[ExI] China to Own the Moon by 2027

[spike]

>... On Behalf Of Anders Sandberg
...

>...Note that retaliation ground-orbit and ground-ground is actually easier
than orbit-ground, since you need to provide enough delta-v to make an
Earth-intersecting orbit (and in orbit you will tend to be reaction-mass
poor). You don't drop things from orbit, you have to throw them very hard.
-- Anders Sandberg

Ja, this is what shaped the notion of brilliant pebbles.  The initial idea
was to have a body to body contact vehicle in orbit to knock out missiles
during the fly-out, which is a fourth category not mentioned above, an
orbit- orbit defense.  After all the calculations were done, it turned out
ground to orbit defense was by far the most practical, and the only concept
that survived, in the form of THAAD and others.  THAAD uses a brilliant
pebble on a ground-based missile.  This is the system that our current
leader (whose name I cannot recall) is plotting with the Russians to
eliminate after his re-election.  It works.

spike