This December 6 article from the website “Russian Beyond the Headlines” is a little confusing. And I’m not sure if it’s confusing because the translators got it wrong or because there’s not much knowledge with how space assets work–or maybe even the Russians aren’t sure what they want.
The article finally gets to its point about “passive” satellites being involved with precision guided weapons for the Russians. Well, I have news for them–that happened a while ago. Desert Storm and such, right? GPS (Global Positioning Satellites for you SatNav boffins) was used extensively then, right?
But the post does seem to also point out the facts that Russia wants to beef up its ground infrastructure (so likely the satellite ground system–you can go here to read what that does–scroll down to part 6 and 7), and the precision guided weapons, too (such as perhaps installing GPS/GLONASS modules on their Intercontinental Ballistic Missiles). So that might be something to worry about if they can do it.
Between China’s moon activities, and Russia’s boasting then, there seems to be a threat of space militarization growing. In the meantime, the United States is fiddling with cutting down its space corps. (here and here), and adding things, such as Cyber to it. Why cyber? Well, someone had to come up with an idea to get promoted, I suppose. Not only cyber, though–it also takes forever for the US to even build and launch new satellites…
Maybe our military and political management is being clever and attempting subterfuge and misdirection? That might be just giving them too much credit.
- Russian Version of GPS Stirs Spy Fears (education.nationalgeographic.com)
- A Russian GPS Using U.S. Soil Stirs Spy Fears (nytimes.com)
- Pentagon objects to Russia building spy “monitor stations” on U.S. soil (cofda.wordpress.com)
- Precision Strike: An Evolution (nationalinterest.org)
- Russia’s military looks to outer space (rbth.co.uk)