Mars.

Public Input: A Critical Opportunity

Public comments are due by January 17, 2025. You don’t have to be an expert to submit comments and it doesn’t take much time. You can read the EA here and submit comments electronically, by mail or in person or on zoom here. Here is a sample testimony you are free to use or modify:

“I am submitting this testimony to urge the FAA to require a full Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for SpaceX’s Starship operations at Boca Chica. The current Revised Environmental Assessment (EA) is based on a Programmatic Environmental Assessment (PEA) from 2022, which in turn relies on a 2014 EIS written for Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy—rockets that are far smaller and less complex than Starship. This outdated and insufficient review fails to account for the unique risks posed by Starship, including its size, power, experimental systems, and increased launch frequency. A full EIS is critical to assess the environmental, safety, and community impacts of this project and ensure transparency and accountability. Additionally, the FAA must extend the public comment period and provide simpler, more accessible documents so communities can meaningfully engage. Other impacted communities, such as Hawaii, where proposed crash sites are located, must also be included in the review process.”

Submitting comments to the FAA is important, but it’s not enough. We must take it a step further and push the Senate, which oversees the FAA, to hold them accountable. The U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, specifically its Subcommittee on Space and Science, oversees the FAA’s Office of Commercial Space Transportation, which regulates commercial spaceflight. Progressives on this subcommittee, such as Senators Edward Markey (D-MA) and Ben Ray Luján (D-NM), have stood for transparency and environmental protections. Senator Gary Peters (D-MI), a member of the full committee, has also championed science-backed policy. It’s critical to contact these lawmakers and demand they pressure the FAA to require a full EIS and ensure NEPA reviews are accessible to the public. We must not allow the billionaire space cowboys to turn Earth into a sacrifice zone for their ego trips to Mars.

Lynda Williams is a physicist and environmental activist living in Hawaii. She can be found at scientainment.com and on Bluesky @lyndalovon.bsky.social

December 18, 2024 Posted by | Reference, space travel, USA | Leave a comment

Remember the dark skies?

100 researchers call out FCC on Musk Starlink launches

By Sarah Fortinsky (The Hill), December 11, 2024
https://space4peace.blogspot.com/2024/12/remember-dark-skies.html

Researchers are urging the federal government to pause further low-orbit internet satellite launches until a comprehensive review is conducted to determine the potential environmental damage that could result.

In a letter to Julie Kearney, chief of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Space Bureau, more than 100 researchers expressed concern about the rapid development of low-orbit satellites and urged international cooperation to determine the best path forward.


“The environmental harms of launching and burning up so many satellites aren’t clear. That’s because the federal government hasn’t conducted an environmental review to understand the impacts. What we do know is that more satellites and more launches lead to more damaging gasses and metals in our atmosphere,” the researchers wrote in the letter.

“We shouldn’t rush forward with launching satellites at this scale without making sure the benefits justify the potential consequences of these new mega-constellations being launched, and then re-entering our atmosphere to burn up and or create debris,” they continued. “This is a new frontier, and we should save ourselves a lot of trouble by making sure we move forward in a way that doesn’t cause major problems for our future.”

The researchers noted that, in just more than five years, tech billionaire Elon Musk’s Starlink service has launched more than 6,000 units that now make up 60 percent of all satellites.

“The new space race took off faster than governments were able to act,” they wrote, adding that regulatory agencies now lack the policies to make fair assessments about “the total effects of all proposed mega constellations.”

They criticized the FCC for granting licenses on a “first-come, first-served basis,” noting orbital space and the broadcast spectrum are not limitless and they require an “unprecedented system of cooperation” with international regulators “to share the commons of our final frontier.”

“Until extensive coordination is in place, we shouldn’t let the commercial interests first to launch determine the rules,” they wrote. 

The researchers also encouraged the FCC to end the “categorical exclusion of satellites” from environmental review, writing, “that launching 30,000 to 500,000 satellites into low earth orbit doesn’t even warrant an environmental review offends common sense.”

December 16, 2024 Posted by | space travel | Leave a comment

ExoAnalytic observes 500 pieces of debris from Intelsat 33e breakup

It is too early to say whether parts of Intelsat 33e could hit another object in orbit after the satellite broke up Oct. 19, which could create more potentially hazardous debris.

Jason Rainbow, October 28, 202

TAMPA, Fla. — U.S.-based space-tracking company ExoAnalytic Solutions has identified about 500 pieces of debris from Intelsat 33e’s recent breakup in geostationary orbit (GEO).

“The size of the debris we are tracking ranges from small fragments roughly the size of a softball to larger pieces up to the size of a car door,” ExoAnalytic chief technology officer Bill Therien told SpaceNews in an Oct. 28 email.

“The majority of the tracked objects are on the smaller end of that spectrum, which contributes to the difficulty of consistently observing all the debris pieces.”

ExoAnalytic has observed 108 of these pieces in the last 24 hours, Therien said, adding that the company does not expect to observe every piece of debris each night because size, velocity, and position relative to ground sensors can influence whether the debris is visible during a particular observation window.

In addition, it is possible some of them are no longer present, such as solid fuel fragments that are evaporating.

“The debris field from an incident like this can be complex, and new pieces can be more reliably tracked over time,” Therien said………

It is too early to say whether parts of Intelsat 33e could hit another object in orbit after the satellite broke up Oct. 19, which could create more potentially hazardous debris……………………………………………………………………. https://spacenews.com/exoanalytic-observes-500-pieces-of-debris-from-intelsat-33e-breakup/?utm_source=ActiveCampaign&utm_medium=email&utm_content=%F0%9F%A4%9DLockheed%20Martin%20buys%20Terran%20Orbital%20-%20SpaceNews%20This%20Week&utm_campaign=SNTW%20Nov%201%202024

November 2, 2024 Posted by | space travel | Leave a comment

Space Tech Is How Israel Targets Doctors’ & Journalists’ Homes For Bombing

The U.S. and Israel have been blocking a space weapons ban treaty (PAROS) at the United Nations for more than 25 years………. Space technology is playing a major role in the Gaza genocide.

The current wars in both Ukraine and Gaza are experimental laboratories for arms developers and showcases for their products

Resistance to building a rocket launch site in Maine

Lisa Savage, Oct 26, 2024,  https://went2thebridge.substack.com/p/space-tech-is-how-israel-targets?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=1580975&post_id=150711847&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=c9zhh&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email

I hustled down to the Maine Space Conference yesterday morning in time to meet with a tv reporter but alas her story seems to have fallen by the wayside (if I find it later I’ll edit to include it.) I told her satellite technology is what enables Israel to target residential buildings where they know doctors and journalists live.

Similarly, an interview of Bruce Gagnon of the Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space by a reporter from Space News is nowhere to be found this morning. Or as Jonathan Cook put it, “Israel kills the journalists, Western media kills the truth.”

If you search for Maine Space Conference you’ll find plenty of adulatory articles about how exciting the space industry is and how each step toward turning our beautiful state into a militarized rocket launch site is to be applauded. 

Folks in Kodiak, Alaska who had this experience continue to suffer the consequences. Though their launch site was built with assurances that all uses would be civilian in nature, that turned out to be a huge lie as even the Israeli military uses the launch site in Kodiak.

A recent report from a local resident highlights the pollution risks of hosting launch sites:

the Alaska DEC is keeping on top of a rocket fuel spill accident at the Pacific Spaceport Complex Alaska that happened the end of July. ABL Space was suppose to launch a rocket back in January and for 6 months all ABL did was ‘testing’ on the launch pad, no launch and closing off the state road to the public off and on during that time.

The end of July the rocket was setting on the pad for engine testing once again when the engine caught on fire, tipping the rocket over and spilled 1,800 gallons of fuel on the pad and surrounding soil. The soil is now in the process of being dug up, stored and covered until it can be shipped off island to a land fill in Washington state.

There was a Astra Space rocket accident last year and it took 6 months to dig up all the contaminated soil and ship it off island, which took until December. Rocket fuel also seeped into the ground water.

Yesterday in Maine we heard from Gagnon during the protest:

The Maine Space Conference is promoting the militarization of space. Efforts are being made to test hypersonic missiles at the former Loring Air Force Base. bluShit Aerospace is receiving funding from the U.S. Air Force and Space Force to launch ‘dual use’ (military/civilian) mini-satellites into dangerously congested Lower Earth Orbit.

Promises of lots of jobs, little to no environmental impacts, and peaceful exploration of space are the standard claims made at a myriad of potential sites the U.S. military is exploring around the world.

The U.S. and Israel have been blocking a space weapons ban treaty (PAROS) at the United Nations for more than 25 years.

Our nation cannot afford to pay for a new expensive arms race in outer space.

And we heard from Mary Beth Sullivan specifically about current wars that already depend on space-based technology: 

Space technology is playing a major role in the Gaza genocide.

The current wars in both Ukraine and Gaza are experimental laboratories for arms developers and showcases for their products

Space is now an essential technical area being used in war fighting

Space is now an essential technical area being used in war fighting

BY FAR: the US is biggest spender on space programs, and the US launches more objects into space than any other nation

SpaceX developed the Starlight Satellite constellations to bring the internet and broadband to the world to connect us all to the internet, right? A commercial product to benefit the masses, right?

Did you know that SpaceX’s Starlink satellites are used by Israel in its genocide against Gaza, and its bombing campaign against Lebanon?  It’s a primary enabler of the use of drones.

Militaries have developed a dependency on space systems to coordinate, command, and control activity at all levels over wide areas.

Israel also has it’s own space launch capability, and its own military satellites which are part of what’s called the Eros NG constellation. One of the most powerful intelligence collection systems in the world. They have satellites in constant orbit downloading info.

 GPS Jamming by Israel being used in Gaza and Lebanon.              

Also, the US and the UK use spy plane flights for Israel to aid in surveillance, facilitate propaganda, and much more

Australia has a spy base in Pine Gap which is downloading info from Gaza. Pine Gap sends the info to the US’s National Security Agency, who then sends to Israel. This clearly implicates Australia –  and the US — in Israel’s genocide.

Same can be said for a spy base called Menwith Hill in the UK.

Reports show that Artificial Intelligence is enabling decision-making systems in Israel against the people of Palestine. Programs called Gospel, Lavender, and Where’s Daddy are trained to recognize features of people who might be affiliated with Hamas. The program tracks individuals and groups.

Techniques using AI and message interception are joined together.

Many nations in the region are developing their own space technology.

There have been no physical attack on a satellite as yet in this war but, if such an attack happens, new replacement satellites will need to be launched quickly.  To that end, the US is operationalizing a “rapid response.”

 For more information on resistance to the construction of a launch site in Maine visit NoToxicRockets4ME.org.

October 26, 2024 Posted by | Israel, space travel, weapons and war | Leave a comment

In the Woomera Manual, International Law Meets Military Space Activities

by David A. Koplow, September 12, 2024,  https://www.justsecurity.org/100043/woomera-manual-international-law-military-space/

The law of outer space, like so much else about the exoatmospheric realm, is under stress. The prodigious growth in private-sector space activities (exemplified by SpaceX’s proliferating Starlink constellation, and other corporations following only shortly behind) is matched by an ominous surge in military space activities – most vividly, the creation of the U.S. Space Force and counterpart combat entities in rival States, the threat of Russia placing a nuclear weapon in orbit, and China and others continuing to experiment with anti-satellite weapons and potential techniques. The world is on the precipice of several new types of space races, as countries and companies bid for first-mover advantages in the highest of high ground.

The law of outer space, in contrast, is old, incomplete, and untested. A family of foundational treaties dating to the 1960s and 1970s retains vitality, but provides only partial guidance. Space is decidedly not a “law-free zone,” but many of the necessary guard rails are obscure, and few analysts or operators have ventured into this sector.

A new treatise, the Woomera Manual on the International Law of Military Space Activities and Operations, has just been published by Oxford University Press to provide the first comprehensive, detailed analysis of the existing legal regime of space. As one of the editors of the Manual, I can testify to the long, winding, and arduous – but fascinating – journey to produce it, and the hope that it will provide much-needed clarity and precision about this fast-moving legal domain.

Military Manuals

This Manual follows a grand tradition of prior efforts to articulate the applicable international military law in contested realms, including the 1994 San Remo Manual on Naval Warfare, Harvard’s 2013 Humanitarian Policy and Conflict Research Manual on Air and Missile Warfare, and the 2013 and 2017 Tallinn Manuals on Cyber Operations. The Woomera Manual was produced by a diverse team of legal and technical experts drawn from academia, practice, government, and other sectors in several countries (all acting in their personal capacities, not as representatives of their home governments or organizations). The process consumed six years (slowed considerably by the Covid-19 pandemic, which arrested the sequence of face-to-face drafting sessions).

The Manual is co-sponsored by four universities, among other participants: the University of Nebraska College of Law (home of Professor Jack Beard, the editor-in-chief), the University of Adelaide (with Professor Dale Stephens on the editorial board), the University of New South Wales—Canberra, and the University of Exeter (U.K.) The name “Woomera” was chosen in recognition of the small town of Woomera, South Australia, which was the site of the country’s first space missions, and in acknowledgement of the Aboriginal word for a remarkable spear-throwing device that enables greater accuracy and distance.

Comprehensive Coverage of a Broad Field

Three features of the Woomera Manual stand out. The first is the comprehensive nature of the undertaking. The Manual presents 48 rules, spanning the three critical time frames: ordinary peace time, periods of tension and crisis, and during an armed conflict. There may be a natural tendency to focus on that last frame, given the high stakes and the inherent drama of warfare, but the editors were keen to address the full spectrum, devoting due attention and analysis to the background rules that apply both to quotidian military space activities and to everyone else in space.

Complicating the legal analysis is the fragmentation of the international legal regime. In addition to “general” international law – which article III of the Outer Space Treaty declares is fully applicable in space – two “special” areas of law are implicated here. One, the law of armed conflict (also known as international humanitarian law) provides particularized jus in bello rules applicable between States engaged in war, including wars that begin in, or extend to, space. But the law of outer space is also recognized as another lex specialis, and it accordingly provides unique rules that supersede at least some aspects of the general international law regime. What should be done when two “special” areas of international law overlap and provide incompatible rules? The Woomera Manual is the first comprehensive effort to unravel that riddle.

The Law as It Is

A second defining characteristic of this Manual is the persistent, rigid focus on lex lata, the law as it currently is, rather than lex ferenda, the law as it may (or should) become. The authors, of course, each have their own policy preferences, and in their other works they freely opine about how the international space law regime should evolve (or be abruptly changed) to accommodate modern dangers and opportunities. But in this Manual, they have focused exclusively on describing the current legal structure, concentrating on treaties, customary international law, and other indicia of State practice. This is not the sort of manual in which the assembled experts “vote” on their competing concepts of the legal regime; instead, Woomera addresses what States (the sources and subjects of international law) say, do, and write. The authors have assembled a monumental library of State behaviors (including words as well as deeds, and silences as well as public pronouncements), while recognizing that diplomacy (and national security classification restrictions) often impede States explaining exactly why they did, or did not, act in a particular way in response to some other State’s provocations.

One feature that enormously facilitated the work on the Manual was a phase of “State engagement.” In early 2022, the Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Defense of the government of the Netherlands circulated a preliminary draft of the Woomera Manual to interested national governments and invited them to a June 2022 conference in The Hague to discuss it. Remarkably, two dozen of the States most active in space attended, providing two days of sustained, thoughtful, constructive commentary. The States were not asked to “approve” the document, but their input was enormously valuable (and resulted in an additional several months of painstaking work in finalizing the manuscript, as the editors scrambled to take into account the States’ voluminous comments and the new information they provided).

Space as a Dynamic Domain

Third, a manual on space law must acknowledge the rapidly-changing nature and scope of human activities in this environment, and the great likelihood that even more dramatic alterations are likely in the future. Existing patterns of behavior may alter abruptly, as new technologies and new economic opportunities emerge. The Manual attempts to peer into the future, addressing plausible scenarios that might foreseeably arise, but it resists the temptation to play with far-distant “Star Wars” fantasies.

The unfortunate reality here is that although the early years of the Space Age were remarkably productive for space law, the process stultified shortly thereafter. Within only a decade after Sputnik’s first orbit, the world had negotiated and put into place the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, which still provides the cardinal principles guiding space operations today. And within only another decade, three additional widely-accepted treaties were crafted: the 1968 astronaut Rescue Agreement, the 1971 Liability Convention, and the 1975 Registration Convention, as well as the 1979 Moon Convention (which has not attracted nearly the same level of global support and participation). But the articulation of additional necessary increments of international space law has been constipated since then – no new multilateral space-specific treaties have been implemented in the past four decades, and none is on the horizon today.

Sources and Shortcomings of International Space Law

The corpus of international space law is not obsolete, but it is under-developed. We have the essential principles and some of the specific corollaries, but we are lacking the detailed infrastructure that would completely flesh out all those general principles. Some important guidance may, however, be found in State practice, including the understudied negotiating history of the framework treaties for space law, particularly the Outer Space Treaty. The Manual provides important insights in this area, notably with respect to several ambiguous terms embedded in the treaties.

The authors of the Woomera Manual, therefore, were able to start their legal analysis with the framework treaties – unlike, for example, the authors of the Tallinn Manuals, covering international law applicable to cyber warfare, who had to begin without such a structured starting point. Still, the Woomera analysis confronted numerous lacunae, where the existing law and practice leave puzzling gaps. The persistent failure of the usual law-making institutions to craft additional increments of space arms control is all the more alarming as the United States, NATO, and others have declared space to be an operational or war-fighting domain.

Conclusion

It is hoped that the process of articulating the existing rules – and identifying the interstices between them – can provide useful day-to-day guidance for space law practitioners in government, academia, non-governmental organizations, the private sector, and elsewhere. The prospect of arms races and armed conflict in space unfortunately appears to be growing, and clarity about the prevailing rules has never been more important. It is a fascinating, dynamic, and fraught field.

October 1, 2024 Posted by | Legal, space travel, weapons and war | Leave a comment

NASA’s uncrewed Artemis mission highlights radiation risk to astronauts

ABC, By science reporter Jacinta Bowler, Thu 19 Sep, 24

In short: 

Scientists analysed the radiation experienced by two ‘radiation phantom’ dummies on NASA’s November 2022 uncrewed Artemis I mission.

The results suggest radiation may not be an issue for short Moon missions, but could be on longer Moon layovers or missions to Mars. 

What’s next? 

Scientists are trying to design ways to minimise radiation on longer space missions, including radio-protective drugs and spacecraft magnetic fields. 

In September next year, astronauts will be strapped into the Orion spacecraft and rocketed around the Moon in the first human moon visit in more than 50 years. 

And thanks to two space-travelling test dummies we now know those astronauts will likely be protected against dangerously high radiation exposure on their short trip.

Known as “radiation phantoms”, the specially designed dummies Helga and Zohar were included on last year’s Artemis 1 uncrewed mission.

Helga and Zohar are recreations of female humans, complete with fake organs that allowed researchers to record radiation exposure throughout the journey, and analyse results from skin, lungs, stomach, uterus and the spine to understand how radiation moves throughout the body. 

The results are published today in Nature.

Stuart George, lead author and a member of the NASA Space Radiation Analysis Group, says the results suggest that radiation exposure won’t be dangerously high for short Moon missions, but problems may arise on longer Moon missions such as the “Gateway” lunar space station, and eventual trips to Mars.

“These measurements comprehensively showed we have a well-developed system for protecting the crew from radiation during Artemis I, but challenges still remain for longer duration missions such as Mars,” Dr George said.

Why is radiation an issue? 

………………………………………………Items in low-Earth orbit are under the protection of Earth’s magnetic field, which shields Earth from the vast majority of radiation produced by our Sun (or from background cosmic radiation). 

But outside of this field, in open space, it’s a different story.

“In general, radiation levels are higher outside of the protection of low-Earth orbit and the protection of Earth’s magnetic field,” Dr George said.

“In addition, the exposure of crew to space weather, specifically ‘energetic solar particle events’ can be much higher as the Earth’s magnetic field is very effective at shielding these.”

……………………………………………...What did the research find?

The Artemis 1 mission, which lasted for 25 days, flew 450,000 km to the Moon, looped around it and then almost 65,000 kms out into deep space before flying back to Earth.

The team used Helga and Zohar as well as radiation sensors called HERA (Hybrid Electronic Radiation Assessor) placed throughout the cabin of the Orion spacecraft to assess how radiation levels changed throughout the mission.

………………………………………………………………..it wasn’t all good news. 

“The inside of the cabin was full of X-rays during the transit of the outer Van Allen belt which was something we did not expect,” Dr George said. 

“The overall biological impact was minor, but this was still a fascinating observation.”

The health risk of ionising radiation is measured in millisieverts (mSv).

The research team suggested that a quick trip around the Moon, like in the Artemis I mission might set you back about 26.7 – 35.4 millisieverts (mSv), which is well below the amount that might cause damage to an astronaut.

……………………………………………………………………………. According to Dr George, travelling to, and then staying on Gateway would expose astronauts to much higher levels of radiation than what they would receive on the ISS. 

Then there’s Mars, a trip which may take around nine months each way, plus any radiation you might receive on the surface.  

When the team extrapolated out the Artemis results to a Mars mission, and combined it with measurements from Mars’ Curiosity rover, they found astronauts might scrape by under the NASA lifetime limit of radiation, which is 600 mSv, but not by much.

“A really big solar particle event (with appropriate sheltering) might also push you up by a few hundred mSv,” Dr George said. …………………………………………………………………..

……………………………………..further into the future, radiation protection might become significantly more high tech.

According to Anatoly Rozenfeld, a medical physicist at the University of Wollongong who specialises in space radiation, one line of research is trying to build a magnetic field for the spacecraft itself, but he warns that this is still very much in it’s infancy. 

“There’s a lot of different kinds of projects and some of them are realistic, some of them are less realistic,” Professor Rozenfeld said. 

“People are also developing radio-protective drugs. So when you take these pills, your cells will recover very quickly after radiation.”  https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2024-09-19/nasa-radiation-artemis-mission-helga-zolar/104365924

September 25, 2024 Posted by | space travel | Leave a comment

India considers joining Russia, China to build nuclear plant on Moon

Rivals India and China are said to be keen on joining a Russian project to build an atomic power plant for a human base on the Moon.

 14/09/2024,  By: Pratap Chakravarty,  https://www.rfi.fr/en/international/20240914-india-considers-joining-russia-china-to-build-nuclear-plant-on-moon

Russia’s atomic energy corporation Rosatom says the lunar reactor will be built with “minimal human involvement” and deployed around 2036.

According to Russia’s state-owned news agency Tass, Rosatom CEO Alexey Likhachev told a meeting of the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok earlier this month that both India and China have shown interest in the venture.

“The task we are working on is the creation of a lunar nuclear power plant with an energy capacity of up to half a megawatt,” Likhachev told the gathering of potential investors.

“Both our Chinese and Indian partners are very interested in collaborating as we lay the groundwork for several international space projects,” the Rosatom chief executive claimed.

Cooperation among rivals 

Delhi has not commented on the purported collaboration.

While Russia is its key arms supplier and a partner on several space ventures, Indian media have been surprised by the possibility of India teaming up with China.

Alluding to unresolved border disputes which took India and China to war in 1962 and sporadic clashes in following years, local daily Business Standard called the two countries “foes on Earth, pals on Moon”.

The proposed power plant will be integrated into a wider Chinese-Russian project to set up a base called the International Lunar Research Station (ILRS), either on lunar soil or in lunar orbit.

ILRS will serve as a fulcrum of scientific research and will be open to all countries and “international partners” after it becomes operational between 2035 and 2045.

But it would require a stable power supply – which only a nuclear reactor can provide, as the Moon’s lengthy lunar nights make solar energy unreliable.

Nasa has been mulling the construction of similar reactors for its own future lunar bases.

India’s space ambitions

The Russian-led project is separate from India’s own ambitions to set up a space station by 2035 and launch a manned mission to the Moon five years later.

Analysts say India, with its ambitions of creating a human colony on the Moon, is actively seeking out potential opportunities to accelerate its space ambitions.

In August 2023, India landed a spacecraft on the Moon and joined a select space-faring club comprising of China, Russia and the United States – the only nations to have ever reached the Earth’s closest celestial object.

India has shortlisted four military pilots to travel on the country’s first manned space flight next year.

The Indian government says the Gaganyaan spacecraft will orbit Earth at an altitude of 400 kilometres and land at sea three days later.

It will also send a humanoid robot into space later this year in line with preparations to land an Indian on lunar soil by 2040.

Air force pilot Rakesh Sharma became India’s first astronaut to go to space in April 1984, when he spent almost eight days on board the Soviet Salyut-7 space station.

September 18, 2024 Posted by | India, space travel | Leave a comment

Whoopsie, SpaceX Blew Up Two Rockets and Punched a Massive Hole in One of Earth’s Layers

We learned something, though. By Darren Orf Sep 05, 2024

  • In mid-November 2023, a disastrous SpaceX launch, which saw the explosion of not one but two rockets, offered a rare opportunity to study the effects of such phenomena on the ionosphere.
  • A study by Russian scientists revealed how this explosion temporarily blew open a hole in the ionosphere stretching from the Yucatan to the southeastern U.S.
  • Although far from the first rocket-induced disturbance in the ionosphere, this is one of the first explosive events in the ionosphere to be extensively studied.

November 18, 2023, wasn’t a great day for the commercial spaceflight company SpaceX. While testing its stainless steel-clad Starship, designed to be the company’s chariot to Mars, the spacecraft exploded four minutes after liftoff over the skies of Boca Chica, Texas.

Filling a metal candle with more than a thousand tons of propellant and flinging it into outer space has always run its fair share of risks (and explosions), but this particular event—occurring around 93 miles above the Earth’s surface—allowed scientists to closely study one poorly understood aspect of human spaceflight: What damage do rockets inflict on the Earth’s all-too-important ionosphere?

Lying at the edge of the planet’s atmosphere and outer space some 50 to 400 miles above the surface, the ionosphere is a sea of electrically charged particles vital to global radio and GPS technologies as well as protecting us from harmful solar rays. Because of its important role in the everyday function of modern society, scientists are eager to understand how disturbances in the ionosphere can impact life on Earth, and that’s why team of researchers from institutes and universities in Russia and France analyzed the explosion of the tallest and most powerful rocket ever built. The results were published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.

Although bad news for SpaceX, the explosion oddly presented a rare opportunity to study aspects of the ionosphere that would, under normal conditions, be too weak to detect……………………………………………………………………………………………..https://www.popularmechanics.com/space/rockets/a62047078/starship-explosion-ionosphere/

September 10, 2024 Posted by | space travel | Leave a comment

Please, No Weapons and Wars in Space

Honoring the Spirit of Apollo 11,
BILL ASTORE, JUL 21, 2024 https://bracingviews.substack.com/p/please-no-weapons-and-wars-in-space—

This weekend marks the 55th anniversary of humanity’s first trip to the moon, when Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin got moon dust on their boots as Michael Collins waited in moon orbit to pick them up. It all went remarkably well, if not perfectly smoothly, for Apollo 11.

Humans haven’t been back to the moon to cavort on it for more than fifty years. Apollo 17 was the last mission in December of 1972. Once America beat the Soviets to the moon and explored it a few times, the program lost its impetus as people grew nonchalant if not bored with the Apollo missions. What a shame!

Apollo 11 left a plaque on the moon saying they went there in the name of peace and for all mankind. It’s a groovy sentiment, but tragically space has become yet another realm of war. Instead of occupying the moral high ground, the United States with its Space Force wants to dominate the military “high ground” of space. The dream of space as a realm for peace is increasingly a nightmare of information dominance and power projection.

A powerful trend is space exploitation by billionaires rather than space exploration funded and supported by the people. Privatization of space and its weaponization are proceeding together, even feeding off each other.

Of course, the military has always dreamed of weaponizing space. The new dream, apparently, is becoming super-rich by mining rare strategic minerals and the like, along with space tourism by the ultra-rich.

Again, the U.S. military sees space as its domain, working with a diverse range of countries, such as the UK, South Korea, and Sweden, among others, on new space ports, radar and launch sites, and related facilities. A key buzzword is “interoperability” between the U.S. and its junior partners in space, which, for you “Star Trek” fans, is akin to being assimilated by the Borg collective. (All of the Borg are “interoperable”; too bad they have no autonomy.)

We humans should not be exporting our violence and wars beyond our own planet. If you believe space should be reserved for peace, check out Space4Peace.org. Follow this link. It’s a global organization of people dedicated to the vision that space should remain free of weapons and wars. The group is kind enough to list me as one of its “advisers.”

Mark your calendars for the next “Keep Space for Peace” week from October 5-12. Together, let’s reject star wars and instead embrace peaceful star treks.

July 22, 2024 Posted by | space travel | Leave a comment

The United Nations Security Council takes up Space Security – it might have been best if it had not

As the international community’s dependence on space-enabled services grows exponentially, the disconnect between space powers on rules for responsible behaviour in outer space can only be a matter of great concern.

Open Canada, BY: PAUL MEYER , Adjunct Professor of International Studies and Fellow in International Security, Simon Fraser University, Senior Advisor, ICT4Peace, Director, Canadian Pugwash Group, Fellow, Outer Space Institute 17 JUNE, 2024

It may come as a surprise that until this April the United Nations (UN) Security Council had never taken up the issue of outer space security despite the Council’s primary responsibility for the maintenance of international peace and security. Outer space has become an increasingly important environment for global well-being with a wide array of space-based services underpinning many critical civilian activities from telecommunications to navigation to remote sensing of the Earth. The world is also experiencing an exponential growth in the numbers of satellites in orbit driven primarily by the private sector and the launch by companies such as “Starlink” and “One Web” of “mega-constellations” to ensure global Internet connectivity. Many stakeholders in the use of outer space also recognize that preserving this environment for peaceful purposes, in line with the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, means ensuring that it is kept free of man-made threats. 

Regrettably, just as global society is discovering ever more benefits from outer space activity, leading space powers are characterizing it as a “war-fighting domain” while accusing one another of having been the first to “weaponize” this vital if vulnerable environment. The ethos of cooperation imbued in the Outer Space Treaty with its stress on space activity being “in the interests and for the benefit of all countries”; its insistence on each party paying “due regard” to the rights of others and its prohibition on the stationing of nuclear weapons or other WMD in orbit, is currently under severe strain. Hostile rhetoric, accusations of nefarious intent, development of anti-satellite weapons and other so-called “counter-space capabilities” plus the abuse of consensus-based diplomatic processes have generated an atmosphere that is not conducive for states agreeing on cooperative security measures even when these are urgently needed. 

To the degree that space security has been addressed by the UN in the past it has been a preserve of the General Assembly and the 65-member Conference on Disarmament in Geneva, both of which have had the “Prevention of an Arms Race in Outer Space” (PAROS) item on their agenda since the early 1980s…………………………………………

Part of the problem has been that since it last negotiated an agreement in 1996 the Conference on Disarmament has been a largely moribund body, unable to agree and implement a basic programme of work let alone negotiate anything. This dysfunctionality is sustained by its consensus-based decision making that essentially gives each of its members a de facto veto over any decision. As security perspectives and threat perceptions differ amongst the member states no common ground has emerged for any new agreement. Specifically, on the PAROS item an East-West divide has existed for decades over how best to proceed. 

In 2008, Russia and China put forward a draft treaty on “The Prevention of Placement of Weapons in Outer Space and the Threat or use of Force against Space Objects” (better known by its acronym PPWT). In the view of its sponsors it is essential that a legally binding agreement is concluded that will ban all weapons in space. The United States (US) and its allies have raised objections to the Sino-Russian treaty ………………………………

This gap in positions could be bridged with a modicum of good will and a willingness to compromise on preferred positions, but neither quality is much in evidence these days. Instead, a decision was made to transfer the unresolved debate over PAROS to the Security Council which had never addressed the issue before……………………………………………….

The US and Japan, along with numerous co-sponsors, introduced this April a draft resolution on Outer Space and WMD with a principal call for all states to adhere to the ban on placing WMD into space. At the April 24 Security Council meeting slated to consider this issue, Russia offered up an amendment to the US/Japan resolution. The amendment stipulated that states “take urgent measures to prevent for all time the placement of weapons in outer space and the threat or use of force in outer space, from space against Earth and from Earth against objects in outer space”; and called for “the early elaboration of appropriate reliably verifiable legally binding multilateral agreements” (i.e. like the PPWT). The amendment failed having received only 7 positive votes whereas 9 are required in the Security Council. 

This set the stage for a vote on the US/Japan resolution which garnered 13 positive votes, one abstention (China) and fatally a veto from Russia. In an effort to turn the tables on the US, Russia introduced a new resolution of its own which incorporated much of the text from the US/Japan resolution, but reinserted the language of its amendment. When this resolution went to a vote at a May 20th Security Council session it failed (like the amendment) to garner sufficient support with a repetition of the earlier split 7-7 vote. …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

More promising than the combative machinations in the Security Council has been the creative approach shown in the recent UN Open Ended Working Group (OEWG) on “Reducing Space Threats through norms, rules and principles of responsible behaviours”. This group convened for a few weeks in 2022 and 2023 with a final session in the week of August 28 to September 1. Due to disruptive and frankly spiteful behaviour by the Russian delegation no concluding report could be achieved (the group operating by consensus) and even the usual anodyne procedural report was blocked by the Russian representative who openly delighted in the group’s failure. 

Despite this egregious conduct the OEWG benefited from the active participation of those present and the rich menu of proposals that were presented, any one of which, if adopted, would make a positive contribution to the security situation in outer space…………………………………….

Notable among these proposals were restraint measures on any destructive action against satellites and refraining from “any other non-consensual act that destroys or damages the space objects of other States”; refraining from “any deliberate act that interferes with the normal and safe operation of the space objects under the jurisdiction or control of other States”; refraining from “any acts that would impair the provision of critical space-based services to civilians” and ensuring “that satellites under their jurisdiction and control or operating on their behalf do not rendezvous, physically connect or physically damage with satellites under the jurisdiction and control of another State, or operate in proximity to, without prior consultations and consent”. Agreement on such conflict prevention measures is the type of action which would really benefit the international community.

In lieu of further polemics between Russia, China and the US it would be helpful if concerned middle powers, such as Canada, and non-governmental stakeholders spoke out on the need to take up some of these specific proposals and seek agreement on them. Let’s put aside the tired and sterile debates over the desired scope and status for space arms control and embark on a purposeful effort to develop cooperative security measures for outer space.  The international community deserves no less.   https://opencanada.org/the-united-nations-security-council-takes-up-space-security-it-might-have-been-best-if-it-had-not/—

June 18, 2024 Posted by | space travel | Leave a comment

SPACEX’S STARLINK MAY BE KEEPING THE OZONE FROM HEALING, RESEARCH FINDS

MEGACONSTELLATIONS COULD BE A DISASTER FOR THE ENVIRONMENT.

JUN 15, 24 by VICTOR TANGERMANN   https://futurism.com/the-byte/spacex-starlink-ozone-healing

Burning Up

In a new study, researchers from the University of Southern California estimated the harmful effects from satellites injecting harmful pollutants such as aluminum oxides into the upper atmosphere as they burn up during reentry.

These dying satellites may even be contributing to “significant ozone depletion,” according to the researchers. The ozone layer is the Earth’s “sunscreen” that shields us from too much UV radiation from the Sun

While researchers have largely focused on the pollutants being released by rockets as they launch, we’ve only begun to understand the implications of having thousands of retired and malfunctioning satellites burn up in the atmosphere.

And that’s only becoming more relevant, as SpaceX has already launched almost 6,000 Starlink satellites to date, and is planning to add tens of thousands more — orbital ambitions that are now inspiring competing satellite constellations.

“Only in recent years have people started to think this might become a problem,” said coauthor and University of Southern California astronautics researcher Joseph Wang in a statement. “We were one of the first teams to look at what the implication of these facts might be.”

Poking Holes

Since it’s practically impossible to get accurate readings from the kind of pollutants satellites release as they scream back through the atmosphere, scientists can only estimate their effects on the surrounding environment.

By studying how common metals used in the construction of satellites interact with each other, the team estimated that the presence of aluminum increased in the atmosphere by almost 30 percent in 2022 alone.

They found that a 550-pound satellite generates roughly 66 pounds of aluminum oxide nanoparticles during reentry, which would take up to 30 years to drift down into the stratosphere.

In total, if constellations from the likes of SpaceX continue to grow as planned, the levels of aluminum oxides in the atmosphere could increase by a staggering 646 percent over natural levels every year.

And that doesn’t bode well, considering we’ve only begun to study the phenomenon.

“The environmental impacts from the reentry of satellites are currently poorly understood,” the researchers note in their paper. “As reentry rates increase, it is crucial to further explore the concerns highlighted in this study.”

June 17, 2024 Posted by | space travel | Leave a comment

Unveiling Cosmic Secrets: Black Budget Tech and UFOs with Aerospace Expert Michael Schratt

The U.S. military and intelligence agencies have billions of dollars’ worth of secret projects they don’t want you to know about. These billions have funded a secret world of advanced science, technology, weapons, and various covert activities, which have always been shielded from congressional oversight and public scrutiny. Back in the 90s, Members of the House Armed Services Committee once said that 70 percent of the black budget could be declassified at no risk to national security. Our taxpayer dollars are funding these black budget programs, and we have a right to know what we’re paying for. So why the secrecy? What is being kept hidden from the public?

To investigate this further, we recently interviewed private pilot and military aerospace historian Michael Schratt, who’s studied top secret advanced technologies buried deep within the military-intelligence complex for over 25 years. He alleges to have first-hand experience with classified government black budget programs, with access to former US Air Force pilots, retired Naval personnel and former aerospace engineers with top-secret clearance. He’s one of the leading authority voices in investigating government programs involving the recovery and study of off-world technology, also known as UAP/UFO crash retrieval programs. He’s author of DARK FILES, which brings to life historically significant and credible UFO cases obtained from university archives, research centers, and private collections using carefully re-constructed illustrations of the events. Whether it’s advanced military aircraft or serious signs of extraterrestrial life, the implications are too profound to ignore. Michael is suggesting that publicly known technology and weapons programs might be fronts for black budget operations dealing with technologies way more advanced than the public is aware of.

Join us in this fascinating 38-min video interview, with many images and videos throughout to verify and illustrate the points being discussed.

  • 00:00:00 Introduction to the military-industrial complex and the black budget world 00:03:54 Interview begins 
  • 00:06:00 What drew Michael Schratt to studying advanced black budget technologies and UFO phenomena 
  • 00:07:22 If you could declassify one technology developed under a black budget program, what would it be and why? 
  • 00:10:20 Out of all the advanced technologies in use on Earth, how much has ET influence? 
  • 00:11:39 UFO/UAP crash retrieval programs 
  • 00:18:05 Top secret technologies 101 00:22:32 The infamous Tic Tac video: a UFO, reverse-engineered craft, experimental military tech, or all of the above
  • 00:26:32 The military bases that are purported to study ET tech and house advanced technologies 
  • 00:29:25 How can the most powerful technologies help humanity instead of harm? 
  • 00:30:37 How to balance disclosure with national security obligations 
  • 00:33:01 Michael’s thoughts on the UAP Disclosure Act 
  • 00:36:32 What keeps Michael inspired and hopeful  

June 17, 2024 Posted by | secrets,lies and civil liberties, space travel, USA | Leave a comment

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