"Pentagon Preps for Orbital War With New Spaceplane" Topic
5 Posts
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Tango01 | 03 Aug 2015 10:43 p.m. PST |
"The XS-1 could replace satellites lost in battle—fast and cheap.Shop ▾ Aerospace giant Boeing just snagged a $6.6 USD million contract to design a cheap, reusable spaceplane for the U.S. military. The idea: to equip America's space forces with an airplane-like vehicle that can fly to the edge of Earth's atmosphere and quickly boost small satellites into orbit, and then land, refuel, load up another satellite, and take off again within 24 hours. The so-called XS-1 program—short for "eXperimental Spaceplane 1"—isn't a space weapon. Instead, it's a sort of defense against space weapons—specifically, the growing fleets of killer spacecraft and satellite-destroying rockets that China and Russia are deploying…" Full article here link Amicalement Armand |
Mako11 | 03 Aug 2015 11:11 p.m. PST |
Sounds good in theory, though of course what's to prevent the enemy from shooting down the space plane, before it can launch the satellite(s)? Granted, probably a more economical way to launch them than using ballistic missiles, but still very vulnerable, nonetheless. |
Rabbit 3 | 04 Aug 2015 5:43 a.m. PST |
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wminsing | 04 Aug 2015 5:43 a.m. PST |
It's going to be launched from the continental US, not over enemy airspace. There's *very few* weapons, even on the drawing board, that could hope to intercept it during the boost phase, or even after. Not invulnerable, but the risk will be small. Overall, I think this is a great idea; create a payload of militarized Cube Sats and you can create an on-demand satellite constellation. -Will |
wminsing | 04 Aug 2015 5:45 a.m. PST |
It's actually the inverse of the shuttle; the shuttle was a spaceplane that rode a rocket to orbital velocity. The XS-1 is a spaceplane that carries a rocket to orbital velocity. It WILL be complex; as the article points out, it's going to have to be a hyper-sonic aircraft. -Will |
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