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Indeed. And if Starlink is used in guidance for offensive drone operations, Russia is going to view those satellites as legitimate military targets. I’m not con

Indeed. And if Starlink is used in guidance for offensive drone operations, Russia is going to view those satellites as legitimate military targets. I’m not convinced the people criticizing SpaceX’s decision to not do that (for free) have thought this all the way through.

kirushik 4y ago
Does this imply that GPS satellites are a legitimate military target for Russia right now? (I'm pretty sure GPS is used for guidance of drones and missiles pretty heavily there.) Or for a satellite top be a legit target the communication needs to be two-way? In such case I suspect Türksat satellite should be considered within scope, since Bayraktar TB2S (which reportedly has been used by Ukraine in this war) uses it for SATCOM. What about other military uses of Starlink, outside of guidance systems? Those are plentiful, and it's hard to see why there would be a drastic difference between guiding a drone and providing communication backbone for military operation coordination in the eyes of the Russians. After all, they are bombing civilian infrastructure just fine, and didn't even care to formally declare this "special military operation" a war... My point being, I don't think "legitimate target" has to do anything with Russia not shooting down any satellites; it's either lack of capacity or fear of retaliation, both being rather orthogonal to the targets "legitimacy" IMO.
- dotnet00 4y ago
  Yeah I agree that SpaceX's concern is unlikely over potential attacks on their satellites. Not only is SpaceX able to put them up faster than Russia could shoot them down, attacking a Starlink satellite would be an act of war against the US regardless. I think SpaceX's concern is more related to domestic liability. The US's policy has been that they will not provide offensive aid for attacking into Russia. They've been very careful about the range of the systems they send for that reason. Unrestricted Starlink is not subject to those range limits. So, if the attacks which went deep into Russian territory involved Starlink mounted to drones, it would essentially be in violation of the US's own stated policy about military aid to Ukraine. Thus far this hasn't caused any trouble, but if something were to happen (eg an escalation), SpaceX might get thrown under the bus by the US government since they aren't contracted by the DoD to provide such service.
  - wazer5 4y ago
    Low earth orbit is easy to hit with anti-satellite missiles, can even use ASM-135 which is a interceptor fired from a fighter jet. GPS altitudes and up are a different story.
    - ceejayoz 4y ago
      There's over 3,500 Starlink satellites. That likely dramatically exceeds the number of anti-satellite missiles in the entire world, let alone Russia's.
      - TheLoafOfBread 4y ago
        One hit will create thousands of fragments. How many consecutive hits would be necessary to create severe enough Kessler event to destroy most of the Stralink satellites? Dozens?
        XorNot 4y ago
        As everyone knows, the best possible way to deal with an aggressor is just straight appeasement. The risks are so large that appeasement is the only answer. If only we had historically tried appeasing belligerent foreign powers, think what wars would have been avoided... /sarcasm
        wazer5 4y ago
        Replace "an agressor" with "the USA" and that pretty much sums up history.
        XorNot 4y ago
        LOL.[1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II
        4y ago
- ThrowawayTestr 4y ago
  According to the anti satellite wiki page, hitting a gps satellite would be difficult and pointless unless you're taking out everything in geo orbit.
  - jdougan 4y ago
    GPS says aren't in geosync, they use 12 hour orbits.
    - shagie 4y ago
      Starlink is at 550 km. A geosynchronous orbit is 37,000 km. GPS saltines are at 20,000 km. While not geosynchronous, they're certainly not in the LEO easy to hit target. This is mentioned in the Wikipedia page - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-satellite_weapon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-satellite_weapon > US intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) satellites orbit at about 800 km (500 mi) high and move at 7.5 km/s (4.7 mi/s), so a Chinese Intermediate-range ballistic missile would need to compensate for 1350 km (840 mi) of movement in the three minutes it takes to boost to that altitude. Even if an ISR satellite is knocked out, the US possesses an extensive array of manned and unmanned ISR aircraft that could perform missions at standoff ranges from Chinese land-based air defences, making them somewhat higher priority targets that would consume fewer resources to better engage. > The Global Positioning System and communications satellites orbit at higher altitudes of 20000 km (12000 mi) and 36000 km (22000 mi) respectively, putting them out of range of solid-fuelled Intercontinental ballistic missiles. Liquid-fuelled space launch vehicles could reach those altitudes, but they are more time-consuming to launch and could be attacked on the ground before being able to launch in rapid succession. The constellation of 30 GPS satellites provides redundancy where at least four satellites can be received in six orbital planes at any one time, so an attacker would need to disable at least six satellites to disrupt the network.
- macspoofing 4y ago
  >Does this imply that GPS satellites are a legitimate military target for Russia right now? Of course it does. In the real world, anything is permissible (because there is no global federal government) as long as you have the strength to enforce. In the case of GPS satellite constellation, that is infrastructure owned and operated by the US military, so any attack on those satellites brings Russia directly into conflict with the US and NATO. >My point being, I don't think "legitimate target" has to do anything with Russia not shooting down any satellites; it's either lack of capacity or fear of retaliation, both being rather orthogonal to the targets "legitimacy" IMO. Right ... To rephrase: is the US military willing to indemnify Starlink to the same degree if it is attacked by Russia?
  - andy_ppp 4y ago
    You can bet they would retaliate, simply because the game theory aspect of all this implies there needs to be a severe cost associated with damaging US infrastructure. Maybe a huge explosion at some vital oil infrastructure or actually destroying the bridge to Crimea.
    - macspoofing 4y ago
      >You can bet they would retaliate, simply because the game theory aspect of all this implies there needs to be a severe cost associated with damaging US infrastructure. It doesn't necessarily imply that that IFF Starlink is providing military assistance to Ukraine, and in response, Russia targets Starlink satellites, that the US will necessarily escalate further. And there is precedence for this. For example, after US assassinated Soleimani, and Iran retaliated against an American base in Iraq (leading to ~100 casualties - though no deaths, and extensive damage to the base itself), America did not further escalate.
- ptsneves 4y ago
  Agree with you. I am damn sure that GPS satellites are a military target! They are even owned by a military organisation. It just so happens that organisation is the most powerful military power in the world. Given that, the next best thing is to jam GPS signals on the ground and I would be very surprised the Russians are not doing it at some scales. I highly doubt Americans gave the Ukrainians the keys for the special modulation that bypasses usual jamming abilities.
  - shagie 4y ago
    > I would be very surprised the Russians are not doing it at some scales. They certainly are - https://www.gpsworld.com/ukraine-attacks-changed-russian-gps-jamming/ https://www.gpsworld.com/ukraine-attacks-changed-russian-gps... The live map of where GPS is getting some interference - https://gpsjam.org https://gpsjam.org
- Dalewyn 4y ago
  >Does this imply that GPS satellites are a legitimate military target for Russia right now? GPS is a US military asset and consequently a military target for hostile actors. The only thing keeping Russia from just blowing them out of the sky is because to do so would be an unconditional declaration and act of war against the USA.
  - TheLoafOfBread 4y ago
    And because they are using it in their planes and within their units. Sure you can argue with Glonass, but if it is working so well, why SU-34s are using Garmin with GPS instead?
    - dzhiurgis 4y ago
      Irrelevant - Garmin can receive GPS, Glonass, Galileo and BeiDou.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
NickNameNick 4y ago
I'm pretty sure spacex can launch starlink satalites much faster and cheaper than Russia can shoot them down. I'm sure spacex won't want to go down that route, but it's not a good tactic for Russia.
- itsyaboi 4y ago
  Why would you need to shoot down all or even most of the satellites? Pop a couple, let the resulting debris fields do the rest.
  - NickNameNick 4y ago
    Kessler syndrome isn't magic. Space is big. Starlink satalites are small. And they're low enough thst atmospheric drag will deorbit must of the small debris very quickly.
    - itsyaboi 4y ago
      I disagree. Considering that StarLink satellites have a orbital period of ~95 minutes, I doubt that debris fields de-orbiting "very quickly" as you so precisely put it will be quick enough. And even so, just shotgun your payload of tungsten flechettes into a orbit a bit higher than the satellites and let gravity do the rest. I'm sure people smarter than me have considered these scenarios and done the economic math.
andy_ppp 4y ago
I really wonder about space junk if we start down this road, would the debris stay in orbit spinning round the earth or would it be pulled into the atmosphere?
- wongarsu 4y ago
  It would come down, most of it very quickly, the rest eventually. The satellites are low enough to deorbit from drag alone within five years or so if their thrusters fail. Blowing them up increases surface area, which increases drag, bringing most of it down much faster. The way orbit mechanics works, if you impart energy on an object at just one point in its orbit, the orbit will change overall but still go through that point. Some debris will be put in an elliptical orbit where it will start crossing higher altitudes, but will also still cross the original altitude, causing it to be affected by drag and eventually deorbit. The worry is what it would damage until it comes down. At some debris density you start setting off a chain reaction (and arguably we are already there, it's just very slow right now)
  - ChatGTP 4y ago
    Could the blast itself be quite strong and blow debris further outwards into space ?
    - modeless 4y ago
      As the parent comment explained, unless the debris reaches escape velocity (in which case it is no longer a problem) it will periodically return to the altitude of the explosion or (more likely) lower, just due to how orbital mechanics works.
      - ChatGTP 4y ago
        Sorry, missed that, thanks.
appplemac 4y ago
Just to clarify that the Starlink service isn’t being provided for free — many of volunteers (and not just them) are paying for subscriptions with their credit cards. [1] I’m sure there are additional costs for Starlink operations in Ukraine vs other countries, such as extra measures against jamming etc so the operation is less profitable in Ukraine than elsewhere. And from what I understand there are some terminals that work without a subscription (although I haven’t seen any info about them specifically). But it’s not free for many users in Ukraine. [1]: https://wccftech.com/ukrainians-are-paying-for-starlink-themselves-say-charity-workers-in-rebuff-to-musk/ https://wccftech.com/ukrainians-are-paying-for-starlink-them...

kirushik 4y ago

Does this imply that GPS satellites are a legitimate military target for Russia right now? (I'm pretty sure GPS is used for guidance of drones and missiles pretty heavily there.) Or for a satellite top be a legit target the communication needs to be two-way? In such case I suspect Türksat satellite should be considered within scope, since Bayraktar TB2S (which reportedly has been used by Ukraine in this war) uses it for SATCOM. What about other military uses of Starlink, outside of guidance systems? Those are plentiful, and it's hard to see why there would be a drastic difference between guiding a drone and providing communication backbone for military operation coordination in the eyes of the Russians. After all, they are bombing civilian infrastructure just fine, and didn't even care to formally declare this "special military operation" a war... My point being, I don't think "legitimate target" has to do anything with Russia not shooting down any satellites; it's either lack of capacity or fear of retaliation, both being rather orthogonal to the targets "legitimacy" IMO.

dotnet00 4y ago
Yeah I agree that SpaceX's concern is unlikely over potential attacks on their satellites. Not only is SpaceX able to put them up faster than Russia could shoot them down, attacking a Starlink satellite would be an act of war against the US regardless. I think SpaceX's concern is more related to domestic liability. The US's policy has been that they will not provide offensive aid for attacking into Russia. They've been very careful about the range of the systems they send for that reason. Unrestricted Starlink is not subject to those range limits. So, if the attacks which went deep into Russian territory involved Starlink mounted to drones, it would essentially be in violation of the US's own stated policy about military aid to Ukraine. Thus far this hasn't caused any trouble, but if something were to happen (eg an escalation), SpaceX might get thrown under the bus by the US government since they aren't contracted by the DoD to provide such service.
- wazer5 4y ago
  Low earth orbit is easy to hit with anti-satellite missiles, can even use ASM-135 which is a interceptor fired from a fighter jet. GPS altitudes and up are a different story.
  - ceejayoz 4y ago
    There's over 3,500 Starlink satellites. That likely dramatically exceeds the number of anti-satellite missiles in the entire world, let alone Russia's.
    - TheLoafOfBread 4y ago
      One hit will create thousands of fragments. How many consecutive hits would be necessary to create severe enough Kessler event to destroy most of the Stralink satellites? Dozens?
      - XorNot 4y ago
        As everyone knows, the best possible way to deal with an aggressor is just straight appeasement. The risks are so large that appeasement is the only answer. If only we had historically tried appeasing belligerent foreign powers, think what wars would have been avoided... /sarcasm
        wazer5 4y ago
        Replace "an agressor" with "the USA" and that pretty much sums up history.
        XorNot 4y ago
        LOL.[1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II
        4y ago
ThrowawayTestr 4y ago
According to the anti satellite wiki page, hitting a gps satellite would be difficult and pointless unless you're taking out everything in geo orbit.
- jdougan 4y ago
  GPS says aren't in geosync, they use 12 hour orbits.
  - shagie 4y ago
    Starlink is at 550 km. A geosynchronous orbit is 37,000 km. GPS saltines are at 20,000 km. While not geosynchronous, they're certainly not in the LEO easy to hit target. This is mentioned in the Wikipedia page - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-satellite_weapon https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-satellite_weapon > US intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) satellites orbit at about 800 km (500 mi) high and move at 7.5 km/s (4.7 mi/s), so a Chinese Intermediate-range ballistic missile would need to compensate for 1350 km (840 mi) of movement in the three minutes it takes to boost to that altitude. Even if an ISR satellite is knocked out, the US possesses an extensive array of manned and unmanned ISR aircraft that could perform missions at standoff ranges from Chinese land-based air defences, making them somewhat higher priority targets that would consume fewer resources to better engage. > The Global Positioning System and communications satellites orbit at higher altitudes of 20000 km (12000 mi) and 36000 km (22000 mi) respectively, putting them out of range of solid-fuelled Intercontinental ballistic missiles. Liquid-fuelled space launch vehicles could reach those altitudes, but they are more time-consuming to launch and could be attacked on the ground before being able to launch in rapid succession. The constellation of 30 GPS satellites provides redundancy where at least four satellites can be received in six orbital planes at any one time, so an attacker would need to disable at least six satellites to disrupt the network.
macspoofing 4y ago
>Does this imply that GPS satellites are a legitimate military target for Russia right now? Of course it does. In the real world, anything is permissible (because there is no global federal government) as long as you have the strength to enforce. In the case of GPS satellite constellation, that is infrastructure owned and operated by the US military, so any attack on those satellites brings Russia directly into conflict with the US and NATO. >My point being, I don't think "legitimate target" has to do anything with Russia not shooting down any satellites; it's either lack of capacity or fear of retaliation, both being rather orthogonal to the targets "legitimacy" IMO. Right ... To rephrase: is the US military willing to indemnify Starlink to the same degree if it is attacked by Russia?
- andy_ppp 4y ago
  You can bet they would retaliate, simply because the game theory aspect of all this implies there needs to be a severe cost associated with damaging US infrastructure. Maybe a huge explosion at some vital oil infrastructure or actually destroying the bridge to Crimea.
  - macspoofing 4y ago
    >You can bet they would retaliate, simply because the game theory aspect of all this implies there needs to be a severe cost associated with damaging US infrastructure. It doesn't necessarily imply that that IFF Starlink is providing military assistance to Ukraine, and in response, Russia targets Starlink satellites, that the US will necessarily escalate further. And there is precedence for this. For example, after US assassinated Soleimani, and Iran retaliated against an American base in Iraq (leading to ~100 casualties - though no deaths, and extensive damage to the base itself), America did not further escalate.
ptsneves 4y ago
Agree with you. I am damn sure that GPS satellites are a military target! They are even owned by a military organisation. It just so happens that organisation is the most powerful military power in the world. Given that, the next best thing is to jam GPS signals on the ground and I would be very surprised the Russians are not doing it at some scales. I highly doubt Americans gave the Ukrainians the keys for the special modulation that bypasses usual jamming abilities.
- shagie 4y ago
  > I would be very surprised the Russians are not doing it at some scales. They certainly are - https://www.gpsworld.com/ukraine-attacks-changed-russian-gps-jamming/ https://www.gpsworld.com/ukraine-attacks-changed-russian-gps... The live map of where GPS is getting some interference - https://gpsjam.org https://gpsjam.org
Dalewyn 4y ago
>Does this imply that GPS satellites are a legitimate military target for Russia right now? GPS is a US military asset and consequently a military target for hostile actors. The only thing keeping Russia from just blowing them out of the sky is because to do so would be an unconditional declaration and act of war against the USA.
- TheLoafOfBread 4y ago
  And because they are using it in their planes and within their units. Sure you can argue with Glonass, but if it is working so well, why SU-34s are using Garmin with GPS instead?
  - dzhiurgis 4y ago
    Irrelevant - Garmin can receive GPS, Glonass, Galileo and BeiDou.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]

NickNameNick 4y ago

I'm pretty sure spacex can launch starlink satalites much faster and cheaper than Russia can shoot them down. I'm sure spacex won't want to go down that route, but it's not a good tactic for Russia.

itsyaboi 4y ago
Why would you need to shoot down all or even most of the satellites? Pop a couple, let the resulting debris fields do the rest.
- NickNameNick 4y ago
  Kessler syndrome isn't magic. Space is big. Starlink satalites are small. And they're low enough thst atmospheric drag will deorbit must of the small debris very quickly.
  - itsyaboi 4y ago
    I disagree. Considering that StarLink satellites have a orbital period of ~95 minutes, I doubt that debris fields de-orbiting "very quickly" as you so precisely put it will be quick enough. And even so, just shotgun your payload of tungsten flechettes into a orbit a bit higher than the satellites and let gravity do the rest. I'm sure people smarter than me have considered these scenarios and done the economic math.

andy_ppp 4y ago

I really wonder about space junk if we start down this road, would the debris stay in orbit spinning round the earth or would it be pulled into the atmosphere?

wongarsu 4y ago
It would come down, most of it very quickly, the rest eventually. The satellites are low enough to deorbit from drag alone within five years or so if their thrusters fail. Blowing them up increases surface area, which increases drag, bringing most of it down much faster. The way orbit mechanics works, if you impart energy on an object at just one point in its orbit, the orbit will change overall but still go through that point. Some debris will be put in an elliptical orbit where it will start crossing higher altitudes, but will also still cross the original altitude, causing it to be affected by drag and eventually deorbit. The worry is what it would damage until it comes down. At some debris density you start setting off a chain reaction (and arguably we are already there, it's just very slow right now)
- ChatGTP 4y ago
  Could the blast itself be quite strong and blow debris further outwards into space ?
  - modeless 4y ago
    As the parent comment explained, unless the debris reaches escape velocity (in which case it is no longer a problem) it will periodically return to the altitude of the explosion or (more likely) lower, just due to how orbital mechanics works.
    - ChatGTP 4y ago
      Sorry, missed that, thanks.

appplemac 4y ago

Just to clarify that the Starlink service isn’t being provided for free — many of volunteers (and not just them) are paying for subscriptions with their credit cards. [1] I’m sure there are additional costs for Starlink operations in Ukraine vs other countries, such as extra measures against jamming etc so the operation is less profitable in Ukraine than elsewhere. And from what I understand there are some terminals that work without a subscription (although I haven’t seen any info about them specifically). But it’s not free for many users in Ukraine. [1]: https://wccftech.com/ukrainians-are-paying-for-starlink-themselves-say-charity-workers-in-rebuff-to-musk/ https://wccftech.com/ukrainians-are-paying-for-starlink-them...