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http://www.forbes.com/sites/saadiam...-for-escalating-the-arms-race-in-outer-space/
Saadia M. Pekkanen
Contributor
I write about the IR of Japan/Asia and outer space security.
Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own.
Asia 5/30/2015 @ 9:45AM 2,838 views
All Eyes on China, But Japan May be the Space Power to Watch
The ambiguities in the dual-uses of space technology blur our understanding of Asia. They mask just who is a competent military space power in Asia today. They also limit our appreciation of what these powers can actually do in outer space in their national security interests.
All eyes are on China, but Japan may be the power to watch. It has emerged with some of the most significant and indigenous counterspace capabilities around. China’s feats attract attention because they are shrouded in secrecy but Japan has hidden its prowess in plain sight. With the unavoidable ambiguity of dual-use, Japan has acquired its impressive capabilities in full view of a pacifist public and under constitutional constraints.
This is possible because it is difficult to divide space technology neatly between the civilian and the military realms, and probably well over 90 percent cuts across them both. The technology that guides your car to that new restaurant across town, for example, can help guide a bomb with precision to its target. A rocket that can take a payload in outer space also brings the ability to deliver a warhead around the planet. This means that a country can develop a wide spectrum of military space assets when professing to solely pursue civilian and commercial goals. Whether by default or design, perhaps no country has done this better than Japan.
The Japanese government protests when a country like North Korea tries to launch a scientific satellite. Like others players, Japan too harbors suspicions that North Korea is really advancing or testing ICBM technologies under the guise of civilian space development. But Japan itself draws little rebuke or notice even though this logic holds also for the development and testing of Japanese liquid- and solid-fuel rockets over the postwar period, including the truly remarkable new and operational Epsilon. It takes considerable luck, or skillful genius, to dodge global scrutiny while acquiring the same basic military space capabilities as other players in Asia.
Japan’s H-2A rocket carrying an information-gathering satellite lifts off from the launching pad at the Tanegashima Space Center in Tanegashima island, Kagoshima prefecture on March 26, 2015. Japan on March 26 successfully launched a replacement spy satellite, its aerospace agency said, as an existing device comes to the end of its working life. (JIJI PRESS/AFP/Getty Images)
In contrast, China’s approach has drawn widespread condemnation, most visibly in the aftermath of its hit-to-kill ASAT test in 2007. The deliberate creation of orbital debris is not the only thing that emerged as problematic. This kind of test also implicates missile defense, calling into question the supposedly defensive elements of some BMD-related technologies and their potential for doubling as offensive ASAT weapons. One simple definition of an ASAT weapon is that it destroys satellites. When the United States brought down one of its own defunct satellites in 2008, it used a modified Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) to do so. The special modifications allowed the SM-3 to perform beyond its intended capabilities to intercept the target.
Beyond the particulars of that case, the U.S. actions showed that a company could turn a defensive missile interceptor for countering an incoming projectile into an offensive weapon for taking out a satellite. This is the same missile technology in the US Navy’s Aegis BMD system. It happens also to be critical to Japan-US cooperative development in advancing ballistic missile interceptor technology. Given these realities at play, it is little wonder that China too has begun to cloak its ASAT testing in the defensive language of missile defense systems.
Other ASAT systems are less visible. Satellites can also degrade, damage, disable, or destroy other satellites. They can cripple both civilian and military assets in a non-discriminatory manner, with consequences for the target country’s economy, society, and defense. This is why there is so much worry about Space Situational Awareness (SSA). It is not just about avoiding orbital debris out there; it is also about evading satellite systems deliberately aiming to sabotage your space assets. Unfortunately, the same technology that can provide in-orbit service for your satellite can also knock it out of commission. The robotic arm that drags away orbital debris can also do the same for your space assets.
Japan claims a world’s first in experimenting with the basic technology that could do both types of things. In 1997 Japan launched an Engineering Test Satellite (ETS-VII, aka Kiku-7), which actually consisted of two satellites: a big chaser satellite and a little target satellite. They first separated, and then were able to rendezvous and dock. The chaser satellite was also able to capture and move the target satellite with its mounted robot arm. The robot arm could do visual inspections and equipment exchanges. The experiments were not perfect of course. But if Japan could design and successfully carry out experiments in the name of in-orbit satellite servicing almost twenty years ago, it is a safe bet that it can do more today to protect its own space assets.
This is the reality that dual-use space technology is continuing to create. It is unrealistic to expect that China and Japan will step back when other space powers do not. After all, no one knows what the mysterious Russian 2014-28E object is. Equally, no one can say whether the furtive X-37B plane is part of an offensive or defensive counterspace capability for the United States. We have to confront space technologies for what they are. Their spreading dual-uses demand that we pay close attention to the intentions and doctrines guiding them not just in Asia but beyond.
Posted for fair use.....
http://www.forbes.com/sites/saadiam...-for-escalating-the-arms-race-in-outer-space/
Saadia M. Pekkanen
Contributor
I write about the IR of Japan/Asia and outer space security.
Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own.
Asia 5/30/2015 @ 9:45AM 2,838 views
All Eyes on China, But Japan May be the Space Power to Watch
The ambiguities in the dual-uses of space technology blur our understanding of Asia. They mask just who is a competent military space power in Asia today. They also limit our appreciation of what these powers can actually do in outer space in their national security interests.
All eyes are on China, but Japan may be the power to watch. It has emerged with some of the most significant and indigenous counterspace capabilities around. China’s feats attract attention because they are shrouded in secrecy but Japan has hidden its prowess in plain sight. With the unavoidable ambiguity of dual-use, Japan has acquired its impressive capabilities in full view of a pacifist public and under constitutional constraints.
This is possible because it is difficult to divide space technology neatly between the civilian and the military realms, and probably well over 90 percent cuts across them both. The technology that guides your car to that new restaurant across town, for example, can help guide a bomb with precision to its target. A rocket that can take a payload in outer space also brings the ability to deliver a warhead around the planet. This means that a country can develop a wide spectrum of military space assets when professing to solely pursue civilian and commercial goals. Whether by default or design, perhaps no country has done this better than Japan.
The Japanese government protests when a country like North Korea tries to launch a scientific satellite. Like others players, Japan too harbors suspicions that North Korea is really advancing or testing ICBM technologies under the guise of civilian space development. But Japan itself draws little rebuke or notice even though this logic holds also for the development and testing of Japanese liquid- and solid-fuel rockets over the postwar period, including the truly remarkable new and operational Epsilon. It takes considerable luck, or skillful genius, to dodge global scrutiny while acquiring the same basic military space capabilities as other players in Asia.
Japan’s H-2A rocket carrying an information-gathering satellite lifts off from the launching pad at the Tanegashima Space Center in Tanegashima island, Kagoshima prefecture on March 26, 2015. Japan on March 26 successfully launched a replacement spy satellite, its aerospace agency said, as an existing device comes to the end of its working life. (JIJI PRESS/AFP/Getty Images)
In contrast, China’s approach has drawn widespread condemnation, most visibly in the aftermath of its hit-to-kill ASAT test in 2007. The deliberate creation of orbital debris is not the only thing that emerged as problematic. This kind of test also implicates missile defense, calling into question the supposedly defensive elements of some BMD-related technologies and their potential for doubling as offensive ASAT weapons. One simple definition of an ASAT weapon is that it destroys satellites. When the United States brought down one of its own defunct satellites in 2008, it used a modified Standard Missile-3 (SM-3) to do so. The special modifications allowed the SM-3 to perform beyond its intended capabilities to intercept the target.
Beyond the particulars of that case, the U.S. actions showed that a company could turn a defensive missile interceptor for countering an incoming projectile into an offensive weapon for taking out a satellite. This is the same missile technology in the US Navy’s Aegis BMD system. It happens also to be critical to Japan-US cooperative development in advancing ballistic missile interceptor technology. Given these realities at play, it is little wonder that China too has begun to cloak its ASAT testing in the defensive language of missile defense systems.
Other ASAT systems are less visible. Satellites can also degrade, damage, disable, or destroy other satellites. They can cripple both civilian and military assets in a non-discriminatory manner, with consequences for the target country’s economy, society, and defense. This is why there is so much worry about Space Situational Awareness (SSA). It is not just about avoiding orbital debris out there; it is also about evading satellite systems deliberately aiming to sabotage your space assets. Unfortunately, the same technology that can provide in-orbit service for your satellite can also knock it out of commission. The robotic arm that drags away orbital debris can also do the same for your space assets.
Japan claims a world’s first in experimenting with the basic technology that could do both types of things. In 1997 Japan launched an Engineering Test Satellite (ETS-VII, aka Kiku-7), which actually consisted of two satellites: a big chaser satellite and a little target satellite. They first separated, and then were able to rendezvous and dock. The chaser satellite was also able to capture and move the target satellite with its mounted robot arm. The robot arm could do visual inspections and equipment exchanges. The experiments were not perfect of course. But if Japan could design and successfully carry out experiments in the name of in-orbit satellite servicing almost twenty years ago, it is a safe bet that it can do more today to protect its own space assets.
This is the reality that dual-use space technology is continuing to create. It is unrealistic to expect that China and Japan will step back when other space powers do not. After all, no one knows what the mysterious Russian 2014-28E object is. Equally, no one can say whether the furtive X-37B plane is part of an offensive or defensive counterspace capability for the United States. We have to confront space technologies for what they are. Their spreading dual-uses demand that we pay close attention to the intentions and doctrines guiding them not just in Asia but beyond.
