Celestial Combat
By Micah Holmquist

The end of the 1900s brought a slew of predictions about what life will be like in the next 100 years. Most forecasted that science and technology will create longer and happier lives. There is another way of looking at things. The past hundred years were, at least in absolute terms, the most destructive in human history and the primary reason for this was more powerful weapons.

There is no reason to think that war is a thing of the past. In fact, the Control Risks Group, an organization that specializes in providing businesses with plans in times of conflict or political crisis, issued a report this past November that predicts increased war and conflict in the immediate future. (For more on Control Risks and this report, go to http://www.crg.com.)

Yet warfare will change along with technology. The significant change in the twentieth century was the use aerial power but in the future the new terrain of conflict is likely to be outer space. It should come as no surprise that the United States military is the leader in this area.

War in space?

In theory, space is not a theater for combat. 91 countries, including the U.S., signed the "Treaty on Principles Governing the activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space, Including the Moon and other Celestial Bodies" or, as it is known, the 1967 Outer Space Treaty. The agreement clearly mandates that the "establishment of military bases, installations and fortifications, the testing of any type of weapons and the conduct of military maneuvers on celestial bodies shall be forbidden." (The treaty’s full text is online at http://www.acda.gov/treaties/space1.htm#2.) This treaty officially remains in effect and the General Assembly of the United Nations voted overwhelmingly to reaffirm it.

The U.S. abstained from voting on this and for good reason. Military objectives have been and remain an important part of the U.S. space program. Journalist Karl Grossman has documented that one goal of both the Apollo 13 and 1986 challenger missions —each of which is famous for other reasons- was furthering research on the potential use of nuclear weapons in space. (See the January 23, 1988 and September 11, 1995 issues of The Nation.)

Military ambitions for space began to lose their cloak of secrecy in the mid 1980s. The Joint Chiefs of Staff created the United States Space Command (USPC - http://www.peterson.af.mil/usspace/) in 1985 in order to centralize military operations in space. This new group and the four branches of the military issued a whole slew of reports pertaining to space in the years that followed. These documents show that the U.S. military intends to be the dominant military force in space and that it envisions the use of space for three purposes: missile defense, communications, and offensive attacks.

The idea behind using space for missile defense, once called "Star Wars", is simple. Satellites would be equipped to release "hit-to-kill" interceptors that knock out any missiles heading towards the U.S. The collision would occur at very high altitudes thus preventing any significant damage to the Earth and its inhabitants. Supporters of these programs argue that computer aided navigational technology would allow such a system to work. Critics have countered that failure to intercept the target is a regular occurrence in any tests of these programs and that the potential for an accidental launching is quite high. Such a mishap would amount to, more or less, an unprovoked assault on some random country by the U.S. These and other problems lead George Lewis, Theodore Postol, and John Pike to declare in this past August’s issue of Scientific American that such a system "would do little to increase national security. In fact it would have the opposite effect." Nonetheless, last year Congress and the President gave the go-ahead for the military to create a Ballistic Missile Defense (BMD) program. As of this writing, the future of the BMD program is unclear because a significant military report expressed qualms about implementing it. (The report is accessible from the web, with Adobe Reader software, at http://www.fas.org/spp/starwars/program/welsh.pdf.)

The U.S. military already uses space for communications. Satellites provided important data to military leaders during the U.S. lead attack on Iraq in 1991. New World Vistas, a 1996 report by the Air Force Scientific Advisory Board, proposes that the Air Force dramatically expand the use of data acquired in this manner by doing such things as equipping all planes with the equipment necessary to be in contact with satellites.

Finally military documents make it clear that there are at least hesitant steps towards acquiring the means to launch offensive actions from space. New World Vistas says that in the near future "new technologies will allow the fielding of space-based weapons of devastating effectiveness to be used to deliver energy and mass as force projection in tactical and strategic conflict." This hardly appears to be just a statement of fact since these lines are surrounded by descriptions of other advancements that the military openly engages in and no qualifiers appear. The USPC’s 1997 report Vision for 2020 (http://www.peterson.af.mil/usspace/visbook.pdf) has some equally ominous signs. The document forcefully says that "[S]pace power is a vital element of in moving towards the Joint Vision [this is a reference to an earlier study] goal of being persuasive in peace, decisive in war, and preeminent in any other form of conflict." (The use of bold is in the original.) Such a statement suggests that the U.S. military is willing to use any tactic or terrain, including space, for war.

Pentagon brass do their best to avoid discussing the use of space for offensive purposes. The U.S. may regularly violate treaties and international law but it prefers to not do this openly. Many peace activists and military analysts do not believe that this is a significant hindrance to the military, however. They contend that the technology used in missile defense programs can easily be applied to offensive purposes. Colonel Tom Clark affirmed these fears this past summer when he said it is "obvious that dual use is clear."

Full Spectrum Supremacy

There is a reason for all of this. Vision for 2020 says, "Historically, military forces have evolved to protect national interests —both military and economic." Two pages later it says "Although unlikely to be challenged by a global peer competitor, the United States will continue to be challenged regionally. The globalization of the world economy will also continue with a widening between ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots.’"

At an April 1998 conference on disarmament, the previously mentioned John Pike explained how the military was reacting to this situation. "The American military objective is no longer one of achieving either military parity with the Soviet Union or military superiority with respect to Soviet Union, but rather achieving full spectrum supremacy with the rest of the world. Full spectrum supremacy is defined as a military preponderance so overwhelming that no other country would even think about possibly acquiring the capability of challenging the United States militarily and obviously the ability to deny the country’s access to space."

What is the impact?

Policing the new world order is not the paramount concern for most of the world’s population. And the militrization of space is a very dangerous project.

First of all, there is the possibility of disaster. There has been NASA missions that carried enough plutonium to give, in theory and if an accident were to occur, a lethal dose of cancer to everyone on Earth. As was said earlier, there is a high chance that any missile defense system could also experience malfunctions. This could also have horrendous results.

Then there is the general idea of using space for military purposes. Space is the forth layer that humans have come in contact with. There appears to be no turning back from using the other three —land, water, and the air- for war. Yet the possibility of not using space for combat does exist. Given the destruction that has already happened on Earth and appears likely to continue, it would be a mistake to just accept war in space.

What can be done?

China has called for an international law that specifically forbids the use of space for any military purposes. Seemingly the 1967 Outer Space Treaty would have covered this although there does appear to be some wiggle room; the treaty does not explicitly outlaw the use of satellites to launch weapons. (It does, however, clearly outlaw the use of nuclear weapons in space.)

The prohibition of nuclear weapons in space would be a positive step, although enforcement would be far from assured. The U.S. military has always been willing to violate international law and treaties when it served its interests. The only tactic that has any possibility of limiting the militrization of space is public pressure. That means it is up to us.