[unepipe]

It will not affect it in any way. They have released their plans for Starlink and there will be a "blackout" zone over China, so China doesn't shoot down their satellites. In 2007, China shot down FY-1C as a test of a kinetic kill vehicle (leaving tons of high speed space debris). Unless they receive approval from China to broadcast, they won't over China.

Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/spacex-internet-satellite-con...

[greedo]

China won't shoot down commercial satellites, they'll just either jam the signal, or block ownership of the ground terminals. Shooting down satellites is very expensive, and would cause an incredible hue and cry internationally. It's one thing to shoot down one of your own defunct satellites, quite another thing to shoot down someone else's.

[larkeith]

China might or might not shoot down the satellites, but the FCC would absolutely not have authorized the satellite network had SpaceX been so blatantly antagonistic towards China as to provide service there.

[lev99]

> Shooting down satellites is very expensive

It's less expensive than launching satellites, and the Chinese goverment has enough money to do it if they want.

[positr0n]

> It's less expensive than launching satellites

I doubt it, since a single Falcon Heavy launch would carry dozens of Starlink satellites but the existing anti-satellite technology can only hit one at a time. Keep in mind they have said the final constellation will be 12,000 satellites!

edit: and BFR could theoretically carry 300 when it is operational. https://space.stackexchange.com/questions/25525/how-many-spa...

[lev99]

I'm not sure that it is cheaper, but I am sure there is a cheaper way to shoot something down than to keep it up. Idon't know if the tech and economics are correct, but the physics says it should be.

Moving something to the same altitude as Leo requires much less energy than moving something to Leo. Rockets don't fire straight up because the need their momentum to be at an angle. In addition, the payload of a communication satellite is more expensive than the payload required to throw it either disable the satellite or put it into a declining orbit.

Maybe Elon's rockets are just so cheap he can make it up in margin, but we are really talking about we aren't talking about marginal amount of difficulty difference, but an entire order of magnitude.

[positr0n]

Yeah I completely agree it could be done cheaper because physics, my comment was about the current economics.

I'm not sure how efficient China's military industrial complex is, but I wouldn't trust the US's military to be able to build a weapon system that could destroy SpaceX satellite's more efficiently than SpaceX can launch them, haha.

[JumpCrisscross]

> It's less expensive than launching satellites

Are you sure? If China knocks out one of ours, we’ll knock out at least one of theirs. We’ll also likely implement a suite of sanctions. Shooting down a satellite is an act of war.

[jessaustin]

Why am I ever surprised at the constant expansion of justifications for war?

Wars kill lots of people. You knew that, right?

[reaperducer]

>If China knocks out one of ours, we’ll knock out at least one of theirs.

No, we won’t. We’ll impose several decades of meaningless tariffs and embargoes with tons of loopholes so it looks like we’re doing something until everyone forgets what everyone was mad about in the first place.

[vatueil]

The linked source says nothing about a "blackout zone" over China. More likely SpaceX won't sell ground receivers in mainland China and/or the PRC will simply ban Starlink receivers.

[52-6F-62]

> shot down FY-1C as a test of a kinetic kill vehicle (leaving tons of high speed space debris)

Do you have more info on this? Or anyone?

That's so crass. It's plain indefensible. I really want to know more.

edit: Thanks for the links.

[djrogers]

Googling the phrase "China shot down FY-1C" came up with a bunch of stuff, the first of which was the wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_Chinese_anti-satellite_mi...

[rhcom2]

Also America's tests:

(2008) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Burnt_Frost

(1985) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solwind

[solarengineer]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_Chinese_anti-satellite_mi...

[psisbwvaiia]

Why is it indefensible to defend your nation’s sovereignty. Many nations have google maps blur out their military bases for example.

I’m sure lots of North Americans wouldn’t want Chinese satellites overhead for concern of privacy.

I mean, generating tons of space junk is not cool. But what else are you going to do if others are lurking on your airspace?

It is going to be shift is policy though. We are going to need to update space law.

[jonknee]

> I’m sure lots of North Americans wouldn’t want Chinese satellites overhead for concern of privacy.

Umm, there are of course Chinese satellites overhead and they have excellent imagery of all of our military bases. As we do for theirs (and every other country!). Orbits aren't very friendly to avoiding airspace.

[52-6F-62]

I mean specifically generating high-speed shrapnel in orbit. That's going to have implications for a very long time.

If there is a willingness to do it once, it tests the barrier of what's acceptable.

It's bad for everyone—present, and future.

[tarlinian]

National sovereignty over airspace does not extend into orbit. Otherwise nearly every earth science satellite in polar orbit would be in violation of international law.

[walrus01]

shooting down shit and generating orbital debris in polar orbits is incredibly dangerous to the commons that is low earth orbit, generally.

accidental example:

https://www.google.com/search?client=ubuntu&channel=fs&q=iri...

no nation-state wants to start the game of shooting down another's satellite, either military or commercial, because everything up there is so vulnerable. it would open china to retaliatory strikes taking down their own polar orbit LEO, inclined LEO (35-45 degree) molnia, MEO and GEO satellites. satellites are fragile things and can be killed with one 200g chunk of tungsten at a closing velocity of 18,000 km/h.

[sambull]

Why is a Chinese sattelite less private than a sheriffs helicopter, private imaging plane running grids or an American satellite? Or my neighbors drone?

Your defining 'space' as airspace is odd also

[mirimir]

How far does "airspace" extend? I can see that for low orbit, but geostationary?

[aphextron]

The SpaceX satellites won’t be in GTO, they will be in LEO, around 600 miles altitude. Well within kill range for ballistic missiles.

[seatotree]

If China shoots down a SpaceX satellite, that is an act of war against the United States. China wouldn’t risk it. This is a great opportunity to break the great firewall and finally give the Chinese people access to unfiltered information.

[zpr]

Which might be seen as a provocation by the Chinese Government of the US to destabilize it's citizens.

[seatotree]

Not illegal under international law. We did this all the time to the Soviets. This is what Voice of America does today.

[btian]

China absolutely will. And if SpaceX were to beam internet over North Korea, then NK will shoot it down too.

[windexh8er]

Your comment implies they could successfully destroy said satellite. It might be a better distraction to tell NK there's one overhead, "leak" it's orbit, position, etc. and watch the fireworks month over month.

[freehunter]

I know NK has made some major advancements in their missile capabilities but shooting down a satellite is pretty advanced stuff... any indications that they're capable of doing what you claim they would do?

[mrep]

> If China shoots down a SpaceX satellite, that is an act of war against the United States.

These are not government satellites and china owns the airwaves over their nation. I highly doubt the US government would retaliate whatsoever against China if they shot down a satellite that illegally interacted with their airspace.

> China wouldn’t risk it. This is a great opportunity to break the great firewall and finally give the Chinese people access to unfiltered information.

Take this with a grain of salt since this is mostly based on what I have heard hearsay, but they can jam the signals and/or monitor who transmits back and go after the citizens using said signal (and china is not a country where you want to poke the government). I doubt this will have any effect on the great firewall.

[seatotree]

Airspace extends 12 miles. Satellites are governed by space law. It would be the same as sinking a commercial American ship in international waters.