PAP won

82-2

Surprise surprise.

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Hmm, space weapons.

Or at least, weapons that can blow up an enemy's Satellite into oblivion.

Useless? Maybe.

Impossible?

Maybe not.

America is planning to develop a laser based weapon which can destroy Satellites by using a "powerful beam of light".

Something which you see in the anime, Gundam Seed/Destiny, where the Z.A.F.T uses the Requirem to blow up the Earth alliance's forces by using a super laser.

Well, for one. At US$20 million, it's cheap as a defensive/offensive weapon. The "Star Wars" program which America has to counter ICBMs (Inter-Continental Ballistic Missiles) costs between $13 billion to $14 billion.

And, it's quite effective too, both to develop, and usage purposes.

At present, there are no treaty or law which forbids such work, simply because no one has thought of it yet. Everyone uses Satellites these days, bus companies to track their buses (ez-link card), Taxi companies (for a faster booking), navigational purposes (GPS) and even telephone calls (long distance calls). No one has actually thought about what would happen if you blow up a Satellite.

For one, "advanced" armies who rely heavily on technology will be at a huge disadvantage. Satellites are commonly used to check out the battleground before the soldiers storm in to capture the place. Further more, satellites are used to track the movements of your own troops, so that friendly fire will not occur, or you don't have two teams running into each other. If that satellite is taken out, the commanders, and the soldiers will be "blind" to any ambush which might have been easily spotted via Satellite.

Also, intelligence divisions uses satellites to sweep areas in the world where terrorist groups may use it as training sites. These satellites, can also be used to sweep enemy countries, to see the troop formations of the enemy. Disabling these satellites would ensure that your troops will not be detected by the enemies, able to move stealthly into the enemy's base.

With all these factors for military, why is it only now that it's discussed?

Simple.

It's expensive as hell.

Countries which can barely equip their army with the latest weapons won't have the budget to spare to blow up Satellites in space. Even those who can, maintaince fees are a killer, and who knows if this reseach would actually be successful.

Assuming it's successful, even more questions are raised. What if you blow up the wrong satellite? "Whoops. Recharge. Prepare to fire again."? What if that Satellite is actually important to an ally country? You might be taking out a satellite which they use for communications, and then what? Give them one for free? Also, there's no knowing what would happen after you blow that satellite into bits and pieces. These bit and pieces could, due to gravity of a nearby rock (most likely, the rock we are on, Earth), could ram into some other Satellite, causing undescribable damage. We aren't talking about Satellites with tank armor here. These babies have some real delicate parts, which if damaged, could affect the whole satellite's stability.

More over, these bits and pieces from the satellite may, and will, return to earth. At the speeds they are travelling, and if the atmosphere does not incinerate them to atoms, they will be deady shooting stars. Can you imagine what would happen if it drops onto a busy town, say New York at 9am, or even worse, a government building with the entire government/congress in meeting? A country's leadership maybe wiped out in a second thanks to a piece of destroyed junk metal.

We are assuming, of coruse, that the Satellite is destroyed almost completely, leaving only bits and pieces. However, this isn't a Gundam/Mecha anime, where one blue beam into the heart of the robot will mean a huge (pink) explosion in space. What if, the Satellite is merely disabled? In physics, we know that thrusters are on satellites to ensure that it counteracts the pull of gravity. If these thrusters are taken out, or have lost all power thanks to the attack, what would happen?

That huge piece of space waste will come crashing onto earth.

Of course, Satellites have been known to "die" by allowing them to "land" in oceans. However, that is due to calculated measurements by scientists which take hours to ensure that it lands in the ocean and not on our heads. What are you going to say to the general? "Wait! Don't shoot, or it will land in Africa! Wait for 6 hours more!" Do you think it will be effective as a weapon then? The enemy which could have been wiped out, could have escaped/discovered the ambush in that 6 hours.

So, is it a good idea? On first thought, sure. However, if you look deeper, you will realise that the consequences far outweigh the pros it provides. Perhaps, this idea can be used in the future, when we have flying spaceships flying around.

But technology isn't THAT advanced yet. Let's stick to bullets and missiles for the time being. They are already horrible enough. We don't need things like laser to join the ever growing list of weapons.