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How Space Trash Can Be Used Against The U.S.

This article is more than 8 years old.

Man-made and defunct objects from over half a century worth of spacefaring now litter Earth orbits. This orbital debris poses a significant challenge for the safety and sustainability of our universal commons. But the greater, and more immediate, risk for the global community comes from the ways in which orbital debris is increasingly being implicated in military realities.

Space debris poses a well-known environmental hazard to spacecraft, from functioning satellites to the manned International Space Station ( ISS ). With over 21,000 pieces of known debris fragments that can be tracked (usually meaning over 10 cm in diameter), their increasing congestion makes an already inhospitable milieu even more hostile. Because of its speed, such as in low Earth orbit where most spacecraft and the ISS are found, space debris even the size of a marble can devastate things in its way.

Thousands of pieces of orbital debris thus have the potential to affect the ability of a spacecraft to “live,” “see” and “hear.” This should worry all the powers that depend heavily on space assets, but perhaps none more than the United States—which tops the list as the most space-dependent country in the world. In 2015, the United States operates over 40% of all known satellites. Estimates also suggest that 80 percent of American communications and intelligence comes from satellites. So, Americans especially need to add “space trash” to their list of things to worry about.

For weaker space powers, orbital debris is not only a problem, but perhaps also an opportunity to exploit. Here’s why. One way to debilitate a superior space power is to take advantage of the orbital debris. The greater the amount of debris whizzing around in orbit, the more likely that those who are the most dependent on space assets will eventually find their societies, economies, and militaries the most hurt.

Accidents in space are not only a consequence of increasing orbital debris; the accidents themselves result in more orbital debris. Major collisions, and the resulting debris, are the big worry. The 2009 collision of a functioning U.S. communications satellite with a non-functioning Russian one drew worldwide attention. This single incident added approximately 2,000 more objects to the space debris cloud.

As the number of players and their space assets rise, this accidental trend might be inevitable. It takes many forms, some of them known. In 1991, for example, a defunct Russian navigation satellite was hit by debris from a sister spacecraft in a similar orbit. In 1996, the fragment of an Ariane rocket, which had exploded much earlier, struck a French spy satellite. In 2005, a piece from a Chinese rocket hit a U.S. rocket stage that had been orbiting for decades. In 2013, a small Russian geodetic satellite, known as BLITS ( Ball Lens in the Space), was struck by some fragment, and shed some debris itself.

It is of course hard to know what is or is not an accident. In early 2015, a twenty-year old U.S. Air Force Defense Meteorological Satellite Program Flight 13(DMSP-F13) craft blew up. The U.S. attributed the event to a power failure, minimizing its importance. But the U.S. delay in admitting the event to a wider audience fueled a few wild speculations that there had been some act of sabotage.

Whatever the causes, what is certain is that the DMSP-F13 explosion too created debris in its wake. Rather than just a hundred or so pieces that could be tracked, it may have ended up creating over 50,000 shards. This only adds to the millions of debris fragments that cannot be tracked. Since some of the greatest risks for spacecraft and human missions come from small debris fragments that are hard to track, this single event is noteworthy. In this case, given the altitude, the debris seems well above the drag effects of the upper atmosphere, meaning it may whirl around for decades to come.

And some collisions are no accidents at all. Witness the deliberate ASAT test in 2007 by China, which used a ground-based missile to take out its own aging satellite. This event added about 3,000 more fragments, giving a major impetus to concerns about the expanding realities of orbital debris. Or consider the controversy over the 2013 Chinese test of a rocket that could reach geosynchronous orbit, where most U.S. military satellites reside.

The threats to U.S. space assets are real, which necessitates a focus on Space Situational Awareness (SSA). For the U.S., knowing what is out there and what it is doing through, for example, its Space Surveillance Network is critical. The U.S. dependence on space assets also affects its military allies, such as Japan with its own expanding national security interests. Japan is well on board with the SSA focus, especially with the elevation of space policy as a strategic domain of cooperation in the revised U.S.-Japan defense guidelines.

We should remember of course that the U.S. and Japan are not the only ones engaged in these types of maneuvers. Other countries, even with fewer assets, have the same protective instincts. So if things stay the course worldwide, it is reasonably foreseeable that the heavens will become less secure for all humanity.