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"US soon being able to just stack depleted uranium telephone poles in orbit to protect it's dependencies" Rods from God is actually real? Thought it was a fail
by inter_netuser 6y ago
"US soon being able to just stack depleted uranium telephone poles in orbit to protect it's dependencies"
Rods from God is actually real? Thought it was a failed research project?
- medium_burrito 6y agoIt's a question of economics. A 20,000 kg rod costs $200m to launch into LEO at $10k/kg. At $200/kg it's only $4m. Uranium price per kilo seems reasonable at $60/kg, so we're getting to a point where the raw material cost is not that different from the getting the damn thing to LEO. If you can get each complete rod down to say $200m, ie the cost of a cruise missle for the DOD, that's a pretty impressive capability.
- inter_netuser 6y agocruise missiles are like 2 million: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomahawk_(missile) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tomahawk_(missile) Im not sure what cruise missiles are you talking about?
- Ancapistani 6y agoRFGs are just a subclass of "kinetic impact weapons", which are _definitely_ feasible. RFGs are rod-shaped to minimize air resistance during re-entry. Tungsten is the material they're most associated with, but DU would likely work just fine as well. A (relatively) small, tungsten rod can be launched by braking from a parking orbit which would mean extremely little in the way of detectable activity. Even if it were detected... it's already at apogee, already at orbital speed, and already on a virtually unstoppable course to impact. To take this a step further - realistically, Elon Musk is on the cusp of being the most powerful man the world has ever seen. Once SpaceX has a semi-permanent presence in orbit and beyond, he would have the practical ability to launch attacks anywhere on Earth with a destructive potential on par with nuclear weapons.