The Pentagon just put out a release saying “debris analysis” indicated the SM III hit on that wayard spy satellite had done its job…
“…officials are confident the missile intercept and destruction of a non-functioning National Reconnaissance Office satellite, achieved the objective of destroying the hydrazine tank and reducing, if not eliminating, the risk to people on Earth from the hazardous chemical.
“By all accounts this was a successful mission. From the debris analysis, we have a high degree of confidence the satellite’s fuel tank was destroyed and the hydrazine has been dissipated,” said Gen. James E. Cartwright, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
Now, that’s interesting…but…(queue up the conspiracy theory montage here…) I’m wondering A.) just how did they do a debris analysis when it either burned up in the atmosphere or is still floating in suborbital space, and B.) what exactly does “reducing, if not eliminating, the risk to people on Earth from the hazardous chemical” mean? It’s either gone, or it’s not gone…Which is it?
Anyway, I think this whole satellite shootdown was a high-profile test of the ABM architecture, and we’ll have to wait and see when the brass starts to testify on Capitol Hill over next year’s funding outlay for the Missile Defense Agency if they start using this “one off” event as a rallying cry for more ABM money.
– Christian
COBRA BALL, which has some sort of spectroscopic MASINT sensor on board, was in the area of the initial intercept. Likely it could also have been positioned to get a look at some of the debris later.
Zimmerman is right spectrography of the “poof!” and the presence of the “poof1″ itself go a long way to assuaging fears.
As to a more low tech approach, no big spherical tank = no hydrazine.
It’s not gone until the lawyers say it’s gone.
“we’ll have to wait and see when the brass starts to testify on Capitol Hill over next year’s funding outlay for the Missile Defense Agency if they start using this “one off” event as a rallying cry for more ABM money”
Well considering that the main argument against an ABM shield is that is could never be made to work, yeah… I’m pretty sure this will come up.
My perspective is that of a rather simple civilian, but it strikes me that us shooting down a satellite has come remarkably soon after the chinese did it. Was this really about protecting folks from gas or just an “anything you can do I can do better” kind of thing?
Maybe I am just being a bit cynical but that is what I thought when I first heard it was going to happen. Hardly cold war, but that kind of principle. Am I wrong?
This was a plain sight event to demonstrate a new power paradigm.
It was a pure power play to demonstrate an operational system for destroying satellites using a platform that roams the oceans, the US Navy destroyer and cruiser. China is on notice that the US can use dozens of ship based radar to guide dozens of missiles to Chinese space based assets, all in a afternoons work.
To me the only mystery is why so many want to create one.
Sorry, munged metaphor. I meant “lose a timeout.”
Re: Whocares
I think that to the CHICOMs this is far more relavent to the issue of Taiwanese independence. China has long threatened to stomp a mudhole in Taiwan if they declare their indepence from Beijing. A big part of making that threat credible is China’s ballistic missile inventory. SM3 adds another layer to an already formidable ADA capability among powers friendly to Taiwan. Adding the ability to whack longer range weapons (i.e., higher flying and faster on reentry) checks that threat. And, it might well check the unspoken threat of using nukes to bring the Taiwanese to heel.
Cheers,
Chief B.
(Note to self: Buy more Raytheon stock.)
Has anyone ever noticed how DARPA and DHARMA sound so much alike?
ak:
it shouldn’t be a surprise that they aim an intercept. Almost every shot the US takes these days is aimed. Over the years, Aviation Week has published photos of intercepts where there was specific aim points for either Thaad, Aegis or the big boys, the NMD missiles.
They could have used airborne samples and gas chromatography…you can find things in the parts per billion with (admittedly quite expensive) commercially available equipment. If there was hydrazine in the impact area for the various parts, you probably would have been able to detect minute quantities in the atmosphere underneath. This of course, assumes that you know what you are looking for and have a little bit of time to run the machinery. The state of the art is not quite up to what you see on CSI but if you use one of these machines to test for a certain substance you will find it if it is there.
Crumbling Chief eulogizes industriously: “Did the US send up a gigabuck recon bird, fake its death (or birth dependent on POV), then carefully begin deorbiting it for the sole purpose of using it as target drone? If you buy that then I recommend that you and Ron Paul come out of the paint locker for some fresh air.”
For those of you who aren’t entirely into Radio Berlin broadcasts: Countries are supposed to play nice in Space, and part of playing nice is to carry enough fuel especially in low-Earth orbit (“L.E.O.”) satellites to let them end their lives with controlled re-entries, normally in the middle of some ocean. Most L.E.O. satellites do carry that suicidal dose of fuel, and even high-”flying” (geosynchronous) communications satellites sometimes have it on board! As a consequence, lots of spy satellites are de-orbited every year, and people even decide in advance exactly where on the Earth’s surface they shall be de-orbited. “According to the Pentagon there were, last year alone, some 42 “major re-entries”, nine of those being satellites and perhaps a dozen others, equally controlled ones, were the upper stages of the rockets that had lofted them and other satellites into orbit).
Trouble (contradiction…) is: The “U.S.A. 193″ satellite’s shoot-down was “justified” to break up precisely that FULL hydrazine fuel tank that could perfectly have kept it aloft!
More perfectly obvious contradictions:
1) Since when is the Neocon gang concerned about the “environmental” impact of ANYTHING ?
2) How does highly flammable rocket fuel N-O-T ignite upon re-entry?
But the satellite “U.S.A. 193″ must have developed a will of its own.
And the only reason why that shoot-down had to take place during a lunar eclipse was to take advantage of the darkness, so that the untested, half-blind “S.M.-3 Standard Missile” could have a chance to sneak up on the satellite!
Anyway, if the Chinese successfully surprised everyone with their A.S.A.T. test while the U.S. Americans made all that media circus and drove 3 warships into the middle of the Pacific just to shoot down one satellite (I bet someone’s still celebrating), the Chinese could simply blow up all U.S. American satellites in the first five minutes of a war. That’s the way to do business!
It is obvious to the casual observer why China shot down a stationary weather bird. It is clearly obvious why this option was exercised regardless of the reasons listed. While most anti-ABM system types try to sell their bag of beans that the land based 9 or 20 missiles based at Vandenburg {spelling} and FT Greeley don’t work / waste of money, when you add them to a list of other successful layered options like MTHELE, THADD, SM3 and couple other systems not published I think statically you have an effective ABM / ASAT system. Not just neocons, but also anti-Nuke people have argued and successfully that the system in its current state render offensive Nukes ineffective against the US. While the ABM system of today is considered rather liberal/immature, it is very effective when coupled with a first strike targeting capability of mobile, silo and sub platforms.
The ability to distinguish decoys, adjust for non-ballistic flight patterns and redundant layering aside, as this technology matures there is no doubt that it will produce a very effective ABM system. Did I say layered? I cannot wait to talk about the goodies that have been developed because of this program. Come to think of it – it is not effective at against the whiz bang PR weaponry of the other roosters in this game.
WHAT A BUNCH OF RACHET JAW CHATTER…..
How about some simple faith that those in charge know whats going on. All this conspiracy flap sounds like third grade recess chatter.
Let us be real Americans for a change. People with all this doubt and critism wouls sing a differnt song if THEY had made said decision and idiots were doubting their every act.
WHAT A BUNCH OF RACHET JAW CHATTER…..
How about some simple faith that those in charge know whats going on. All this conspiracy flap sounds like third grade recess chatter.
Let us be real Americans for a change. People with all this doubt and critism wouls sing a differnt song if THEY had made said decision and idiots were doubting their every act.
RE: “reducing, if not eliminating, the risk to people on Earth from the hazardous chemical” mean? It’s either gone, or it’s not gone…Which is it?”
It’s “The dose makes the toxin” rule. The chemicals have either dissipated to the point where there are only harmless concentrations, converted into other compound(s) through reaction with the upper atmosphere and/or radiation (including sunlight), burned up/converted in the kill event, or some combination of the above.
I took extra physics classes to avoid as much chemistry as possible, but through flight test operations, particularly in the disposal of weapons dross, you get to be awfully familiar with Material Safety Data Sheets. It is amazing how the handling precautions change based upon state of the materials. We had one project that had a very fragile low-level radioactive material on board, so prior to launch it had to be handled with kid gloves lest it break all over someone. We were concerned as to how hard the cleanup was going to be post-mission, but when we got into the fine print of the MSDS it said we could dispose of the dust (in the quantities that we were expecting) by flushing it down a kitchen sink.
And what if the numbers were run, and it was decided that the risk was unquantifiable (ie could be very small OR very large, or there were too many variables to even estimate)?
Enjoy all the wild theories you want, if that’s what keeps you warm and happy inside.
OK, then they could simply say: dudes, the risk is unquantifiable and we decided to shoot it down anyway, and because of these other reasons: X, Y, & Z.
What I don’t agree with is giving a lame excuse without any numbers and expecting the public to buy it.
You know, it wouldn’t matter what the hell they did or said, or didn’t do or didn’t say: They’re gonna catch hell for it.
Dithering over details, trying to cover one’s ass, and soliciting everyone’s opinion ad infinitum is the never-fail route to failure. Most notably so in the real world outside of politics and the academe.
Sometimes leadership means making a decision and stepping out. Fortune favors the brave, boys.
Cheers,
Chief B.
A follow-up:
As pup some years ago, I had the great good fortune of serving with Earl. Earl was 6′6″, black as night, never without a cup of coffee and a Kool dangling from his lip. He was as ready to fight as he was to laugh. And, he never shied from doing the right thing. A more noble and natural leader I’ve yet to know.
Once, during an interminable cruise, I screwed up something pretty important and the XO was sure to come into the shop at any moment, red hot and ready to kill, maim, and cause three generations of genetic mutations. But, I’d learned to trust Earl and to say “Senior Chief, I’ve screwed the pooch.”
Earl was not happy, but he didn’t take my head off either. He knew how the XO was going to take it and did what a leader ought: “Don’t worry, shipmate. We’ll figure out what went wrong and fix it. Right now, let me handle the XO.”
I knew that he was going to catch a ration of shit he didn’t deserve and I told him so. “Hey, man, let me worry about that shit. I’ve had my ass chewed so many times that there ain’t nothin’ but scar tissue back there… and scare tissue ain’t go no nerve endings.”
He went up to the XO’s stateroom, came back an hour later, whistling some damned tune. He sat down at his desk, lit a Kool, and went back to work. We all looked at each other, then at Senior, and asked him what’d happened. “It was rough, man! I thought I was gonna have to choke him out. He was talkin’ courts-martials and captain’s masts, brig time, keel-haulin’, and packin’ your ass off to Adak, Argentia, or BFE. I ain’t seen nuthin’ like that since Bin Thuy in ‘69.”
My bowels went a bit liquid at that. Two years in the Navy and I was about to be shark chum.
Earl shuffled papers, drank some coffee, and didn’t say another word. “Senior? What’s going to happen now?” He put down his coffee and turned to me with a face of stone. “Look. I’m a Senior Chief Petty Officer and I told you I’d take care of the XO. I did and its done. Don’t ever question my integrity or my word. Please.”
Never heard another word about it from him, the XO, or anyone. And I never had another moment of doubt or pause about anything Earl ever said or ordered me to do. (Except when we were all drunk and he was telling us outrageous lies about Bin Thuy, Olongapo whorehouses, and dungaree liberty in Subic.)
That, my boys, is leadership. It was always a rare trait in most men, but it has become nearly extinct in this age of CYA, Me, I, and Why. I pray every day that the young men and women coming out of combat tours in the Sand Box and the ‘Stan will have re-learned the things our fathers and grandfathers learned through blood and pain.
Hopefully, the next generation of senior leadership will have the mettle to think clearly, make sound decisions, and act without hesitation. No more press conferences to try to spin something one way or another, win political favor, and find the path to the Golden Parachute.
IOW: Shoot the damned thing down and then tell the jackals in the media about it later.
Cheers,
Chief B.
Okay, SOAPBOX_MODE=OFF