Not an Orbital Fortress. It will be a large array, but due to its bulk, it will comfortably accommodate a range of countermeasures. It will have to have capability to move and even rotate to evade any damage from space objects, and destroy small objects such as stones, etc., so missiles will be a part of a larger and non-directed threats.
I cant see how you can possible destroy a set of stones flying 15 km/s in opposite direction. Any countermeasure will only amplify damage done, and not prevent it.
You can't see it because the installation is so high in orbit, and the stones are so small ;-)
Eh, if everything would be as simple... man, A LOT of money cant buy a safe bet for CBG against simple 3 mach missile... in hundreds of thousands tonns hulls... now you want to convince me what somehow money will buy a protection from A LOT of small 50 mach stones in SPACE?You can't see it because the installation is so high in orbit, and the stones are so small ;-)
Seriously though, where there is a will, and lots of money involved, there is a way
The latter. NASA is currently launching another module (this week iirc?) on a Shuttle, then the two remaining modules will be added over the next year or two. Just 4-5 years late compared to original plans.
Valid remark. If there are 10 stations, taking all of them out would be difficult for anyone but most capable opponent.
Complely false in all points. You dont need any explosive device. A simple BULLET, traveling in opposite direction, will have kinetic energy equal to 100mm APFSDS. And will do as much damage. Now, in 1 kg payload you can cram 100 bullets... in 100kg payload - 10 thousands bullets....
All in all, viable idea BUT we need to reach much higher technical and scientifical level to make it work. Then again, at such level we might obtain 1000 times better accus to store energy, or other means to fuel military vessels - so these space stations would be useless.
Sand casters would stop bullets, or at least slow them down significantly.
Sand casters, unless notoriosly thick (remember Star Fortress?) will only apmlifiy damage due to added debris. Imagine how thick should be sandcasters to stop 100mm APFSDS... And now keep in mind, the energy is focused in much smaller cross-section, so even better penetration...
But where are you going to get a 100mm APFSDS in space from? Is there a capability ion the BMP-3 we are not aware of? ;-)
Did you even read what i wrote? A bullet traveling 15 km/s have about as much kinetic energy as 100mm APFSDS flying 1km/s , and will do about as much damage.But where are you going to get a 100mm APFSDS in space from? Is there a capability ion the BMP-3 we are not aware of? ;-)
"Faster than a speeding bullet! More powerful than a locomotive! Able to leap tall buildings at a single bound! "Look! Up in the sky!" "It's a bird!" "It's a plane!" "It's satellite-busting BMP-3!"
suggested countermeasure: depleted Kryptonite round ?
Name one country that uses "bullets" to take out satellites? It would be near on impossible to get a bullet in exactly the right orbit at the right time to begin with. Even a geo-stationary orbit is a very large area of space. Why do you think so many countries seriously look at nuclear weapons to knock out satellites (as a result of the EMP blast)? Because they're really hard to hit. Notice that the only countries that have the means to take out satellites are those with advanced ballistic missile systems?
There are hundreds and hundreds of satellites in the sky for all sorts of purposes. Research, weather, communications, junk, military. You can't just knock them all out. Mind you you could just see which one is emitting the beaming the microwaves.
Most anti-satellite plans i know of include so-called "bucket with nails" as main killing factor. Either way, it is much, much, much easer to hit space object with several nails from the bucket than guide missile with explosives to exact right spot... And anyway, what is purpose of explosives? Is it not to accelerate nails toward target? But in satellite case the speed of nails already order of magnitude higher than any speed they can gain from explosion...
Yes, but 1st - we are talking about future. More countries will posses capable ballistic missiles. It is even possible they would be sold on open commercial market like aircrafts now.
Hardly shaping against a low-tech opponent. For example; spy satellites. The Russians have had the ability to shoot them down since the 60's. Yet you'd hardly dream of reverting to solely spy planes now, unless you had to. Almost everything has a counter - that's why you build redundancy, and secondly, have a back-up plan. I can't see why this is so different.
The difference is like between 18th century rockets and 21th century ballistic missile. While they use basically some laws, there are 3 hundreds years of technical development between. Some case with this "power from space" - there are so many unsolvable (on current technical level) obstacles - what it is pure fantasy. Cold thermonuclear reactors are probably more real than this...
Technology is not there in the sence what it will be 1000 times more effective to power devices with other means. Sure, even now we can spend 300 billions $$ and launch such space station in space what will be able to power may be 2-3 tanks, with devices to recive power being larger than tank itself... Are you really sure this is what you call "technology is there" ?
Hmmm.... from the Pentagon report, the power they're asking for is only 5-50 megawatts as being enough to be worthwhile. Most previous studies were looking at commercial power generation, and were looking at systems up to 1 km big that would generate up to 50 gigawatts (1000 times more then needed). Proponents of the scheme point out that it's more promising then fusion technology currently is (has costed over 20 billion in research so far).