Fire 1! Fire 2!
Posted on 04/08/2025 11:07:50 AM PDT by bitt
It may sound like the beginning of a Star Trek plot, but there’s a very real arms race going on in space.
And Russia may have just made the first move.
According to some startling reports, Russian military satellites have apparently launched unknown objects into Earth’s orbit.
Space.com described the trio of Russian satellites as “secretive” objects “whose purpose is unknown.”
“The three satellites, designated Kosmos 2581, 2582 and 2583, launched on a Soyuz-2.1V rocket from Plesetsk cosmodrome early on Feb. 2,” the outlet reports, adding that the satellites “have displayed interesting behavior.”
That behavior includes getting oddly close to other space objects.
That behavior also includes, according to IFL Science, a “new object” being launched into orbit on March 18.
Both reports cited Jonathan McDowell, an astronomer and social media spaceflight activity tracker, who noted the mid-March release.
Space Force have cataloged a new object associated with the Kosmos-2581/2582/2583 launch. It may have separated from Kosmos-2583 on Mar 18.
— Jonathan McDowell (@planet4589) March 19, 2025
Also in March, U.S. officials spoke to CNN and outright accused Russia of practicing “attack and defend tactics” with its mysterious military space satellites.
“Russia wants to take away our advantages in space, and they don’t care about collateral damage,” one defense official told CNN.
(Excerpt) Read more at thegatewaypundit.com ...
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The French have designed active detection and defense systems for their satellites. I’d hope we have also.
Most likely these are kill vehicles.
Anything that blows up in orbit throws off an infinite kill shotgun blast that will go on hitting and killing for decades. Each thing that gets hit becomes more floating debris that can kill even more satellites.
The conservative approach would be for the kill vehicle to kill the target with electronics, like a stun gun, or with some other tactic like painting the lenses.
It’s New!
Hopefully those space aliens that shut down our nuclear launch sites will stop these devices too.
Posted on 04/03/2025 8:27:15 AM PDT by Red Badger
https://freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/4308592/posts
What’s the range of a .300 Win Mag in low-Earth orbit?
Rods From God!
Run away!
And everyone is so shocked that Russa would break the space treaty.
Depends on velocity and direction. It could be circling, at speed, for centuries.
Now imagine that SpaceX is successful with their StarShip rockets, and the U.S. military collaborates with SpaceX to build a modified StarShip to go to space, open a cargo bay and snatch a Russian military satellite.
Only problem, the Russians have the satellite rigged to detonate on contact. Boom goes the StarShip. Kill vehicle, indeed.
Yeah, that was in at least one Bond movie
“The conservative approach would be for the kill vehicle to kill the target with electronics, like a stun gun, or with some other tactic like painting the lenses.”
Or just thrusting out of orbit.
“Or just thrusting out of orbit.”
If you want to use your kill vehicle several times, you have to conserve fuel. Probably more than one was carried in an ordinary sized satellite. So, they’re small. Either their kamikazes or they’re some other kind of kill vehicle. But it’s unlikely they’ll try to balance on a satellite and fire their engine. They’d have to maintain contact somehow to impart the force. And likely it would take all the limited fuel they have. An alert ground controller might be able to counter that move.
Blowing up satellites in orbit is a strategy akin to releasing an incurable biological plague bioweapon: you may achieve the objective but you’re dead too.
“you may achieve the objective but you’re dead too.”
I agree. But desperate men do desperate things.
The Russians have essentially lost the space race. The best they can do now is ruin it for everyone, for all time. So there! Now you’ll be sorry.
And that ultimate kill-all plague? Pretty sure if Hitler had it, he’d have unleashed it at the end.
Or just a straight kinetic kill vehicle, no explosive payload. Just punch a hole through a satellite.
We likely don’t. Guess why.
Fire 1! Fire 2!
“Yeah...if ya miss.”
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