US 193
Russia, I tend to agree with you.
Voices out of the Kremlin are claiming that the upcoming attempts of the US military to shoot one of their own satellites out of space with a missile is an (poorly veiled) opportunity to test a surface-to-space missile.
Americans claim that their bus-sized satellite, which is on the fritz and due to crash-land on Earth in early March, needs to be knocked to smaller bits because they don’t want anything on land wrecked, and more importantly there is 1000 pounds of hydrazine (the satellite’s fuel) which is very toxic.
According to WIkipedia,
Hydrazine is highly toxic and dangerously unstable, especially in the anhydrous form. Symptoms of acute exposure to high levels of hydrazine in humans may include irritation of the eyes, nose, and throat, dizziness, headache, nausea, pulmonary edema, seizures, coma, and it can also damage the liver, kidneys, and central nervous system. The liquid is corrosive and may produce dermatitis from skin contact in humans and animals. Effects to the lungs, liver, spleen, and thyroid have been reported in animals chronically exposed to hydrazine via inhalation. Increased incidences of lung, nasal cavity, and liver tumors have been observed in rodents exposed to hydrazine.
OK, so there’s a health risk. The conspiracy theorist in me says, so what. 70% of the Earth’ surface is water, and of the land, 90% of it isn’t USA. So that leaves two options that I can think of.
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The USA has been under a bit of pressure lately from all kinds of other wannabe superpowers. Russia, China, al Queda all have qualms, quibbles and beefs with the US. They’ve been asserting their power and flexing their muscles all over the world in the last year or two. China recently blew one of their own old satellites out of the air with some kind of suped up laser. Russia is threatening Eastern Europe over potential cooperation with American missile defence systems and even going so far as to say there is a new arms race. Why not shut some pie-holes up by firing a missile from a boat on the ocean into outer space to destroy a satellite?
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The other theory (and I personally like this one much better) is that the Americans have something on board the satellite besides the hydrazine that they don’t want anyone else to come in contact with. If 95% of the Earth isn’t the USA, there’s a darn good chance someone else could be around to pick up some of the pieces. Just exactly, what could those pieces be?
Well, check out what US 193 (the boring name of the satellite) translates into using webdings, wingdings 1, 2 and 3:
US 193
US 193
US 193
US 193
From these icons, I would conclude the contents may be square buttons, video tapes, trash cans, bull horns, file folders, diving helmets or perhaps the red cross blood donor records. Scary!
Read what actual journalists are saying here.
Interesting post….there´s a book by Tom Clancy out there by the name of “The Cardinal of the Kremlin” which in other things is about Star Wars and the laser you where mentioning….if the Chicoms have developed the laser then my friend that is scary stuff.
Thanks for the comment. You know, now the articles I’m reading mention the Chinese used a missile. But I could have SWORN that in the initial reports it was a laser. I need to do some more looking on this topic.
We have a air to space weapon that we have already tested called the ASM-135.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ASM-135_ASAT
Great post! I’m also partial to your second theory. The purported hydrazine danger seems just the nudge a passive public would need in order to think, “Thank you, safety-minded government,” and not give the shoot-down any critical thought. BTW, the price tag on the missle conversion needed to shoot down this satelite was $30-40 million.
Robert Burns’ (AP) report on the US 193 sayas it “…carried a sophisticated and secret imaging sensor.” I find it interesting that this sentence is in the past-tense… I’ll bet $40mil that US 193 is CURRENTLY carrying…
I think you nailed it on the head with the passive public. This sort of assauges their guilt/conscience/boredom/apathy.
I’ve heard about these ‘price tags’. We’re talking about money the US has already spent in most cases, or is spending anyways. I’m trying to imagine the money that would need to be spent:
- money for the development/creation of the missile = already spent
- money to pay the crews on the ships and the engineers/brains behind the operation = spent or being spent currently
- deployment of the ship = already deployed, being spent anyways
How does this cost $40 million?
I’ve seen dollar values made public after police operations to catch a criminal or break a drug ring (etc). Wouldn’t those cops be getting paid anyways? This just proves the money we’re already spending is actually being used to do things. Suddenly we’re successful at completing something and then we have to pay out?
I’m confused.
Well, another thing that adds to the passive public, “Thank you, safety-minded government,” aspect is the fact that the safety portion of the hydrazine entry in Wikipedia prior to Dec. 2006 only said, “Hydrazine is highly toxic and dangerously unstable, especially in the anhydrous form.” This can be seen through archive.org, (previously waybackmachine.org…) at:
http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrazine
http://web.archive.org/web/20061110184036/http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrazine
Here’s the current entry:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hydrazine
Mmmm……..
The Chinese used a land-based missile . They had earlier “painted” a US satellite with a laser, blinding it in effect.
Thanks for the update. I’m assuming painting another’s country with a laser is indeed an international no-no. Why, I wonder, is China putting up such a fuss over the Americans doing their own satellite in?
Wow, the media continues to disappoint…
Yahoo is carrying an updated report (2-21-08) from Robert Burns and Lolita C. Baldor (AP) about how ’successful’ the shoot-down went last night. They mention that the “…military is tracking the debris as it falls over the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.”
If I have my geography right, there is land in between the Atlantic an Pacific… is this intelligent debris, that somewhow falls selectively?
I can’t tell from the graphic at the top of this post, but it would seem that the path of the satilite was West-to-East, meaning that the military chose to shoot down the satelite over the Pacific in order to ensure that the ensuing debris field would be our own soil, our own neighborhoods, increasing the likelihood of government recovery of sensitive material at the cost of citizen exposure.
Nice. Thank you, safety-minded government.
Hmm… in the past few hourse the AP has amended the report I refered to above, removing the portions I quoted and touching-on-but-glazing-over many of the legitimate concerns on this thread.
Isn’t it interesting how the web allows for the immediate transfer of information. What is equally as interesting is that those things can be amended, changed, and nobody really knows what exactly is going on. We have only our memories to rely on. (That’s not good news for a guy like me) I wonder what we’ll be hearing in the days to come…
“They mention that the “…military is tracking the debris as it falls over the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.””
Most likely means that the remains of the missile impact fell over the Pacific Ocean and the satellite debris fell into the Atlantic. It is rocket science after all, and remember that there two things impacted and had a kinetic exchange of energy at ~5km/sec. Thats 5km per second relative speed.
I noticed that this is not the first time at all that you write about this topic. Why have you chosen it again?
I allowed this comment, even though the URL doesn’t work, but it’s a fair question. Last year when this stuff was going on, I was very interested in the details. I’m fascinated (well interested in, anyways) US foreign policy, American military technology (which as far as I know is still the best in the world), and conspiracies. This story has all of these great elements. Makes for interesting reading I figure…
I am at times overly critical, probably because they’re capable of so much good, but am keenly aware of the good they do already.
about structure silent missile 3 process by america war ship connect to china and i know as taepodang get control it so i already fix new challenger call for mirv use cloud citrus air circulation ,get information test missile at defense department this create by indonesia defense minister .