Monday, March 30, 2015

US: Master of Space



During the taped interview I also talked about some things that were left on the cutting room floor.  One of them was the growing problem of space debris.  There are now more than 25,000 tiny bits of junk whirling through space at 15,000 mph and this problem would be accelerated if any country was to attack another with an anti-satellite (ASAT) weapon.

The International Space Station (ISS), which cost taxpayers $100 billion, has to frequently be moved to avoid space debris that is passing dangerously close.  Some scientists have predicted that someday the ISS will be destroyed by flying space debris making the problem even worse.  Any war in space would create so much space junk that no nation would ever be able to get a rocket off the planet again - space would become so polluted with debris that it would become an orbiting minefield.

Thus the urgency to create a new treaty at the United Nations to ban all weapons in, and through, space.  But sadly the US and Israel continue to block any progress on such a treaty essentially because the US wants to be the Master of Space.

The US, China and Russia have all tested ASAT weapons in the past.

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