US already has weapons in orbit, Air Force secretary says (www.aerotime.aero)

submitted 4 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago) by supersquirrel@lemmy.ca to c/world@quokk.au

48 comments fedilink hide all child comments

The X-37b is everything you could want in an orbital surveillance, espionage and sabotage platform and it has existed for years...?

A good recent article on the x-37b

https://migflug.com/afterburner/fr/x-37b-space-force-mystery-spaceplane/

Officially, it tests reusable spacecraft technologies and carries experiments for the government. Unofficially, its knack for changing its orbit and vanishing from where trackers expect it has made it a favourite Cold-War-style headache for America’s rivals — a point a former Air Force secretary once made with unusual candour.

“It can do an orbit that looks like an egg, and when it’s close to the Earth it’s close enough to the atmosphere to turn where it is. Our adversaries don’t know where it’s going to come up next, and that drives them nuts. And I’m really glad about that.”

Heather Wilson — former U.S. Secretary of the Air Force (Aspen Security Forum, 2019)

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[-] supersquirrel@lemmy.ca 14 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

Yes but don't miss the fact that the X37b gives you all the ability to mess with all the orbital communications equipment you could possibly want, wasting a ton of energy lifting weapons into space to shoot at other satellites or shoot down at earth is an absurd proposition given the stupendous energy cost but an unmanned space shuttle with an arm that can fiddle with things that can stay in space and change its orbit with aerobraking constantly for years on end......? That is exactly what you would want for this kind of thing.

this post was submitted on 15 Sep 2026

86 points (98.9% liked)

World News

2458 readers

987 users here now

Rules:
Be a decent person.
No racism, sexism, ableism, homophobia, transphobia, zionism/nazism, and so on.

Other Great Communities:

Rules

Be excellent to each other

founded 2 years ago

MODERATORS

Deceptichum@quokk.au

Grainne@lemmy.dbzer0.com