Cannot we blast it to bits now? Why wait.
Never underestimate the government’s ability to make things unimaginably worse.
Look how defending against pandemics caused by viruses crossing species worked out.
If you blast it, a bunch is likely to get sucked into Earth’s gravity well and land on us. Many smaller catastrophes is not a desired outcome when the probability of a big catastrophe is in the hundredths of a percent.
I will say it again, I think that in a few decades, we will be in a position of knowing everything that could possibly pose a danger to Earth, as well as being able to move or blast them out of the way, as may be appropriate in any given scenario. We will have many bases in near Earth orbit, probably several in geosynchronous orbit, some on the Moon and something on Mars. Between all of those, we will be able to see lots more and reach lots more than we currently are able to do. In my mind, it is pretty likely that AI will take care of this for us without us having to do much, if anything, until the problem has been solved.