eder@ssc-vax.UUCP (Dani Eder) (06/06/84)
6 June 1984
There is no way to avoid having weapons in space if you are
in space at all. Whenever you have lots of energy available, and
space travel requires energy, you have the makings of a weapon.
For a simple example, imagine the Space Shuttle approaching
a Soviet spacecraft, perhaps a reconnaisance bird. The Shuttle
turns its aft end to face the spacecraft and proceeds to blast
the spacecraft with 6000 lbs of thrust from an OMS engine. This
will destroy almost any spacecraft built by either side.
In the future, mass-driver reaction engines can be used for
machine guns, solar power satellites can fry electronics, asteroid
miners can throw rocks, and fusion drives are unhealthy to merely
turn on in the vicinity of unshielded poeple.
For some references, I recommend reading "The Moon is a Harsh
Mistress" by Robert Heinlein, and the 'Known Space' books by Larry
Niven.
Dani Eder / Boeing Aerospace Company / ssc-vx!eder