The Space Weapons Treaty Hoax

Copyright © 2014 by Thomas Gangale
@ThomasGangale

The Sino-Russian Treaty on Prevention of the Placement of Weapons in Outer Space, the Threat or Use of Force against Outer Space Objects (PPWT) is nothing more than a propaganda device; these two states pose as peacemongers while the US just says "No." The US says "no" with good reason. The PPWT prohibits space-based weapon systems, a high-tech realm where the US has the advantage, and is silent on ground-based threats to space systems that are vital to the US economy as well as to its full-spectrum defense posture. Ground-based threats are so low-tech that they are within the capability of any state that can toss a handful of gravel in the path of a spacecraft. As such, the PPWT is the most unequal treaty seen since those that the European states imposed on the Qing dynasty. China and Russia fully understand that the US will never seriously consider their treaty, yet they have persisted in hawking it for the past six years.

A serious anti-satellite weapons treaty, addressing both space-based and ground-based threats, would need to have the character of a comprehensive and very detailed arms control treaty along the lines of the following:

Draft Treaty on the Prohibition of the Threat or Use of Force Against Outer Space Objects

Draft Protocol to the Treaty on the Prohibition of the Threat or Use of Force Against Outer Space Objects

At more than 300 pages, the draft treaty and its protocol are only a template for such a compresensive and detailed agreement, yet this template is far more substantial than the half-dozen-page charade offered by Russia and China.

UN Duped by Sino-Russian Space Weapons Treaty Hoax

Propaganda Weapons vs. Space Weapons

OPS-Alaska Proposes Space Weapons Treaty

Thomas Gangale in Outer Space! 

 

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9 November 2014

純大串 (Jun Okushi) asks: "As I informed, a couple of weeks ago, China conducted Anti-Satelite action again. So, we can understand that China breached the treaty, can’t we?"

My response: "First of all, one cannot breach a treaty that is not in force. Secondly, to reiterate, the Sino-Russian PPWT proposal, were it to become international law, would not prohibit ground-based attacks on satellites, as China has been testing the capability to do, but would only prohibit space-based weapons, which China and Russia fear that the US has already deployed. Thus the Chinese ASAT tests make the case perfectly against their own PPWT proposal. But, it is not a serious proposal anyway; it merely serves as a fig leaf of peace to cover the truth that China is developing a warfighting capability against space assets."