2 ms·

Space is "international waters". Any country has the right to remove dangerous debris from the ocean or from space.

guntars 4y ago
They also have the right to create the space junk in the first place. What are they going to do, revoke your space launch permit?
_carbyau_ 4y ago
One mans space treasure is another mans space junk. Say China decides to flood a particular orbit path that a US company was planning on using and went through all the approvals for. Is the China stuff now "dangerous debris"?
- MichaelCollins 4y ago
  It works the same way in space as it does in the ocean. You can mess with other people's stuff under the pretext of doing something legitimate, and you might get away with it or you might provoke a conflict. It depends on who you are, who you're messing with, who your friends and their friends are, whether they stand to lose face or can pretend they didn't notice it, etc. The US once tried to steal the wreck of an entire Soviet nuclear-armed submarine off the bottom of the ocean (and mostly failed.) The Soviet response was a request to stop talking about it, because it wasn't worth a war and Soviet leadership didn't want to explain the incident to their own public.
  - _carbyau_ 4y ago
    Which is my point. This isn't just about "removing junk". This is about space capability vs others in space.
    - MichaelCollins 4y ago
      Depends. If they're building satellites that grapple dead satellites, that can certainly be used to attack active satellites too. But laser brooms wouldn't be effective against anything larger than a few centimeters. A space broom might be a cover for a more powerful directed energy weapon, but not necessarily so. Anyway, China is already toying around with the first sort, and they didn't ask anybody for permission. Their 'authority' to do it is being a sovereign nation. https://space.skyrocket.de/doc_sdat/sj-21.htm https://space.skyrocket.de/doc_sdat/sj-21.htm

They also have the right to create the space junk in the first place. What are they going to do, revoke your space launch permit?

_carbyau_ 4y ago

One mans space treasure is another mans space junk. Say China decides to flood a particular orbit path that a US company was planning on using and went through all the approvals for. Is the China stuff now "dangerous debris"?

MichaelCollins 4y ago
It works the same way in space as it does in the ocean. You can mess with other people's stuff under the pretext of doing something legitimate, and you might get away with it or you might provoke a conflict. It depends on who you are, who you're messing with, who your friends and their friends are, whether they stand to lose face or can pretend they didn't notice it, etc. The US once tried to steal the wreck of an entire Soviet nuclear-armed submarine off the bottom of the ocean (and mostly failed.) The Soviet response was a request to stop talking about it, because it wasn't worth a war and Soviet leadership didn't want to explain the incident to their own public.
- _carbyau_ 4y ago
  Which is my point. This isn't just about "removing junk". This is about space capability vs others in space.
  - MichaelCollins 4y ago
    Depends. If they're building satellites that grapple dead satellites, that can certainly be used to attack active satellites too. But laser brooms wouldn't be effective against anything larger than a few centimeters. A space broom might be a cover for a more powerful directed energy weapon, but not necessarily so. Anyway, China is already toying around with the first sort, and they didn't ask anybody for permission. Their 'authority' to do it is being a sovereign nation. https://space.skyrocket.de/doc_sdat/sj-21.htm https://space.skyrocket.de/doc_sdat/sj-21.htm