The New Arms Race

We who grew up in the time of the Apollo missions are more than aware of the arms-​race angle to the Soviet and American forays into Earth orbit and beyond. 

Now, we must recognize that the space race is no longer mere ornamentation over earthly military competition.

“The United States and China are rapidly building space warfare capabilities,” writes Bill Gertz in the Washington Examiner, “as part of a race to dominate the zone outside Earth’s atmosphere.”

Of course, much of this remains ground support. WHNT News 19 in Alabama quotes the Commander of the U.S. Space and Missile Defense Command at Redstone Arsenal — a Lieutenant General who “will soon become Deputy Commander of the U.S. Space Command in Colorado” — explaining that current space resources must be ever-​ready in support of “the war fighter, the soldier on the ground.”

But the “satellites in space” he refers to, the ones with “very unique capabilities,” are not just about ground support. For when Donald Trump proposed a new Space Force military division last year, he wasn’t blowing smoke.

Billions of future dollars, maybe, but not smoke. 

In the works?

• “AI for space war to stop anti-​satellite weapons”;
• Capabilities to treat “Space [a]s a warfighting domain similar to air, land and sea”;
• Space planes, such as the in-​dev X‑37B;

and much more.

The Chinese are looking for “space superiority,” says American intelligence, and of course “you know what this means,” as Bugs Bunny liked to say.

War?

At least war profits.

Even France is talking about militarizing space.

Brave new world? Or more of the same, just higher up?

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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