Mark West

One of the most astonishing technological displays in some time occurred on Feb. 21, when a modified SM-3 missile was launched from a Ticonderoga-class guided-missile cruiser stationed in the North Pacific and hit a satellite 133 nautical miles above the ocean.

Considering that the satellite was moving along at about 23,000 miles an hour, and that the ship was at sail, the technical prowess that the launch indicates is nothing short of amazing. But perhaps even more worthy of our consideration is the light this event shines on how those at the top echelons of our government think about international relations, and about what they are and are not obliged to tell the citizenry of the United States.

NRO Launch 21 was a classified satellite launched at Vandenberg Air Force base on Dec. 14, 2006. Nobody knows what NROL-21’s purpose was, although speculation holds that it may have been tasked with radar imaging of ground targets for the military.

In any event, contact with the satellite was lost shortly after launch. The satellite, which has been described in media accounts as being about the size of a school bus, carried a fuel tank full of hydrazine, which is described as carcinogenic.
Hence, as the orbit of NROL-21 decayed, the military decided that it should use its Aegis anti-missile technology to attempt to put a heavy slug through the satellite in hopes of penetrating the fuel tank so that the hydrazine would burn off during re-entry.

It worked. The military posted imagery of the remnants of NROL-21, and the mailing list of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada posted eyewitness accounts of debris trails above Prince George Island, spotted by amateur astronomers watching the eclipse that night.

The Internet chatter has held that the reason for the destruction of NROL-21 was not for public safety, but to test the Aegis.
But that hypothesis doesn’t hold up under scrutiny. In December 2007, for example, the Japanese navy tested the SM-3 by firing one from the JDS “Kongo” against a ballistic missile. Surely the task of striking a ballistic missile, whose trajectory must be calculated in moments, would be a greater challenge than that of striking a satellite moving in a predictable orbit, particularly after the recent modifications in the SM-3’s software to retask the missile for anti-satellite as well as anti-missile operation.

And if a message is being sent, it is not being sent to the “axis of evil.” If North Korea is a threat to the United States, it isn’t because they’re going to throw a fleet of Taepodong-2 missiles at us. For an anti-satellite capacity to be of interest, an enemy nation must have a substantial satellite capability; and, while Chinese satellite capabilities are rudimentary, those of the Russians are not.

But George W. Bush, now the lamest of lame ducks, is well beyond being able to engage in diplomacy. His brand of cowboy diplomacy has made serious negotiation unlikely; his increasing irrelevance in the American political landscape means that his opinions on policy matters have ceased to make much difference. And his almost irrational truculence, and his recent turn to history as the sole entity capable of seeing his greatness, mean that he wouldn’t try to negotiate some way out of our return to the Cold War even if he could.

So the satellite shot, brilliant as it was, was yet another example of cowboy diplomacy, the space-age equivalent of one cow-poke shooting a tin-can off a fence post at 200 yards to show an opponent what he can do. It’s impressive. It may even be decisive.

But there is no way to contend that it lowered the level of tension. The future effects of this obvious escalation are unknown — and, as George W. is so fond of saying, history will indeed be his judge.
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Mark West is a professor of mass communications at UNC Asheville.