I don't particularly see the need to completely abolish all militaristic uses of space. Face it, in the 20th century just about EVERY major technological achievement has been developed by the military and then later converted for civilian use. Airplanes owe most of their current existance to every war since WWI, modern rocketry was developed by the Nazis for delivering destructive payloads, radar was developed by the British to detect enemy aircraft, helicopters were developed to deploy troops in remote locations, GPS was made to track troop movements, the list is endless.

Why not let nations try to get a piece of space, Lord knows theres more than enough for everyone. Along the way the rest of us will have gobs of new technology and exploration data as a by-product. And besides, who cares if nations deploy weapon in space? It wont change a single thing, weapons are just tools, its the men that control the tools that are the problem. With current technology we can blow Terra Firma up about 15 times over anyway, adding an extra 2 or 3 times to that doesn't exactly make things much worse.

I certainly wish we could do it any other way but lets face it, governments won't spend money on space unless it benefits them, and private citizens won't spend the billion/trillions needed unless they are VERY certain they could get a decent return on investment. Lets just let all the buracrats play soldier while we reap the true rewards.

From all my reading of the U.S. anti-terrorism efforts, the ideal "insertion" vehicle for the Marines would be a Toyota truck. The flatbed can be configured for a host of bolt-on weapons platforms, it is cost-effective, and will not arouse suspicion with the locals.

The Toyota has additional advantages of NOT blazing across the sky at Mach X and announcing it's arrival with sonic booms. It does not require a heavy lifting rocket platform. As a matter of fact, it runs on regular unleaded gas! If the vehicle encounters hostile fire, the squad can quickly dismount into the nearest ditch or culvert.

Talk about "low Earth orbit". How about sneaking into the belligerent country on foot in the dead of night. The SEALS are good at that. And other Special Forces, etc.

Keep the high ground of space free for cost-overrun space spations.

(:raig

Several of you had asked whether transporting armed troops through space violate any international treaties. One or two rhetorically asked "Explain how does this NOT violate any treaties". And several more said that said treaties SHOULD be violated or nullified.

Frankly, I am appalled at the amount of ignorance displayed by all sides. Outer Space Treaty prohibits placing Weapons of Mass Destruction into orbit or onto other planets - i.e. nuclear, biological and chemical weapons. It says nothing about guns, grenades and the like, and in fact every Soviet cosmonaut crew (and I am pretty sure all Russian ones) carried a pistol for self-protection in the event of wilderness landing. At least one Salyut station carried a Gatling gun; conventionally armed satellites or even "space fighters" are not prohibited by OST.

Moreover, since proposed vehicle would not actually enter orbit, it would not fall under Outer Space Treaty at all. Just like (suborbital) ICBM's are not prohibited by OST (although nuclear-armed satellites are), these Marines could conceivably carry a backpack nuke with them and still not be in violation of any treaty.

Indeed, Article IV of the treaty is curiously ambiguous. It prohibits military manoeuvers on celestial bodies, but does not make clear whether this includes objects orbiting Earth, or in interplanetary space…

Article VII is also worth looking at:

No mention of damage caused by troops inside such object, unless they are counted as “component parts”.
Curious...

Outer Space Treaty

Nuclear warheads atop ICBM's are specifically designed to "cause damage" yet are not prohibited by Outer Space Treaty. It simply does not apply to suborbital objects.

This:
looks like a loophole big enough to drive a nuke through!

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Any day you wake up on "the right side of the dirt" is a good day.

T. Anderson

Of course. What I find interesting is that the most crucial part of the treaty does not seem to apply to orbital objects either. Only to "celestial bodies" - as if anyone were going to set up military facilities in those any time soon. Cleverly written.

Ugh, that thing is written like the Marquis of Queensbury's rules for boxing. How nauseously Emily Post... nevermind... The US will pull out of that load of tripe the minute it interferes with the missile defense shield.

That'll be the day. Look forward to putting China to the test on this one.

Most DEFINITELY this one too

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I'm not completely heartless, the doctor who removed it told me he'd never be able to get it all.

No need to. The treaty was written so that it would never interfere with the missile programme of any country in the foreseeable future.

--As stated earlier, the use of space has been pioneered by the military. Until recently, every astronaut we had was a military pilot. The gov't spends far more on launching things into space than any commercial enterprise does.
In fact, I'd estimate that about 90% of space vehicles are military in nature, so you can safely say that the miitarization of space is not only the predominant type of space activity, but is essential to even getting to use space for commercial uses at all.
Being against the military in space is kinda pointless. It's almost solely a military playground as is. Even surveillance satellites are a type of 'weapon'. Or can be though of as merely a componant of our overall militay 'weapon'.
The fact is that exploring the solar system is firstly about resources. Resources that will be limited by factors such as location and ease of utilizing. No different than earth, those resources will need protecting. Makes sense that the military will be needed to do the protecting.

I agree that the military poineered space exploration. Just look at the astronauts of the Apollo programme. That's because space exploration has been, so far, a national undertaking, not a private one. However, they were military in a peaceful mission. There is a difference.

I cannot agree with the identification of surveillance and military activity in general. A spy satellite is not a weapon, just as intelligence is not the same as an arms race.

Those same spy satellites direct Tomahawk cruise missiles with the TerCom system. Every bombing route, every possible target is identified by orbital platforms.
If the guidance system of a weapon is a satellite, is the satellite itself not part of the weapon system?
Alot of our precision bombs are GPS guided. I dare say that we already use satellites as active componants of weapons systems.

Yes and no. Yes, they are a part of the weapon system, but no, they are not the delivery mechanism, which seems to be the specific element targeted by the treaty.

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I'm not completely heartless, the doctor who removed it told me he'd never be able to get it all.

If you keep to a treaty that is no longer to your advantage you're not a good guy you're just an id...

Okay....

This is getting political [-X .... I say it's an interesting idea. Kay?

Make no mistake, information is power. In both Gulf Wars the Iraqis had more manpower and more firepower in theatre. That is not even counting the fact that being in a prepared defensive posture is considered to be a three fold force multiplier. The key to any modern battle is information and targeting. This is true in all phases of conflict. Those who are saying that we need more troops to stabilize Iraq are ignorant of modern warfare. What we need is better intelligence. One Battalion of Marines could take out all of the remaining Baathist hardliners and foreign fighters in Iraq. The trick is finding them. As time goes by our intel will improve. We are starting to make arrests at the rate of dozens at a time.

I will take all of the spy and GPS satelites I can get, but real intel has to be gathered the old-fashioned way.

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That which cannot be remedied must be endured.

Exactly right, ripper. The old fashioned way is HUMINT. However, HUMINT is incredibly difficult to obtain and usually fatal to the spy if the bad guys even suspect it. We're not as good at HUMINT in the middle east as the Brits.
One reason is that the Clintoon regime put a ban on dealing with bad guys to get the worse guys. Imagine if the cops here had to work like that. All we'd ever catch would be low level flunkies. But by cutting a deal with them, we can get the info on the big boys. The CIA was ordered to cease and desist that sort of work in the 90's. Politically incorrect. Boo Hoo.
Until we take the gloves off, and I mean REALLY take them off, all we are doing is buying time until the next attack.
In that interim, I'm all for arming space, the ocean floor, even hamsters if it means keeping an attack from happening. If we have to invade every arab country, so be it. They'd still be herding camels if it wasn't for the oil they sit on. So I'm not inclined to care much about whether our actions are politically correct or not. The entire population of the middle east is not worth the life of a single American to me.
Besides, it's naive to think that if we don't arm space, that no one will. Better to be ahead than behind when being caught with your pants down means massacre of 9/11 proportions or worse.

"With no fanfare, the Bush Administration is taking military control of what it terms 'near space', thereby laying claim to the area of the Solar System that lies between the Earth and the Moon's orbit...success of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq depended on the use of more than 50 military satellites to direct U.S. missiles and bombers to their intended targets. "I'd call this the first real space war," says Brig. Gen. Larry Jones..."
http://inthesetimes.com/comments.php?id=336_0_3_0_C

I don't even know where to begin with this post. It's exactly this ignorant bigoted attitude, and willingness to indiscriminantly kill non-americans that provokes terrorist behaviour in the first place. That is not to say that I think it is deserved- but your "kill first, ask questions later" approach will begat violence.

If you want some real security, try opening your eyes and mind to the billions of people on earth who aren't american, and giving a rats *** about people in general, the human race, not just those in the USA.

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<3

What encourages terrorist attacks is weakness. You can't reason with them. All you can do is find them and kill them. Believe it or not, I have no hatred for the people of the Middle East. I have spent too much time sitting on floors drinking tea with them in a dozen countries from Afghanistan to Morocco. There is one major problem that seems to be almost universal in the Middle East. If you are interseted, read about the recent comments by the Malasian Prime Minister.

Killing innocents is counter productive in any military situation.

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That which cannot be remedied must be endured.

It doesn't take a seer to realize this thread is doomed but I couldn't let your rant go by without comment.. Before you get on your soapbox and start preaching about the USA maybe you better open your eyes. It seems the Bali bombing killed many of your fellow citizens and last time I looked, Australia wasn't part of the US. There's NO justification/rationalization for terrorism period.