Chinese Test Antisatellite Weapon - Updated

by CKR

By now, you’ve probably heard that the Chinese have destroyed one of their old weather satellites in a test of an antisatellite weapon. It’s made a terrible mess up there in orbit; the pieces may hit other satellites of all nationalities and damage them.

I have to say that I wasn’t surprised. The Chinese have been demonstrating their missile capabilities by sending taikonauts into orbit. (We all have to have our own nationalistic names for people in orbit, or is that just an artifact of American news coverage?)

What we’re not seeing much of in the official US government indignation is the background of the US position that the US must be hegemonic in space as well as on the ground. No arms control for us, on earth or in space! We must be free to test and deploy whatever we want!

We kept things reasonably under control for fifty years or so by agreeing to check our ambitions for weapons if others would check theirs. This was called arms control. Those who feel that US ambitions must not be hindered in any way, however, felt that agreeing to check our ambitions was always wimpy and, after the fall of the Soviet Union, no longer necessary.

But we in the US have been giving the Chinese a big economic boost by buying their manufactures, and they are using some of that excess money to develop their military capabilities.

So when the US makes a statement like this (pdf), should we be surprised when someone tests it?

• The United States considers space capabilities -- including the ground and space segments and supporting links -- vital to its national interests. Consistent with this policy, the United States will: preserve its rights, capabilities, and freedom of action in space; dissuade or deter others from either impeding those rights or developing capabilities intended to do so; take those actions necessary to protect its space capabilities; respond to interference; and deny, if necessary, adversaries the use of space capabilities hostile to U.S. national interests;

• The United States will oppose the development of new legal regimes or other restrictions that seek to prohibit or limit U.S. access to or use of space. Proposed arms control agreements or restrictions must not impair the rights of the United States to conduct research, development, testing, and operations or other activities in space for U.S. national interests

So China is just taking the same attitude.

The New York Times, the Boston Globe and phronesisaical are saying what I’m saying: maybe it’s time for the US to think about arms control again.

Since America has by far the largest number of assets in space, both military and commercial, it has the most to lose from an arms race in space.

Just as the Bush administration has rejected Iranian overtures out of hand, it has also ignored suggestions from China and other countries that an arms control treaty for space might be desirable.

Jeffrey Lewis is providing more indignant and more detailed coverage than mine. Scroll down for several articles. The Guardian has a couple of articles worth checking out, as does Hans Kristensen at the Strategic Security Blog.

Update (01/23/07): China has confirmed the test (WaPo, NYT).

They also seem to have confirmed their desire to talk about a treaty to control this sort of thing.

AND: Best title for a post on the subject. (Post is pretty good too.)