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(More customer reviews)For nearly fifty years the world has engaged in activity in outer space for military, scientific, and commercial purposes, but without placing weapons there or engaging in serious efforts to target objects in space. Working effectively during the cold war, since then the space arena has witnessed the entry of many more actors and a much broader array of vested interests than during the cold war, resulting in a variety of positions regarding future space activities. For example, humans have been in space more or less continuously since 1961 and since November 2000 have been permanently in place on the International Space Station, a peaceful, cooperative venture of sixteen nations that represents at more than $100 billion the largest non-military cooperative effort in world history. At the same time, almost 700 spacecraft are operating in continuous Earth orbit, each serving a range of scientific, military, civilian, and commercial uses. And the hegemonic status of the United States and the Soviet Union/Russia has been demolished in the last twenty years. Over 60 new launches take place every year, and at least 35 nations had payloads in orbit in 2005.
This activity has sparked a debate, especially since 2000, about how best to ensure American access and reliance on space assets for its many uses, including military ones. Debate over this issue has been marked by two extreme positions, neither of which are representative of the majority of those debating the subject. The first is the "sanctuary" concept, which insists that space should not be used for military purposes under any circumstances and a "Star Wars" approach that seeks to ensure American hegemonic status in space through weaponization and other potentially offensive actions. This "Star Wars" position is best stated by the Commission to Assess United States National Security Space Management and Organization, which concluded in 2001: "We know that every medium--air, land and sea--has seen conflict. Reality indicates that space will be no different. Given this virtual certainty, the United States must develop the means both to deter and to defend against hostile acts in and from space" (Donald H. Rumsfeld, et al., "Report of the Commission to Assess United States National Security Space Management and Organization" (Government Printing Office, 2001), p. x).
Michael O'Hanlon, a senior scholar at the prestigious Brookings Institution, wades into this exceptionally divisive debate in "Neither Star Wars nor Sanctuary" and strikes a careful balance between the legitimate necessity of protecting American resources in space and perhaps giving the impression of belligerence toward other nations. He notes that the United States' unilateral abrogation of the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in June 2002 opened the door to develop space-based ballistic missile defense, and that the Bush administration reportedly engaged in research and development on anti-satellite weapons.
Carefully reviewing the public record on this important issue and noting the perspectives of a range of others, O'Hanlon comes firmly down in favor of a middle ground for space weaponization debate. He find that the simplistic "either/or" discussion of popular media fails to unpack the nuances of the debate and tends to obscure the truly important differences. In so doing, one must always distinguish between the militarization of space--force enhancement through communications, navigational, early warning, intelligence, and other types of satellites--and the deployment of weapons in space. This dichotomy tends to polarize the discussion in ways that misdirect it from the central issue, as O'Hanlon views it, devising the best approach toward ensuring national and global security in space.
O'Hanlon believes that it makes sense to recognize that the place the United States is in the first part of the twenty-first century is the best place to be from the standpoint of national security space issues and therefore a continuation of this situation is the logical approach to dealing with the issue. The status quo for the U.S. is not a bad future, and therefore changing the national security space regime may be both unnecessary and potentially disastrous.
He notes that the U.S. has pursued what amounts to a three point program relative to space security issues, and this appears both prudent and in retrospect quite prescient. First, the U.S. has ensured that peer competitors did not step beyond the space technological capabilities that this nation possessed through a range of hard and soft power efforts, treaties and arms control measures, and other initiatives. Second, the U.S. has long made clear that it would take harsh action should a competitor alter the national security regime in space. A long history of declaratory statements condemning actions viewed as belligerent in space and warning of appropriate repercussions has helped to create the current favorable situation for the United States. A continuation of those methodologies is appropriate and completely expected by the other nations of the globe. Third, the U.S. has pursued on the whole a reasonable program of research and development to ensure that any rival capabilities can be destroyed if necessary.
O'Hanlon argues for a moderate approach to the space weaponization debate, one that emphasizes "Neither Star Wars nor Sanctuary" as its end result. What happens long term, however, is very much an open question? The prospects for preventing space weaponization are not good. Can the world continue the status quo, which isn't really all the bad for the U.S., for the foreseeable future?
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