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Starshield: Secured satellite network for government entities

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Re: Starshield: Secured satellite network for government entities

#51

Post by georgeg23 »

GekkePrutser wrote: post #49
wmf wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there's a consensus that orbital weapons are bad.

Even if they're defensive weapons only? I think Reagan's star wars program was cancelled only because the Russian threat was not as big anymore. Not because of weapons in space concerns. FWIW only WMDs are really banned in space.

Democrats / Clinton shut down the original Star Wars program because they favored arms control (arguing Star Wars was illegal under the Anti Ballistic Missile Treaty)

That treaty expired in 2002 and then Elon went to Russia to buy some ICBMs...

Re: Starshield: Secured satellite network for government entities

#52

Post by ngcc_hk »

credit_guy wrote: post #12

Sooner or later the US Government will realize the Starship will be a good launching vehicle for the ballistic missile defense. Currently a midcourse ground base interceptor booster [1] weighs more than 20 tons, costs a few tens of millions, and carries one single kill vehicle [2] that weighs about 64 kg. A single Starship would be able to carry more than 1000 such kill vehicles. If Russia launches a few hundred miss…

Why Russia, china or even North Korea cannot do that as well.

Re: Starshield: Secured satellite network for government entities

#53

Post by credit_guy »

jltsiren wrote: post #36
credit_guy wrote: post #12

Sooner or later the US Government will realize the Starship will be a good launching vehicle for the ballistic missile defense. Currently a midcourse ground base interceptor booster [1] weighs more than 20 tons, costs a few tens of millions, and carries one single kill vehicle [2] that weighs about 64 kg. A single Starship would be able to carry more than 1000 such kill vehicles. If Russia launches a few hundred miss…

Three things: 1) That way you would have a single Starship launching a single kill vehicle in more than 1000 pieces. In order to be truly independent, each kill vehicle needs significant delta-v on its own, which lowers the number of kill vehicles by two orders of magnitude. 2) Starship has pretty weak engines for this task. While the missile used to launch the Exoatmospheric Kill Vehicle reaches ~10 km/s in less tha…

1. Not sure what you mean by significant delta-v. An 8km/s vehicle meeting a 6km/s warhead coming from the opposite direction will kill it just as surely as a 10km/s one. If you mean delta-v to go laterally, for that 1km/s is probably more than enough. A vehicle with 1km/s delta-v is, in the worst case scenario, twice as heavy than one with 100m/s delta-v, not 100 times as heavy.

2. 9 minutes is plenty. A ballistic missile takes about 30 min to go from one continent to another. The difference between 4 min and 9 min is not a make or break thing.

3. Everything has a price. If a single GBI booster costs north of $50 mil, then you can afford to spend a few tens of millions to keep fully fueled Starships on the launchpad, 24/7/365. From time to time you'd have to empty them, and move them an give them a thorough inspection. It can be done.

4. (bonus) If things get tense, a Starship could also carry a few hundred MIRVs. China thinks it can sprint forward in the arms race at a certain point. They'll find out it's not going to be that easy.

Re: Starshield: Secured satellite network for government entities

#54

Post by gz5 »

coolspot wrote: post #15
gz5 wrote: post #11

Low-orbit data centers become interesting in this context. Yes, problems with radiation, solar flares and traditional ops. But 'free' power, real estate (1) and cooling. (1) Low orbit real estate may be a future battleground?

There is no free cooling in the space. It is actually harder to cool something in the space than in Sahara, because you have no air that you can dump energy into. Your only choice is to radiate heat away, which is very inefficient.

agree you would radiate it away - but why does that need to be inefficient at scale (understood there are upfront costs)? meanwhile cooling is a huge expense in terrestrial DCs.

i am not an expert - happy to hear more expert opinions which is why i wrote the parent comment - but on a quick google search it seems folks are working on these designs: https://orbitsedge.com/satframe

Re: Starshield: Secured satellite network for government entities

#56

Post by Throwawayaerlei »

georgeg23 wrote: post #51
GekkePrutser wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if they're defensive weapons only? I think Reagan's star wars program was cancelled only because the Russian threat was not as big anymore. Not because of weapons in space concerns. FWIW only WMDs are really banned in space.

Democrats / Clinton shut down the original Star Wars program because they favored arms control (arguing Star Wars was illegal under the Anti Ballistic Missile Treaty) That treaty expired in 2002 and then Elon went to Russia to buy some ICBMs...

The Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty was a Nixon-Brezhnev 1972 thing, albeit ratified by a Democratic Senate in the same year: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Ballistic_Missile_Treaty

Re: Starshield: Secured satellite network for government entities

#57

Post by dmix »

threeseed wrote: post #45
dmix wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes I remember the study showing the total amount of ad spending by Prigozhin was But yes, I'm sure Russia did enough to sway the election... All of the social media campaigns attributed to Russian agencies weren't even backing one party. They hit both sides. All they cared about was generating social conflict.

I am glad we can both agree that Russia did in fact interfere in the election.

You're openly spreading Russia propaganda by the guy who founded Wagner (Russia is very important, they even swayed the US election!). I wouldn't pat myself on the back for such a thing.

If spending a few hundred $k on foreigners using Twitter/FB advertising accounts is enough to meaningfully sway an election I think we have bigger problems than Russia.

Re: Starshield: Secured satellite network for government entities

#58

Post by ilyt »

> Starlink already offers unparalleled end-to-end user data encryption. Starshield uses additional high-assurance cryptographic capability to host classified payloads and process data securely, meeting the most demanding government requirements.

aka "We put TLS in SPAAAACE!" ? I kinda doubt government needs help in such basic things as "talking over unsecure channel"...

Re: Starshield: Secured satellite network for government entities

#59

Post by ilyt »

GekkePrutser wrote: post #49
wmf wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there's a consensus that orbital weapons are bad.

Even if they're defensive weapons only? I think Reagan's star wars program was cancelled only because the Russian threat was not as big anymore. Not because of weapons in space concerns. FWIW only WMDs are really banned in space.

> Even if they're defensive weapons only?

And how you are going to convince everyone else that they are "just" defensive weapons ?

Re: Starshield: Secured satellite network for government entities

#60

Post by jvanderbot »

amatecha wrote: post #16

Huh. "Secured Satellite Network For Government Entities" .. which, or how many, entities? You can only offer your service to so many before you hit those inevitable political barriers. I think they're already firmly cemented in the "US and allies" market, so the broadly-worded marketing text is a bit funny to me.

"Government entities" usually referrs to US gov subcontractors, military, intelligence, etc etc..

Not 'an entity with a gov' and not 'an entity of a government'

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