What is Russia’s mysterious new space weapon?
WASHINGTON WAS abuzz on February 14th with news of a mysterious Russian space weapon. There are essentially three options: a “pop-up" nuclear weapon designed to destroy satellites, which would be stationed on the ground and launched only when it was about to be used; a nuclear weapon that would be stationed in orbit; or a nuclear-powered satellite which would not be a bomb itself, but instead used nuclear energy to power some other sort of device. If Russia plans to deploy a nuclear weapon in full orbit—rather than a “fractional" one in which it does not completely circle the Earth—it would be breaking the Outer Space Treaty of 1967. A report on global anti-satellite capabilities published last year by the Secure World Foundation, an NGO, noted: “New evidence suggests Russia may be developing high-powered space-based EW platforms to augment its existing ground-based platforms." The Space Review describes Russian documents explaining that nuclear reactors on satellites allowed the installation of “jammers operating in a wide range of frequencies".
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