The State Department sent cables to all embassies yesterday instructing diplomats to explain to foreign governments how the upcoming attempt to shoot down an out-of-control spy satellite is different from China's destruction of one of its orbiting satellites early last year.
The order by President Bush for the Navy to launch an antimissile interceptor to destroy a disabled satellite before it falls from orbit carries opportunity, but also potential embarrassment, for the administration and advocates of its missile defense program.
China's anti-satellite test in January increased the country's military threat to Taiwan by demonstrating a limited ability to blind the U.S. satellites that would be deployed in defense of the island, according to a report from the Council on Foreign Relations.
More than two decades after President Ronald Reagan set a goal of developing a space-based missile defense, the U.S. Missile Defense Agency is planning for an early 2006 test that could produce the first intercept of a target using a kill vehicle launched from space, according to Defense Department officials.
The US Defense Budget for 2005 contains a program that some analysts say could "cross the Rubicon into space weaponization". The program in question, the Near Field Infrared Experiment (NFIRE) satellite, is primarily designed to track ballistic missiles from space for missile defense but it will also contain a smaller "kill vehicle" that can be used to attack missiles or enemy satellites.