The U.S. Starting Asia Space War? Please…

A groan-inducing article at The Diplomat asks the intentionally provocative question ‘Is the U.S. Starting an Asian Space Race?” The answer, although you would never gather it from the article’s tone and presentation, is a resounding ‘no.’ The article uses the X-37, the re-usable space platform that looks like a quarter-scale space shuttle and launched [...]

3 Glonass Satellites To Launch In September

Russia plans to make their positioning, navigation, and timing (PNT) satellite system, Glonass–the Global Navigation Satellite System–operational.  How? With a needed three-pack launch on a Proton-M planning to a 2 September launch date. This launch will provide Glonass with enough operational satellites for continuous navigation services covering the Russian territory. The EU’s Galileo PNT system [...]

Russia Balks At Another Bilateral Nuke Deal

Russia appears to be happy with their place in the nuclear world. Why is that?  Because they are satisfied with where they think new START will leave them on the strategic side vis-a-vis the U.S. and the rest of the world, and they will also be keeping their massive inventory of tactical nuclear weapons. At least that’s [...]

Putin’ On The Ritz? No, Putin On The Spaceport

Russian PM Vlad Putin promises $800 million for a new Russian spaceport that will be ready for use by 2015. I’m not holding my breath.  The Russians also say they’ll be testing 10 to 12 ICBMs and SLBMs a year for a decade which just isn’t going to happen.

Compliance, New START, and Nuclear Whack-A-Mole

The Washington Times and the Washington Post both report on Russian ‘compliance issues,’ regarding the 1991 version of START, the Chemical Weapons Convention, and the international convention banning biological weapons. Compliance issues is of course code for both purposeful cheating and inadvertent non-compliance. Are these compliance issues serious?  Well, the headline in the Post says this could [...]

New START: a Bi-lateral “Solution” In a Multi-lateral World?

Why do we have treaties?  There are a number of possible answers.  They could be used to codify things we were going to do anyway.  They could be used to build relationships with other nations.  They could be used to improve security or trade, or as a symbol of shared values. Does the new START [...]

Russia Attempts To Play It Both Ways?

The Russians warrant scrutiny. Let’s see: public announcement Russia will provide fuels for Iran.  Despite being off-limits via the recent UN sanctions, selling Iran S-300 air defense systems hasn’t been waved off.  Also, Iran is capable of making trouble in Russian “areas of influence.” This means the administration will have to keep sweetening their deals [...]

The New Space Race?

The new space race will be for positioning, navigation, and timing.  Why?  It’s too important not to have, or conversely, it’s too important to have to depend on someone else for such space-provided services. Who is in the game?  The U.S., Russia, China, and the ESA. Assuming war doesn’t break out (with selective disabling), cross-system [...]

Why Don’t We Take the Russian Spies Seriously?

Adam Kirsch writing at The New Republic asks ‘Why don’t we take the Russian spies seriously?’ The question itself is a great one.  Kirsch’s answer is even better. Kirsch’s hypothesis is we don’t take them seriously because–in effect–we won the Cold War.  Game over, man, game over.  The USSR has been disestablished and Russia is a [...]

Medvedev Warns of Iranian Ability To Go Nuclear

When a political leader says something that’s true but inconvenient, or is substantively different from an earlier position, that’s a good time to pay attention. So when Medvedev says Iran isn’t too far from building a nuclear bomb, Iran’s near-nuclear status has become an obvious truth.