…until Space Access ’07. It should be an interesting meeting, with lots going on in both the orbital and suborbital world.

If you think you might want to attend, it would behoove you to make a hotel reservation today. You can always cancel.

On this week of anniversaries of space disasters, space historian Dwayne Day writes that we should display, rather than hide, the results of past tragedies, and allow not only NASA to learn from them, but the public as well. I agree.

I’m going to DC for the weekend to celebrate my birthday with Patricia, sans computer. But because it’s my birthday, there are a couple of sad events to commemorate. Tomorrow will be the fortieth anniversary of the Apollo 1 fire, which occurred the day before my birthday in 1967. And Sunday, people who were born the day the Challenger was lost will be old enough to drink adult beverages legally. It makes me feel old.

Iran has been getting pointers on rocket design, from that noted space power, North Korea.

Good luck with that. Not.

It looks like a lot of people are starting to agree with me that we need more responsive military space systems:

Peter Hays, a Science Applications International Corp. employee and senior policy analyst supporting the plans and programs division at the Defense Department’s National Space Security Office, said that small, distributive space-based systems could particularly benefit compared with larger satellites – speeding up a shift that already started. The new attention could even re-energize the U.S. aerospace industry, he said.

“It could be a fire under people that was lacking,” Hays said. “I wouldn’t be surprised if other things get energized.”

Of course, as I predicted (hardly a feat worthy of Kreskin) we have the usual foolishness from the usual suspects:

“American satellites are the soft underbelly of our national security, and it is urgent that President Bush move to guarantee their protection by initiating an international agreement to ban the development, testing, and deployment of space weapons and anti-satellite systems,” said Rep. Edward Markey (D-Mass.), House telecommunications and Internet subcommittee chairman.

Yes, as I noted in my article, this is exactly what they’d like. If Congressman Markey (and others like him) actually were on the side of the Chinese, how would they behave differently?

[Update late afternoon]

Useful comments in the comments section. It seems to me is that what we want is not a treaty to ban ASATs, which is certainly impractical (and would be to our great disadvantage). A much better model is a convention, similar to Geneva, in which we stipulate the manner in which anti-satellite warfare is to be conducted, in order to eliminate, or at least minimize, collateral damage. I haven’t thought about it much further than that, but it’s what Theresa Hitchens et al have in mind, we’re probably on the same page. But I suspect that’s a different page than Rep. Markey.

Here’s a piece by a Greg Autrey in the Baltimore Sun on space policy. It’s kind of a mess:

Why should we care about missiles threatening low Earth orbit? When the Chinese get on with reabsorbing Taiwan – the most likely trigger for a U.S.-China confrontation – U.S. drivers may find that the navigation systems in their SUVs (not to mention their ambulances) aren’t working. Low-flying U.S. military spy satellites are the first target of the new weapon, but the slightly higher GPS (global positioning system) satellites that guide our weapons systems are also attractive to Chinese war planners.

Or, what about when the censorship-savvy Chinese government decides it has had enough of Howard Stern corrupting the youth and takes out Sirius satellite radio?

GPS isn’t “slightly higher.” It’s thousands of miles higher. GEO, where satellite radio satellites reside is thousand of miles higher than that.

But the real problem is that the whole thing is incoherent. What does the “sands of the moon” have to do with ASATs? Just what is it that he’s recommending, policy-wise? More money for NASA? More encouragement of private enterprise? How?

You’d think that with all the knowledge out here on the web, newspapers could find better commentators on space than “a lecturer on business strategy and entrepreneurship.”

As I noted in my TCSDaily piece, I’m not a space lawyer, but Jesse Londin is, and she has some thoughts on the legalities of the Chinese ASAT test.

You know, if your world view was really “shaken up by China’s ASAT demonstration, you couldn’t have been paying attention. China is a very real threat in military space (though not manned space), and has been for some time.

You know, if your world view was really “shaken up by China’s ASAT demonstration, you couldn’t have been paying attention. China is a very real threat in military space (though not manned space), and has been for some time.

You know, if your world view was really “shaken up by China’s ASAT demonstration, you couldn’t have been paying attention. China is a very real threat in military space (though not manned space), and has been for some time.