We are still a long way from star wars, and yet some are already preparing for it. In a recent report by the Beijing Institute of Tracking and Telecommunications Technology, a research institute attached to the Chinese military, military researchers are concerned about the threat that Elon Musk’s constellation of satellites could pose to national security, case of armed conflict. In a long document, published last month in the review Modern Defense Technology and translated here into English, scientists recommend the establishment of a defense program.
The objective: to monitor each of the satellites and be able, if necessary, to neutralize them. “A combination of material and non-material methods of destruction should be adopted to cause certain Starlink satellites to lose function and destroy the constellation’s operating system”, writes, bluntly, the team of researchers. As the newspaper writes South China Morning Postwhich relayed this report, China is already working on technologies to destroy satellites, through jammers or the use of a very long-range laser, for example.
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