Originally Posted By: Art_in_FL
LOL.

Fairly recently the Chinese shot one of their satellites. And a mighty gasp was heard within the US about how the Chinese were going to stage a 'Pearl Harbor on the Hight Frontier'. What got missed was the many developments and tests the US had been doing along the same lines.

The unwritten logic was: US developments are 'good' and in the service of peace' but the Chinese efforts are a 'threat to world peace and US security'. Silly.

Now this administration has, at considerable cost (one estimate was $1 Billion), deigned to shoot at one of our satellites. The experts on such things pointed out that the whole 'hydrazine risk' story was canard. The odds of a hydrazine tank surviving reentry are slim to none. Assuming it made it down at least partly intact the risk was minimal, contamination of an estimated two football fields.

Which means that for purely symbolic reasons, demonstrating we can, we have spent most of a Billion dollars for no practical effect.

Maybe it is just me but this smacks of the psychology of insecure adolescent boys. A need to 'prove themselves' and an immature inability to restrain themselves that drives them to do outlandish inappropriate acts simply because 'they can'. Regardless of the consequences.

Again, maybe it is just me but I keep getting the feeling this administration needs adult supervision.


I've doubted the story from day one from what I've heard. The "spy satellite" was apparently one of the newer breed that was sent up and then stopped working shortly after achieving orbit. I know - call me paranoid but I think the chances of hydrazine container not burning up is just an excuse. Some have suggested that it was really the secret capabilities of the satellite that the government wanted to protect.

However, I will go one better and say that this whole farce was probably planned from the start. What proof we have that it really was a top-secret satellite instead of a lump of junk? I think this was purposely put up in space to act as a target under the guise of "we have to protect earth from the hydrazine container". This gave the government and the military the perfect target to practise their space age technology in shooting down the satellite. 'Know what - for once I think the Chinese have hit it on the head in their claim about the American governmemt.