In article <re6dnUOVT59lgF3anZ2dnUVZ_qOknZ2d@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>,
wjtingle@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
says...
> I occurred to me that there is one way a stealthy attack in space might
> work (at least once). It would depend on a lot of misdirection, really
> good security, and an inattentive, though not really incompetent victim.
>
> The key is a mass driver, driven by a fission reactor, and the fact that
> most of the viewpoints humans can reach easily are in or near the plane
> of the ecliptic.
>
> For example, suppose the First Marshen Republick launches an expedition
> to visit various uninhabited asteroids, a-to-b-to-c-to-d. The carefully
> selected crew (who all happen to have high security clearances and tight
> lips) visit the asteroids and publish their papers and all is right with
> the worlds. Ten years later, an unmapped giant asteroid wipes out the
> Terran Pacific Rim with giant tsunamis and earthquakes, and severely
> inconveniences the rest of the earth with several nuclear winters.
>
> It just so happens, that this asteroid was one that the Republick's
> survey visited. And that the Republick has a long-standing bone to pick
> with Terra.
>
> Mass drivers probably have the lowest radiated signature of any
> propulsion system. If you keep a very well designed radiator panel
> aligned parallel to the ecliptic (hard, when it's a few acres, but not
> impossible), very few sensors will ever see it.
>
> Now the whole deal can be queered if someone happens to look at the
> asteroid during the initial movement. Whether they see the heat
> signature, or the odd whatever signature that the mass drivers will
> cause, the sight of an asteroid actively changing course surely gives
> the game away. You have to do it when the asteroid is obscured by the
> sun from your target, and from anyone else who might rat. You can
> probably also only do this once.
>
> Still, it is a stealthy attack in space. There should be some kind of
> extra credit for that, other than the massive Terran space fleet that 20
> years later non-stealthily nukes the Republick into near-extinction.
>
> Regards,
> Jack Tingle
>
Such asteroid bombs have been discussed for at least 40 years. I suspect
that a space faring society which Earth would have to be for this
scenario to work would be able to detect such an asteroid long before it
hit.
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