A document released last month said China needed to develop capabilities to track and monitor and, if necessary, destroy every Starlink satellite in orbit around the Earth.
Starlink is a satellite system operated by Mask SpaceX, which includes an estimated 2,400 low-Earth orbit satellite repeaters that can transmit high-speed Internet data anywhere in the world.
He has been hailed for providing high-speed Internet to developing countries and poorer parts of the world, but he also has potential military uses that Beijing fears.
The study was led by Zhen Yuanzhen, a researcher at the Beijing Institute for Surveillance and Telecommunications of the PLA Strategic Support Forces. The co-authors include several leading scientists in China’s defense industry.
“It is necessary to use a combination of soft and hard methods of destruction, so that some Starlink satellites lose their functions and destroy the operating system of the constellation,” – said in an article published in the peer-reviewed journal Modern Defense Technology.
SpaceX Mask has signed a contract with the US Department of Defense to use the Starlink Platform for military purposes, including the development of sensitive tools capable of detecting and tracking hypersonic weapons moving at speeds five times the speed of sound in the Earth’s atmosphere. It is known that it is evolving.
Thousands of Starlink satellites covering the planet’s sky – with documents showing that SpaceX plans to launch up to 30,000 in the next decade – are also equipped with ion engines that allow them to quickly change orbits and turn into low-Earth ram projectiles. Ren’s team believes that there are important goals in space.
Rehn estimates that with Starlink, US military drones and invisible fighter jets could increase data transmission a hundredfold, leading Beijing to conclude that the Starlink system – despite all the benefits it can bring to the planet – is a potential threat to China.
But destroying the network would be an extreme feat for Chinese military planners, as the network can afford to lose several satellites and continue to operate.
Elon Musk
Elon Musk
The opportunities that Rehn believes China needs to develop include super-clear space surveillance satellites for Starlink espionage, as well as capabilities to intercept and analyze data transmitted to prevent threats.
He also believes that China needs to expand its capabilities to destroy satellites to more economically destroy several targets, such as Starlink, although there is a large-scale risk of space debris that could affect other space functions.
We will remind that the head of “Roscosmos” Rogozin began to threaten Ilona Mask for the help to Ukraine: “It is necessary to answer as an adult”.
Earlier we reported that Ilona Maska overtook him: Volodymyr Zelensky became the most influential man of the year according to Time magazine.