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Alan W. Dowd is a Senior Fellow with the American Security Council Foundation, where he writes on the full range of topics relating to national defense, foreign policy and international security. Dowd’s commentaries and essays have appeared in Policy Review, Parameters, Military Officer, The American Legion Magazine, The Journal of Diplomacy and International Relations, The Claremont Review of Books, World Politics Review, The Wall Street Journal Europe, The Jerusalem Post, The Financial Times Deutschland, The Washington Times, The Baltimore Sun, The Washington Examiner, The Detroit News, The Sacramento Bee, The Vancouver Sun, The National Post, The Landing Zone, Current, The World & I, The American Enterprise, Fraser Forum, American Outlook, The American and the online editions of Weekly Standard, National Review and American Interest. Beyond his work in opinion journalism, Dowd has served as an adjunct professor and university lecturer; congressional aide; and administrator, researcher and writer at leading think tanks, including the Hudson Institute, Sagamore Institute and Fraser Institute. An award-winning writer, Dowd has been interviewed by Fox News Channel, Cox News Service, The Washington Times, The National Post, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and numerous radio programs across North America. In addition, his work has been quoted by and/or reprinted in The Guardian, CBS News, BBC News and the Council on Foreign Relations. Dowd holds degrees from Butler University and Indiana University. Follow him at twitter.com/alanwdowd.

ASCF News

Scott Tilley is a Senior Fellow at the American Security Council Foundation, where he writes the “Technical Power” column, focusing on the societal and national security implications of advanced technology in cybersecurity, space, and foreign relations.

He is an emeritus professor at the Florida Institute of Technology. Previously, he was with the University of California, Riverside, Carnegie Mellon University’s Software Engineering Institute, and IBM. His research and teaching were in the areas of computer science, software & systems engineering, educational technology, the design of communication, and business information systems.

He is president and founder of the Center for Technology & Society, president and co-founder of Big Data Florida, past president of INCOSE Space Coast, and a Space Coast Writers’ Guild Fellow.

He has authored over 150 academic papers and has published 28 books (technical and non-technical), most recently Systems Analysis & Design (Cengage, 2020), SPACE (Anthology Alliance, 2019), and Technical Justice (CTS Press, 2019). He wrote the “Technology Today” column for FLORIDA TODAY from 2010 to 2018.

He is a popular public speaker, having delivered numerous keynote presentations and “Tech Talks” for a general audience. Recent examples include the role of big data in the space program, a four-part series on machine learning, and a four-part series on fake news.

He holds a Ph.D. in computer science from the University of Victoria (1995).

Contact him at stilley@cts.today.

Pentagon Scrambles to Defend ‘Juicy Targets’ After Rivals’ Space Tests

Friday, November 19, 2021

Categories: ASCF News Missile Defense

Comments: 0

Source: https://www.defenseone.com/threats/2021/11/pentagon-scrambles-defend-juicy-targets-after-rivals-space-tests/186925/

In this photo taken from video distributed by Russian Defense Ministry Press Service on Monday, Oct. 4, 2021, a new Zircon hypersonic cruise missile is launched by a submarine of the Russian navy from the Barents Sea. RUSSIAN DEFENSE MINISTRY PRESS SERVICE VIA AP

Russia’s direct ascent anti-satellite launch Monday is adding urgency to the U.S. Space Force’s efforts to better defend U.S. space assets, and has left the Pentagon questioning the implications of Russia’s decision to launch, even when it put its own cosmonauts in danger.

“What we’re seeing Russia demonstrate is a weapon. If they can destroy a Russian satellite, they can destroy an American satellite,” U.S. Space Force Lt. Gen. Nina M. Armagno said Wednesday at the Ascend space conference in Las Vegas. “It’s not just Russia, it’s China as well.”

Monday’s ASAT test and China’s July test of a hypersonic missile that entered space and orbited the globe has the Pentagon working quickly to develop countermeasures, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin told reporters Wednesday.

“We are concerned about the weaponization of space,” Austin said. “We're working as hard as we can to ensure that we can defend ourselves against a range of threats going forward.”

For the Space Force, that means finding ways to make space assets “more difficult to find or less juicy,” Armagno said.

“We’re doing this mission area by mission area. We need to take our missile-warning assets, we need to add layers of orbits, hybrid capabilities, smaller satellites, and commercially provided capabilities,” Armagno said. “That will all complicate Russia targeting our prime missile-warning capabilities.”

Austin questioned why Russia would put its own people aboard the ISS at risk; two Russian cosmonauts were among the seven International Space Station crew who had to seek emergency shelter in their spacecraft from the debris field Monday.

“They have the ability, they know exactly what kind of debris field they're going to create,” Austin said. “So we wonder why they would move to do such a thing.”

It’s likely signalling to the United States, said Maj. Gen. Leah Lauderback, Space Force’s director of Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance.

“It's probably from a deterrence perspective,” Lauderback said at the Ascend conference. “This is a continuation of their intent to degrade and deter us from using our space capabilities.”

Russia’s test Monday was the fourth direct ascent ASAT launch to destroy a satellite. According to U.S. Space Command:

In 2007, China hit its Fenyun 1C satellite. Some 3,013 of its 3,679 trackable pieces of debris are still in orbit.
In 2008, the U.S. conducted Operation Burnt Frost to destroy an NRO satellite that was failing. None of the 173 pieces of debris remain in orbit;
In 2018, an Indian direct ascent launch destroyed Microsat-R. One of its 168 trackable pieces of debris is left in orbit.
On Nov. 15, 2021, Russia destroyed its COSMOS 1408 in 2021, generating at least 1,500 pieces of debris that are trackable, meaning they measure 10 cm across or more.
Tens of thousands of smaller pieces of COSMOS 1408 are believed to remain in orbit, but it will take “weeks to months” before the 18th Space Control Squadron is able to fully track the whole debris field generated by the launch, U.S. Space Command said in a statement to Defense One.

Monday’s test is reminiscent of China’s 2007 launch, U.S. Space Command deputy commander Lt. Gen. John Shaw said at the space conference. Just days before Monday’s event, the International Space Station had to maneuver to avoid a collision with debris from Fenyun 1C.

The debris from Russia’s launch Monday “will be a threat for years to come,” Shaw said. “ We’ll be talking about this for years. It’s simply irresponsible and it will cause so many problems. This isn’t the beginning of activity by Russia. They continue to show disregard for the stability of space.”

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