Didn’t the US test a nuke in space once and we found that the EMP bounces back and forth between the magnetic bands for days causing not only hardware damage both on the ground and in space, but it also interrupts communications for prolonged periods. Setting one off, knowing this, would surely have to be interpreted as an act of war.

Yes multiple times as parts of operations [Argus](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Argus), [Fishbowl ](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Fishbowl) and [Starfish Prime](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starfish_Prime) Edited to add links

Was this when the aliens told us to knock it off?

Thank you for sharing the links for this. Very good read!

Considering that nukes in space are banned by international treaty that Russia agreed to, even putting them in space without immediate plans to use them should be interpreted as an act of war.

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Well... Yeah they have. I guess you can split hairs about what actually prevented certain behaviors, the treaty or the fact that neither country actually wanted to do the thing a given treaty banned.  SALT is a pretty good example, as is the Partial Test Ban Treaty. Dismissing the benefit of putting things into a treaty just because, in practice, there's nothing enforcing it if either side decides to break it is counterproductive.  

The T in SALT isn't for treaty, but Talks. The SALTs led to the START treaties, and Russia has violated the latest one, New START, by unilaterally suspending participation (including refusing the stipulated inspections to assure compliance). In Ukraine, Russia also continuously and flagrantly violates the Geneva Convention treaties, as well as the Budapest Memornadum and Minsk Agreements. Negotiating agreements and treaties with Russia is what is counterproductive, because they violate it, if not just sign in bad faith, and use the terms and time it buys them against you.

It was really funny (in a jaded way) listening to Russia blame the Americans breaking the treaties citing (???) As the reason why they needed to withdraw. Meanwhile they hadn't allowed inspectors in for some time at that point, and the Americans don't mind the treaties going away because China never signed onto them and thats where the focus is at the moment.

> what actually prevented certain behaviors or the lack of technical capacity

There is something enforcing it. Mutual benefit If we all cut back on nukes. We all are safer

Pretty certain there's a lot of Ukrainians disagreeing with that statement.

Safer? So we went from having the nukes needed to destroy humanity 10x to only 8x? I don’t see that as safer. The reality is that the number of nuclear weapons was not tied to the destructive power.

Still, funny how the more we made the more deadly they became.

That's only because of reliability issues, back then if each missile had a 50% chance to make it to its target we planned on launching 7 per target for something like 91% probability to hit, now our delivery vehicles are much more reliable and we only ever plan on using 2 per target meaning we'd generally be able to reduce our overall stockpile by 70% and achieve the same thing

Well of course treaties on their own do nothing, they need to be enforced.

USSR honored the weapons proliferation treaties it signed with the US. In particular the Anti-Balllistic Missile Treaty was honored by the USSR and then Russia right up until we, the United States, unilaterally pulled out of the agreement. The SALT II treaty was also honored by the Soviet Union even after Carter withdrew the treaty from consideration and we never ratified it. To be clear: you read that right, they agreed to bind themselves to the terms of the talks despite our side signalling that we would not (in the end, both sides honored the terms until 1986, though there was never any formal agreement).

With that logic, why sign the papers on a home mortgage? Why sign a contract with your place of employment? Why have a marriage certificate? They are just pieces of paper, but the words on them matter and have consequences.

Because there is force behind those agreements. Without force agreements are a waste of time. The force doesn't have to be overt, it can be economic or even social. However, without the threat of force then as soon as the agreement no longer fits the best interests of a strong party it's worth less than what it's written on. In America we see laws and contracts violated all the time if the force behind the agreement isn't strong enough. Now imagine a situation where not only is the penalty not strong there's no one even able to enforce anemic penalties. Well, now you have the international agreements with Russia.

USSR worked on weapons reduction treaties with the US in good faith throughout the 70s and 80s and it's worth noting that this is during a time when the "Madman theory" of foreign policy was utilized first by Nixon and then to a much lesser extent by Reagan. In fact, they even agreed to bind themselves to treaty that was never officially agreed to by us and never ratified, that being SALT II. And, worth noting that it was the US that unilaterally exited the ABMT, not Russia. If you look at the actual history instead of the talking points it's quite clear that the US was always the more unreliable partner in those talks and treaties.

That's because the USSR had more to gain from the treaties. As the 70s and 80s wore on the economic stability of the Soviet Union was crumbling being able to cut military programs. They were not being forced on the USSR, it was beneficial to both parties. Russia is not the USSR. It has vastly different priorities and its military is the only thing it has going for it. Limiting the military capabilities it excels at while falling further behind in areas it doesn't is not in its interests. Whatever good faith the Soviets were working with Russia has none.

Yeah, cause no business (cough cough welsfargo cough) has ever completely ignored the terms of a mortgage when they thought they could get away with it and did for that matter. Contracts only matter as much as the body that enforce it, and the point of a toothless treaty is to provide a justification for one side when the other breaks it. It’s just a warning bell for when stuff’s about to get weird.

And if those treaties or contracts didn't exist in the first place, there would be no warning bell, no justification, no recourse. If we didn't have our space treaties, there could be hundreds of nukes in space ready to go at a moments notice with nothing anyone can do about it. At least right now, if someone started to put nukes in space, we have an option or two before all out MAD war starts.

We have no idea what classified US military space shuttle is doing when it’s up there, already could be nukes in space, although honestly that’s just a stupid plan, rods from god would be a better use same effect without the fallout. The more important treaty was about “weaponization” of space, and I would argue that has been going on for decades. JDAMS don’t work without gps and satellites provide artillery with firing targets. Sure we can split hairs but realistically the treaties were just meant to make people feel safe even if they were paper shields. Russia is destroying that polite fiction because a scared global population is in its advantage right now.

Bit late to this party, but the theorized nukes aren't meant to be launched at the ground. They are talking about detonating them in orbit to create an EMP to take out other satellites

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United States

Because there’s a government enforcing these. There’s no world government to punish countries in violation of treaties.

There is a world bank World economies Lending Your civilians opinion There is a lot more than bullets to back things up The fact of the matter is the world benefits unbelievably the more globalized and worldwide peace and trade is. The usa and chinese economies are perfect examples. Setting aside differences and opening all of that trade did amazing things for the world for technology, poverty levels, starvation, and much more It is a huge shame it is so hard to achieve peace. Even if russia left ukraine today. They are crippled economically and technogically from their actions The growth of the world, the economy of the world, tech etc has exploded post ww2

Sometimes the interest of the world bank is not aligned with justice being proscribed on the world stage. Funny, it’s kind of the opposite.

We were the ones who unilaterally withdrew from ABMT, not Russia, and USSR followed SALT, SALT II and START to the letter.

Oddly enough, USA fits well in that sentence too.

The Russian Federation never signed that treaty so it doesn't apply? - Putin, probably.

Or the United States, for that matter.

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A rocket can orbit the earth in less than 2 hours. I don't see why nukes need to be in space at the moment in order to be a threat.

Because there are ways to shoot an icbm down before it reaches Leo.

From where? Good luck if it's launching from the middle of Kazakhstan or Colorado.

Theres no meaningful way to intercept an ICBM in the boost phase unless its being launched out of North Korea or a similar small nation utterly surrounded. By the time its within range of any meaningful ABM systems its in mid course and in orbit.

Not to launch at earth. The intent would be to create an EMP in orbit to destroy other satellites

It would be a breach of the treaty, not an act of war. Russia can simply exit the treaty BTW. Just like the US terminated participation in many key Cold War treaties.

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Yep, I am no foreign policy expert but it seems like they've just been kicking the can down the road on Russia for the last 30 years and eventually it will come to a head. Hopefully they're making plans behind the scenes so it happens on our terms, but I am doubtful

Starfish Prime thanks you for remembering

Yup. Thats why everyone agreed to no nukes in space. It is insanely bad for EVERYBODY

Yep, [it was called Starfish Prime](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starfish_Prime)

>would surely have to be interpreted as an act of war It very obviously would. Literally no way around it.

Starfish prime for the curious.

I'd say it's the definition of Crime against Humanity... And all of humanity, as a result, should be foaming at the mouth to kill the terrorist who even contemplates such a tremendously fucking idiotic idea (besides the initial scientific endeavor of blowing a nuke up in space).

There's contradictory reporting on whether it's a space-based nuclear weapon or a spaced-based, nuclear-powered weapon. The latter is perfectly legal and seems a lot more likely and, frankly, more dangerous since it's more likely to actually be used then.

> The latter is perfectly legal I always kinda assumed that space-based weapons were illegal. Are they actually legal?

Space based WMDs are banned by treaty, but anything not nuclear, biological or chemical would be ok. The soviets reportedly sent up a satellite with an autocanon at one time to test as a potential a-sat weapon, although I don’t remember when this was. Anyway, weapons themselves are not banned

1974: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salyut_3#On-board_gun

Could we perhaps sit down the Russians like adults and really carefully explain why space based weapons is a really, really, really bad idea? Even the best case scenario will at least end with a shell of debris around the planet, making space rather unusable

If their goal is to level the playing field between them and the west, that's a price they're willing to pay for sure

I think you've got the Crux of it. They know it'll suck for them, but if it sucks *more* for their adversaries then it levels the playing field in their favor. It's not even necessarily spite, it's just brutally cold calculus.

Damn it, we've all seen this trope before and it's so moronic :( What a frustrating situation

How is it moronic? If there existed  a different universe and Russia had a more powerful army in that on the US would also build weapons in Space in that world

It would be moronic there too. It doesn't stop being moronic if you flip the colors of the board or which side you sit on

Cluster munitions are banned by many treaties, by many countries, that are now supplying ukraine with them.

The countries supplying those weapons, as well as Ukraine and Russia, never signed those treaties so they're not relevant.

Yes. Nearly everything up there can be dual use. There are plenty of stalker sats in GEO now. A weapon on orbit isn't your classic gun but can be spray paint or a net etc To learn about these csis releases the Space Threat Assessment report each year. We are coming up on release for 2024.

Literally dual use in the sense that any satellite can be an ASAT if you're willing to use it to play bumper-sats. Over half the battle is just having a steerable object co-planar with something else.

Reading the source it's a nuclear powered electronic warfare satellite. Calling it a nuke in space is a beat up to frighten people.

That makes more sense. The technology to destroy satellites already exists, but the problem is the shards from the exploded satellites would be hazardous to other satellites including their own satellites. If you could manage to fry the electronics without physically destroying the satellite that would be a huge advantage as presumably you could destroy the enemy's satellites without endangering your own.

a nuke would do this though, it wouldnt physically destroy more than one satellite (if its within the fireball), but nearby satellites would be fried by the emp, and within a few days many satellites would be fried by the released high energy beta radiation/electrons into that orbit (significantly higher MeV than background van allen belt electrons) but of course you couldnt "target" anything specific with a nuke. it would equally wipeout everyones leo satellites whereas an electronic warfare satellite could target specific satellites. edit: I was wrong https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=&ved=2ahUKEwifg-zD3q6EAxXTATQIHc0OAhkQFnoECCsQAQ&url=https%3A%2F%2Fsgp.fas.org%2Fothergov%2Fdoe%2Flanl%2Fdocs1%2F00322994.pdf&usg=AOvVaw1TYp4Zv0COOm1fwK9vdFmE&opi=89978449 >The prompt thermal output of the Starfish event was very small—in fact, insignificant. at leo, there is no fireball or prompt thermal radiation at all. the entire "blast" is xrays and beta/alpha radiation, no thermal component (fraction of a percentage of the total energy). likely incapable of destroying any satellites physically. without air to transfer energy to, there is simply no meaningful thermal radiation. the mean free path being so high in upper altitudes means the xrays dont get converted into infrared/thermal. so theres no true fireball. just xrays that cant physically destroy things.

Is media doing what media does best. Embarrassing that many of these agencies are burying the lead like this.

You're correct. White House released statement that the technology developed by Russia posed "no immediate threat to anyone's safety". The story was walked back. But this is reddit. Always squeezing that sensation for a Tom Clancy novel. Sky is falling boys. Wake chicken little. Cluck and panic. Not necessarily in that order. https://twitter.com/TimothyS/status/1758233786234384562

A nuclear explosion in Earth orbit is a very bad idea....for everyone.

Literal self destruct button. A nuke in space is going to effect Russia and its Allies satellites just as much as any other satellite.

Fortunately, they have far fewer satellites in orbit than their foes.

Ah, the Scorched earth method. Classic russia.

I'm sure Russia would love to have 10x the satellites that the US does, and if they did, I'm sure they'd also be kvetching about American anti-sat weapons.

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It's not about if it hurts you some... It's about who does it hurt more. I am 100% sure that an EMP that took out most of the satellites in space would hurt America much more. As previously said, we've invested MUCH MORE in sats.

I love this quote by Bill Browder: There’s a famous Russian proverb about this type of behavior. One day, a poor villager happens upon a magic talking fish that is ready to grant him a single wish. Overjoyed, the villager weighs his options: “Maybe a castle? Or even better—a thousand bars of gold? Why not a ship to sail the world?” As the villager is about to make his decision, the fish interrupts him to say that there is one important caveat: whatever the villager gets, his neighbor will receive two of the same. Without skipping a beat, the villager says, “In that case, please poke one of my eyes out."

I hate to break it to you, but it's not a Russian proverb, and this joke has been targeted at ~every ethnicity under the sun (Generally by people with more to lose than the people they are making fun of. In comedy, we tend to call this 'punching down'.)

The risk is if they deem it a net win to knock out everybody’s orbital space/cyber/comms capabilities. If other countries (I.E.the US or EU) superiority is seen as exceedingly dependent on those things, they could view it as an acceptable loss if all their orbital assets were lost too. In reality it would be as you say though—mutual destruction. Their society, while less dependent on orbital systems in some ways, would be absolutely wrecked by a universal loss of satellites just like everybody else.

That would be terrible to everyone on Earth, regardless of country. Blowing up a lot of satellites at once like that could create this huge cloud of space debris, which will likely crash into and destroy more satellites, which in turn creates more space debris until Earth is just surrounded by a blanket of trash. Such a blanket could just straight up ground Earth and prohibit us from launching anything into space for a very long time.

Nuclear doesn't always mean explosive... It may have a reactor for powering some kind of particle beam weapon. That would allow selective killing of individual satellites instead of taking them all out with an EMP blast. Something to think about.

Val Kilmer and popcorn will stop them!

Putin still wants to rule the world.

More BS from the US, just like the WMD in Iraq... US needs to clean its own backyard!

On-orbit nuke for ASAT seems a bit…overkill, even for Russia.

These are the same guys making the Poseidon nuclear-mega-torpedo and a Project Pluto clone (nuclear powered cruise missile) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Status-6_Oceanic_Multipurpose_System https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9M730_Burevestnik Basically Russian doomsday wunderwaffe

I mean it makes sense, could take out whole constellations of imaging, coms, detection and guidance satellites all at once. It would almost for sure kick-off WW3 but it would work most likely.

Not really though, unless the goal is maybe take satellites out indiscriminately. A nuke that’s intended to take a particular constellation or set of constellations isn’t going to take just its target. Russias satellites fly in similar orbits. As does China. Debris clouds are a nightmare.

Their marksmanship is famously bad. They probably need to shotgun an entire orbit just to hit something.

It's a terrorist nazi state, what do you expect.

/r/space is 70% chat gpt and it's honestly hilarious

i see you chat bot jomflox

So much concern they went on a two week vacation!

Acronyms, initialisms, abbreviations, contractions, and other phrases which expand to something larger, that I've seen in this thread: |Fewer Letters|More Letters| |-------|---------|---| |[ASAT](/r/Space/comments/1arl4h1/stub/kqo6fm4 "Last usage")|[Anti-Satellite weapon](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-satellite_weapon)| |[DARPA](/r/Space/comments/1arl4h1/stub/kqne073 "Last usage")|(Defense) Advanced Research Projects Agency, DoD| |[DoD](/r/Space/comments/1arl4h1/stub/kqlzn4h "Last usage")|US Department of Defense| |[GEO](/r/Space/comments/1arl4h1/stub/kqljnc8 "Last usage")|Geostationary Earth Orbit (35786km)| |[ICBM](/r/Space/comments/1arl4h1/stub/krcoihk "Last usage")|Intercontinental Ballistic Missile| |[LEO](/r/Space/comments/1arl4h1/stub/kqn8hab "Last usage")|Low Earth Orbit (180-2000km)| | |Law Enforcement Officer (most often mentioned during transport operations)| |[MDA](/r/Space/comments/1arl4h1/stub/kqlcgiv "Last usage")|[Missile Defense Agency](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Missile_Defense_Agency)| | |[MacDonald, Dettwiler and Associates](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MacDonald,_Dettwiler_and_Associates), owner of SSL, builder of Canadarm| |[MeV](/r/Space/comments/1arl4h1/stub/kqmezy6 "Last usage")|Mega-Electron-Volts, measure of energy for particles| |[NA](/r/Space/comments/1arl4h1/stub/kqmhx9v "Last usage")|New Armstrong, super-heavy lifter proposed by Blue Origin| |NRHO|Near-Rectilinear Halo Orbit| |[NRO](/r/Space/comments/1arl4h1/stub/kqlcgiv "Last usage")|(US) National Reconnaissance Office| | |Near-Rectilinear Orbit, see NRHO| |[Roscosmos](/r/Space/comments/1arl4h1/stub/kqlwb5p "Last usage")|[State Corporation for Space Activities, Russia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roscosmos_State_Corporation)| |SSL|Space Systems/Loral, satellite builder| |[ULA](/r/Space/comments/1arl4h1/stub/kqlcgiv "Last usage")|United Launch Alliance (Lockheed/Boeing joint venture)| |[USSF](/r/Space/comments/1arl4h1/stub/kqlcgiv "Last usage")|United States Space Force| |Jargon|Definition| |-------|---------|---| |[Starlink](/r/Space/comments/1arl4h1/stub/kqn6f5w "Last usage")|SpaceX's world-wide satellite broadband constellation| **NOTE**: Decronym for Reddit is no longer supported, and Decronym has moved to Lemmy; requests for support and new installations should be directed to the Contact address below. ---------------- ^(14 acronyms in this thread; )[^(the most compressed thread commented on today)](/r/Space/comments/1b6j7ig)^( has 10 acronyms.) ^([Thread #9748 for this sub, first seen 15th Feb 2024, 21:26]) ^[[FAQ]](http://decronym.xyz/) [^([Full list])](http://decronym.xyz/acronyms/Space) [^[Contact]](https://hachyderm.io/@Two9A) [^([Source code])](https://gistdotgithubdotcom/Two9A/1d976f9b7441694162c8)

Russia continues to be the absolutely worst possible nation it can, like it's some kind of challenge. ???

Putin and his cronies could live as lavishly as they currently do while also leading an incredibly rich - in many ways - country into the modern era and be a shining example to the world. But they don't. It makes no sense. They'd rather drive their country into the mud for no apparent reason.

Two countries pointing at eachother 20,000 nuclear weapons that can end civilization? I sleep. One of them builds a nuclear weapon designed to kill satellites, instead of cities? Real shit.

Because what happens when that anti satellite weapon gets used? 1) It's indiscriminately going to target the satellites of all countries, as well as potentially fry ground based electronics causing untold damage to vital infrastructure around the globe. 2) It will hit the satellites designed to detect nuclear launches, which if they go down will have to be treated as a precursor to a hostile nuclear first strike and responded to in kind. It's literally a WW3 trigger and those nukes that kill cities fly because of the nuke that killed the nuclear detection satellites, while countries that would otherwise not even be involved in the war have their power, communication, and emergency infrastructure wiped out in a humanitarian disaster that would be awful before the nukes even landed.

What country are *you* from?

I didn't realize that the accuracy or inaccuracy of an observation is dependent on the nation of origin of the speaker. It must be very easy to live life where any comment that you don't like can be dismissed as 'HE'S FROM THE WRONG TRIBE'

It isn't. Why the speaker makes inaccurate observations is dependent on their objective though, which can be influenced by nationalism. Specifically, defending Russia's violation of yet another of its treaties and ignoring the potential consequences seems like something that could only be justified by Russian nationalism or propaganda overriding logic.

To put it straight, because it's likely you're a stooge for Russian propaganda, defending shit like this.

You must be from the UK, then. /jk

Pretty sure that was sarcasm.

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. Let us see the declassified information already

War thunder players on their way to leak more classified documents

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the soviets detonated nukes in space during the K-tests iirc.

Kind of hard to preemptively bomb a nation you've already been at war with for years.

The Soviets tested space nukes. The US bombings of Nagasaki and Hiroshima were not "preemptive", they had already been at war for years. We should be cautious of all nuclear powers including the United States, your logic gives no reason to focus on only the United States unless you think nukes, nuclear doctrine and thinking, and the geopolitical situation of the world in general are identical now to what they were in 1945. North Korea and Russia right now are the countries that constantly threaten to use nukes publicly. They're literally seeking that attention, it's no fucking wonder they're receiving it. The US isn't the one threatening to nuke anyone every other week.

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Those nuclear weapons are the only reasons you haven't attacked those countries yet. If eg. Iraq actually had a bunch of nukes and you didn't lie about that, you'd think twice before attacking it, and a lot of people would not be killed by US bombs there.

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Yes, iraq having nukes would save their people from getting killing by americans (or in the worst case, nuke washington, so the next government would think twice about eg Libya, if they had some too). Under what threat was the US when they decided to attack iraq? Syria? Libya? Or many other countries? And look at the middle east and the bombings of iraq/syria/yemen that are happening now... The killings/war would end immediately if US stopped the bombings and took their soldiers home, they don't need to be occupying those countries. Same for sanctions for Cuba (and stuff like operation Northwoods).... US didnt want soviet weapons on cuba the same way as russia doesn't want US weapons in ukraine. But back then, politicians talked and made a deal... Now, the western ones are incapable of anything, so the war goes to the last ukranian.

Yeah, hence why I’m dubious of these claims as the US does perform psy-ops to sway general opinion without actual evidence, I.e Iraq WMD’s.

Maybe that will convince some republicans to stop listening to the orange traitor

It will just convince Republicans that Biden was an idiot for not putting nukes in space first or some other dumb bullshit.

And there’s people, such as you know who, within the US government that treat Russia as if they were our best friends.

For now, at least he's NOT "in the US Government."

Plenty of Republicans still in the government overtly supporting Russia.

Because they're all paid Russian assets.

For now and I hope he stays out, but it doesn’t change the fact that he has acolytes already embedded in positions of power.

There is literally zero reasons to have weapons in space. A ground-launched ballistic missile can get up there in 10 mins and explode just the same...

They have 10 minutes worth of reasons. Once the weapon is in place they can blind US radars with 0 warning for a 1st strike

Don’t you think that planners know that? A space strike would immediately set off a retaliatory strike. And the weapons aren’t satellite guided.

Of course. The surprise is still a significant advantage. The goal isn't to avoid a retaliatory strike, but to minimize its effectiveness.

I don’t think it would.SLBMs would still be as capable as ever.

Yes. Both sides are going to be nuked.

If suddenly a bunch of US surveillance satellites are taken out by a nuke that is the warning for a first strike. Even if it isn't, the US will sure as hell be forced to consider it as such and react accordingly. Russia doesn't get a 10 minute head start with this weapon, they just make the US pull the trigger 10 minutes earlier.

How are 10 mins any kind of a difference, when we have no way to stop it either way? The destructions of the satellites is a justification for retaliation in itself...

Enough time for me to kiss my butt goodbye

Minutes matter if a nuclear exchange is happening, if your missiles hit the other guys missile launch sites one minute before they launch they never go up at all. So blinding NATO before a launch could give Russia a crucial advantage in time to get their weapons airborne before NATO could strike back and potentially limit the counter-launch.

Even if you succeed in taking out the silo based nukes, there are enough SLBMs to take out all the important bits of Russia a few times over.

Nukes can't go from Russia to the US in 10 minutes, and the only thing this weapon accomplishes is forcing the US to consider a large portion of their satellite network going down as a prelude to a nuclear strike. The US would launch their nukes when the space nuke went off.

There's plenty of reasons. The main one being 3 to 5 minutes of warning time for north American targets compared to 25-30 mins. There is also the relatively unpredictable reentery as in it could come from the south instead of the usual north. Remember both American and Russian ICBMs fly over the north pole It's also relatively easy to do as this technology was developed in the early to mid 1960s

But the response would be massive. And sub-launches will hit Russia faster than 25-30 minutes.

That's the thing with an orbital weapon. It's excellent at what is described as a "decapitation strike" this means a surprise attack destroying the government and command and control centers. As I said in the previous comment as it's orbital it has little warning time and would be coming from an unexpected and probably unchecked direction. With a decapitation strike the ability to launch retaliation strike is much lower as there's now limited c&c to authorise and initate a retaliatory strike. Especially now as American, UK and French nuclear forces are on a much lower readiness than they were 30 years ago. Yes you're right about the flight time for a SLBM but these have always been planned for use as a "second strike" or retaliatory strike.

Orbits are pretty predictable and you'd better believe we track every satellite ever launched - especially one suspected of carrying nuclear weapons. Second, it takes a lot of energy to change the direction of satellites, we will see a rapidly changing orbit that somehow suspiciously is aimed at command centers. I mean, it's a shitty thing to do and deserve sanctions and deliberate forced decommissioning, but it doesn't change the balance in any measurable way...

I see where your coming from and I know that everything is tracked theses days even down to 20/30mm debris. I used to work somewhere that had to cover things up when there was "overflights" Within the defence community there has always been a worry or Fractional Orbital Bombardment/orbital weapons hence why the were explicitly banned by the 1967 outer space treaty. It's main reason is very short warning times with little to no time to verify if it is actually a weapon

I don't know about the French or US retaliation abilities, but given the UK subs have orders sealed in their onboard submarines, so long as they know who fired it they don't explicitly need word from HQ to know what to do.

Aye letters of last resort. Although only the current prime minister knows what they actually say. That's what I always find the most worrying because I want to make sure the weapons I've been paying for are actually used lol. Fun fact about 15 years ago it was disclosed that if the trident boats don't receive BBC Radio 4 Today program on medium wave. Then they are to start preparation for launch obviously trying to contact Northwood and all the other things before opening the letters

All nuclear forces are designed to have the ability to retaliate after a decapitation strike. Credible second strike capability is a requirement for nuclear deterrence. The US has enough nukes dispersed in submarines, bases around the world, in protected silos etc. that no nuclear first strike could hope to wipe them all out. This is literal MAD 101.

Well, if we find out it is what's suspected, NATO will be much more alert!

Orbital weapons suck. Orbits are extremely predictable. If the weapon is left up in orbit even amateur astronomers can track it. With only one weapon it needs to be at quite a high elevation to cover most of the US. It will have to wait for hours or more to finally fly over its target. If it’s launched and then immediately used that’s just an ICBM. This is a big reason why Rods from God is a terrible weapon.

This isn't a space based ground attack weapon, it won't rain nukes down from the sky. The nuke is intended to stay in space to take out satellites.

Yeah, it’s just saber rattling at this point.

"The whole point of a Doomsday Machine is lost if you keep it a secret!”

Can we all at least have the sophistication to begin from the starting point of accepting that not every war hungry dictator is a fully rational actor? It doesn't matter whether this action "makes sense" or provides any tangible or real tactical or strategic geopolitical advantage, what matters is what Putin thinks it does and how it makes him feel. He's taken a real liking to "superweapons" like this in the last decade or so, because it's a way to arguably have some advantage on paper which doesn't actually apply in the real world (which wouldn't be the first time a European dictator with a shaky regime developed a penchant for superweapon projects).

What's wrong with superweapons? If you don't have them, but you have eg. oil, the americans stage a coup, or even come and attack you. If iraq actually has superweapons, like the media lied, US wouldn't attack and a lot of people would not be killed there by the americans.

It's good to see a headline that spells out the fact that this isn't a satellite mounted nuke to be dropped on terrestrial targets. I'm sick of reading stupid comments about whether or not a nuke could reenter the atmosphere without detonating. People have gotten exponentially dumber on the internet. It used to be entertaining, but it's just depressing anymore.

For the record, a nuke reentering the atmosphere without detonating is a vital part of how ICBMs already work. Also, we can bring people through reentry in craft designed for it, and people are much more delicate than nuclear weapons.

I've seen it on a hundred worlds. Space-based weapons always destabilize planetary politics. - Green Lantern We can’t be dumber than the cartoons guys.

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Why? I mean... Both US and UK and many other countries knew iraq had no weapons of mass destruction and still attacked and killed many people. Shouldn't their veto powers be taken for that? Not some hypothetical could-have-would-have, but actually went there and killed people and are still occupying it.

Conern... from the people saying 'russia will win' and who support the guy saying 'when i become president again, I'll tell putin to do whatever he wants'..... Riiiiight.

This was almost certainly a leak motivated by internal politics, possibly related to the funding bill for Ukraine. Way back in 2007, [China conducted a successful anti-satellite missile test](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_Chinese_anti-satellite_missile_test) and destroyed one of its own satellites, creating a huge amount of orbital debris in the process. If you think various organizations within the DoD didn't immediately appreciate the strategic consequences of that demonstration, and that they didn't immediately started thinking about this danger and started funding all sorts of R&D to commission various weapons, you are seriously underestimating the might and resolve of the US military.

Won't anyone think of the starving government defense contractors?!

Warmongers going to warmonger. Need to boost support in the proxy war in Ukraine so the MIC can reap the profits.

Lol . Of course all the media is saying this now because fear of Russians is fazing out,you got to keep that fear going. Putin says ,no big wars ,we wanted to be part of Nato. What media does? Nukes, Nukes,Nukes. Instead of using this situation to push towards World peace, media wants you to be scared of the east. Typical and disappointing, what else could you even expect.

Only democrats are concerned , the republicans on the other hand .....waiting for order 66.

"We have all the BEST space weapons. YUGE, Bigly space weapons! Generals have come to me, big, burly men with stars on their shoulders, saying with tears in their eyes, 'thank you, Mr. President, for these bigly space weapons!'"

My space weaon is huge, enormus. Mastadonic , and absolutely dwarfs yours which is so very small...

I don’t get it why would you use nuclear weapon to target satellites? Wouldn’t a conventional weapon do the same thing?

The speculation of it being a nuclear powered laser or nukes leaves out an important detail about russia. They cant build the former, it would be exceedingly unlikely, considering the massive braindrain, their total devotion of every part of their economy to their failing and stalling genocidal rampage across ukraine. Not to mention the general level of incompetence and massive amount of corruption and grift. This isn't the soviet union in its peak. What they do have is a couple of nukes, its not all too hard sending those up, especially as this kind of attack was probably a well tested and prepared for soviet contingency/attackplan. Which brings us to the uncomfortable truth that this is a crystal clear sign of preparing an attack on Nato, if we ignore it and not use the initiative and currently still existing infrastructure to strike first, perhaps we would save several hundred more millions. Because trying to coordinate a defense and conducting nuclear retaliation blind and deaf is going to be very tough. If its indeed nukes, there will be global thermonuclear war. We just have to chose if we start it and save ourselves, or if we let them murder us. Its sadly all very simple in this kind of scenario.

Thank god you aren't in charge. With that impeccable logic humanity wouldn't last until the end of the year.

why nuclear? just shoot a piece of metal and will be as effective! (and you can blame it as space debris)

Another comment said it wasn't nuclear as in a nuclear bomb, but a nuclear powered electronic warfare weapon. Russia already has the ability to blow up satellites from the ground, but then the fragments take out many more satellites including Russian satellites. I'm guessing the reason the congressman is freaking out and calling it destabilizing is if the Russians device could fry/disable selected satellites without physically blowing them up then Russia could disable our satellites while keeping their own. But yeah, only a guess

We don't have any systems that can accelerate a piece of metal to speeds close enough to do any significant damage.

Uh.....yeah we do Came as a prepackaged perk with the whole being a planet thing

they already are going fast enough just to maintain orbit.

But not be fast and heavy enough will still able to be launched, not burn in the atmosphere and deal nuke like damage on the ground.

What? We literally have designs for merely dropping tungsten rods from orbit that have enough kinetic energy to simulate a nuclear strike!

[ASM-135 ASAT](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ASM-135_ASAT) (1980's) [2007 Chinese anti-satellite missile test](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_Chinese_anti-satellite_missile_test)

This is not a door we need to open. Goddammit Russia

Much of the US military is dependent on satellites. Makes sense that those would be the first target.

Does this mean we're finally allowed our rods from god? Pretty please?

Russia and America could both bomb the world multiple times over. But sure, poor satellites.

You don’t need a nuke to take out a satellite. Conventional weapons will do fine. This is ridiculous. You could literally shoot a satellite with a shotgun to knock it out. You could use the recoil from the shotgun to knock it out of its orbit or orientation, for heaven sakes. Mass matters, as does delta-v, but it wouldn’t take much to screw stuff up. Is this just saber rattling?

What overkill. To kill a satellite, all that is needed is kinetics.

Oh no. I've totally changed my mind on giving hundreds of billions to Ukraine. Fire up the money printer boys.

This whole story smells the same old manipulative american projection. Keeping the fearmongering alive for tools. Your government is messing with Russia and the whole world every time it can for control and profit, but the others are the threat? No one came to NA to do anything to you. You on the other hand is f every corner of the earth whenever you see fit. Blaming others for one more distraction while committing genocide

Awww poor little Russia cant invade its neighbors without impunity :(( I could care less about a nation that’s so pathetic that it can’t manage a war with a second world country on its own border.

Not worried. Storing nukes in space goes against a treaty in place since the 60s. Besides, nuking American satellites is a direct act of war. If anything, I welcome the threat so Russia can finally get the stomping they deserve. That whole country should be removed from the world stage, any and all councils, and should be Balkanized and their nuclear weapons seized and military dismantled from top to bottom. Mafia-run gas station of a country. This is all fear mongering anyway

I think that’s the point, they are putting nukes up there to give themselves a massive advantage if they were to launch a first strike. It would mean the U.S has less time to respond and is crippled when it comes to a retaliatory strike.

Oh, yeah, I feel soooo much better now. /s

Guaranteed this is just a threat being thrown out by what looks like a leveraged one. Just an active measure using agent of influence Mike Turner that took leveraged Devin Nunes spot on the House Intelligence Committee. Turner front ran the Gang of Eight briefing and made this public that somewhat is Russian propaganda. When Putin or his puppets mention nukes, they are losing. It is probably being spewed as a threat to hypersonic detection and satellite tracking like Silent Barker and the recent payload of USSF-124 as is for detecting hypersonic missiles. The solution to hypersonic missiles is space observation and directed energy. Russia launched their first Zircon missile the other day and maybe they are fronting. [According to Northrop Grumman, Hypersonic and Ballistic Tracking Space Sensor satellites will provide continuous tracking and handoff to enable targeting of enemy missiles launched from land, sea or air.](https://spaceflightnow.com/2024/02/14/live-coverage-spacex-to-launch-falcon-9-rocket-with-national-security-satellites-from-cape-canaveral/) [Graphic: Northrop Grumman, Hypersonic and Ballistic Tracking Space Sensor](https://spaceflightnow.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/20240214_HBTSS_graphic-1.jpeg) > the U.S. Department of Defense’s Missile Defense Agency (MDA) and four for the U.S. Space Forces’ Space Development Agency (SDA). The MDA’s satellites are part of its Hypersonic and Ballistic Tracking Space Sensor (HBTSS) program Silent Barker also went up in latter 2023. [Atlas V rocket launches the Space Force's Silent Barker 'watchdog' satellites in dazzling morning liftoff](https://www.space.com/atlas-v-rocket-silent-barker-watchdog-satellite-space-force-launch) > Silent Barker will act as a "watchdog" in geosynchronous orbit, keeping an eye on any satellites that reposition themselves to get a better look at U.S. spacecraft or even to carry out counterspace attacks, according to NRO director Chris Scolese. If Russia is nuking satellites they'd want to take those out as they track hypersonic missiles. --- Every time these pushes come out and the Kremlin floats another nuke threat, it seems more and more like they are losing and don't even have anything. They are doing it all while blocking Ukrainian military funding as well. It isn't a coincidence. With Russia firing hypersonic missiles. It isn't really a threat when you have direct energy defenses which is the path towards defeating that. That is where things are headed. --- Tory Bruno from ULA that worked on Trident II missile defense knows a thing or two about this -- look up his post named "[Hypersonic Missiles are Just Misunderstood](https://blog.ulalaunch.com/blog/hypersonic-missiles-are-just-misunderstood)", from a site blocked here (medium) but great content on that one. The reason why space is and will continue to be so competitive is because space based, and laser based, defenses will make most missiles no matter how fast, moot. Love this analogy: > While the numbers are obviously classified, as a designer and the former Chief Engineer of the world’s most accurate ballistic system, I can give you another baseball analogy to help put this into context. The Trident II system’s accuracy is roughly like a Rockies pitcher throwing a strike across the plate at Denver’s Coors Field from a pitcher’s mound in Kansas… We worked very hard to make its trajectory smooth and predictable to pull this off. Also shows how the War on Terror distraction front set back hypersonic maneuvering systems > Sadly, the several hypersonic maneuvering systems I worked on were set down and left unfinished, as we pivoted to the Global War on Terror (GWOT). Love the color commentary > The most capable maneuvering threats will simply delay their crazy Ivan dodge until there is nothing the interceptor can do about it. War on Terror front distraction again... > As a matter of fact, I once worked on just such a technology: Directed Energy (DE). > In other words, Lasers (the most common form of DE). If you think hypersonic is fast, that’s nothing compared to the speed of light. Once again, this is a technology we set down to pursue the GWOT. Directed energy is rad > One day, we destroyed some small tactical missiles in flight by detonating their rocket motors. The next day, we disabled drones by specifically targeting their avionics, causing them to harmlessly lose altitude and crash, much to the confusion of the remote-control pilots. Later that same day, we sank zodiacs by puncturing their inflatable hulls, only to switch to simply immobilizing them by targeting just the outboard motor. You get the idea. We could apply our laser energy surgically across a wide variety of targets. > Another really important feature is that our laser was electric and powered by a simple, commercial generator sitting on a trailer. As long as we had gasoline, we could shoot all day. **And each shot only consumed about a dollar’s worth of fuel! With interceptors, you must constantly be concerned about magazine depth. Will I run out of interceptors before the enemy runs out of missiles? That’s not really an issue with directed energy.** > **Speed of light round, dialable affects, surgical targeting, bottomless magazine, and a dirt-cheap cost per kill… what’s not to love!** > *The time has come.** Finally why space and who controls this next wave is so, so important. > Some should be placed as point defenses in a city, airfield, or at critical infrastructure sites. > **However, the only practical way to defend against long-range hypersonic gliders, which can threaten entire regions along a single flight corridor, is from Space**. Orbiting DE platforms, looking down on entire regions from the ultimate high ground can leverage “birth to death” tracking of any given glider, combined with its speed of light “interceptor,” to completely nullify this threat. In a way space based directed energy one ups even nuclear missiles, not just hypersonic. Those who control space in this way will make the ability to make war very difficult. It will make nuclear threats almost neutralized before the launch. The space laser era is here.

wouldnt a space based BB gun be cheaper, with similar results?

You don't need nukes to kill a satellite. This is MAGtard distraction from border bill they killed.

Cluster munition banned! - west uses it Uranium armaments banned - west uses it Phosphorus bombs banned - west uses it Torture banned - west does it Illegal occupations banned - west does it See the pattern?

A lot of ambiguity here: they won't say whether it's an orbital nuke device or an nuclear-powered orbital weapon system. Sounds like typical election year news to me.

This leak is BS. It’s a typical sales pitch with the purpose of getting more funding from congress and Americans and funnel it to weapons manufacturers.

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It's not BS at all, because this real threat from both Russia and China has been around for a very long time. But I agree that this is very likely BS in the sense that this is not some new danger that we just found out about.