Space Academy · Contents · Chapter 6 · Nederlandse versie
Chapter 6: Counterspace and space warfare
All the ways of disrupting or destroying an opponent's space systems: kinetic (from the ground and from orbit), directed energy and nuclear weapons, electronic and cyber — with the known ASAT tests, the 'inspector' satellites and the problem of space debris.
6.1The counterspace spectrum
From a jammer you can switch off again to a missile that blows a satellite into thousands of pieces.
Read §6.1 →6.2Kinetic from the ground: the ASAT tests
Four countries have destroyed one of their own satellites with a missile from Earth.
Read §6.2 →6.3Co-orbital: inspectors and approaches
Satellites that manoeuvre towards another satellite — to look, to jam, or worse.
Read §6.3 →6.4Directed energy and nuclear weapons
Dazzling with a laser, overloading electronics — and the spectre of a nuclear explosion in space.
Read §6.4 →6.5Electronic and cyber
The most widely used counterspace: cheap, reversible and hard to pin on anyone.
Read §6.5 →6.6Space debris: everyone's problem
What you break in orbit stays there — and hits your own satellites too.
Read §6.6 →