| Another thing: the Outer Space Treaty also calls for consultations in the event any state feels other countries are doing something that might impede peaceful uses of space, which is an injunction against weaponizing space, a weak one, but nevertheless.
Generally speaking, there are strong lobbies in the US and most other countries against putting weapons in space, not the least of them being all the industries that heavily rely on space communications. Once countries start putting up battlesats and plinking at satellites, civilian or otherwise, the cost of access to space would go immensely due to the higher insurance costs. There are also issues of debris polluting orbits and destroying satellites. It's doubtful even the US would be able to protect civilian satellites against ground-based ASATs and, eventually, ground-based lasers. |