oday, space is more crowded (and more important) than ever. Roughly 27,000 human-made objects now orbit the earth, with thousands more scheduled to be launched in the next few years. Avoiding collisions (and thus much more junk) is already difficult.

Any kind of a war in space, featuring anti-satellite attacks and explosions, would likely double or triple this number in a matter of days. Space traffic control would be a nightmare, and critical satellites that we rely on daily for vital communications as well as routine transactions would be disrupted or destroyed…

Space, in short, is too dangerous to be treated as a warfighting realm. Deploying weapons to space, moreover, would be counterproductive. America, which is $30 trillion in debt, doesn’t need yet another unnecessary, expensive, unpredictable, and destabilizing arms race.

A US Space Force that seeks to dominate space will ultimately make America less secure.

Recall that NASA was created as a civilian space agency in the aftermath of Sputnik (1957) during the Cold War partly to avoid the rampant militarization of space.

Recall as well that America’s astronauts went to the Moon in 1969 in the cause of peace and for all humanity. International space crews have worked cooperatively, astronaut-to-cosmonaut, for decades.

Let’s not sully space with our petty Earth-based grievances.

Read the full article here.

Space, in short, is too dangerous to be treated as a warfighting realm…America, which is $30 trillion in debt, doesn’t need yet another unnecessary, expensive, unpredictable, and destabilizing arms race.

William Astore