Space Warfare: What will it be like

Well one things for certain. Its not going to be like star wars.

What kind of tactics do you think will be used once we have taken too space?

Here are some tactics that could be specifically applied to space warfare
1) Putting your ship between the enemy and the star. This would glare the enemys view of you and make you ship less visible.
2) Shadow a planet. If you put your ship behind a planet youll block yourself from enemy view. Than as the enemy comes in closer you fly out of the shadow and take them by surprise.

Taking out a planet.
If you want to take out the enemy in the planet but still maintain the planets natural ecosystem for economic exploitation the only way to do it is by ground assault or playing god. Nuking would create too much fallout, shooting asteroids at it will create too much havoc and create a shift in power in the ecosystem, melting the planets ice cap will have obvious negitive effects. So that brings us back to ground assault or playing god. God is probably the most efficient way if the planets intelligent population is still primitive. But most civilizations wont be so gullible so youll have to intimedate with the military which might lead to a long guerrilla war. So extermination of intelligent populations would be the most effective and efficient.

Some things that wont be a factor.
Asteroid belts. Although movies often portray asteroid belts as crowded with many large boulders moving towards the ship this is wrong. In reality asteroids in the belt are hundreds if not thousands of miles apart and a space vessel could easily pass through

What do you have to say?

What will space warfare be like?
Big, bright and silent.
Lots of high power, very expensive, very mind boggling and very confusing weaponry followed up by a main course of astrophysiscs nightmare calculations and finished up with a desert of high radiation danger.
Arent 3 course meals lovely.

Most weapons will be kinetic projectiles, with everything moving at huge velociites a small slug of lead in the right place will devastate fragile space ships.

Again for orbital bombardment kinetic projectiles (rods from god) will be used.

Also high yield A-bombs will be popular as well because the EM pulses will scramble ships circuits. Also there could well be counter missiles and laser weaponary.

If you want to go more exotic/sci fi then you could see blackhole weapons to suck in spaceships and planets. Also the use of the thrist from high power engins could be used to vaporise incoming ships and projectiles.

Ultimately though most space warfare will be fought in orbit and consist of projectiles being used to take out ships and installations while lasers are used to destroy incoming projectiles. Force fields may have value but they could succoumb to overload to easily since they would prevent any weapons being used.

yeah would lasers maintain enough power over the distances to be an effective assult weapon, or could they only used as in close deffence?
if laser were used as an inclose defence, what would happen if there were to friendly sapce craft, on with a deffensive laser, and an enemy projectile was comming in at such a angle that it wasnt able to be hit with the laser with out risk of the laser going on to hit another ship?

this would be true for all space weapons, as they wouldnt stop for a while, especially in deep space, so where these weapons were going would really have to be a consideration

what if we have the craft traveling faster than the projectile? and some how a ship actually manages to get in front of its own weapon? with faster than light travel this might also happen with a laser

or one of these high kenetic rounds might go into orbit, come round and smack into the gun that fired it again, not likely but it more probable to happen than on a planet

Cut the crap, by the time that would be possible, either mankind would have destroyed itself through war, one nation would have achieved dominance anyway - the US, so there would be noone to fight - or all nations would be living in peace together anyway, no point in speculating on unrealistic Star Wars space battles. By the way, an ordinary bag of sand and a grenade in orbit can create quite a minefield. At such large relative velocities as one finds in space, a single grain of sand can destroy a satellite.

Originally posted by Simon666
Cut the crap, by the time that would be possible, either mankind would have destroyed itself through war, one nation would have achieved dominance anyway - the US, so there would be noone to fight - or all nations would be living in peace together anyway, no point in speculating on unrealistic Star Wars space battles. By the way, an ordinary bag of sand and a grenade in orbit can create quite a minefield. At such large relative velocities as one finds in space, a single grain of sand can destroy a satellite.

With respect, the time IS here.
We have the tech, we have the knowledge, just lack the money and will power.

First up, all you need to do is breach a hull and its over, so kinetic projectiles would rule the battle. I can imagine centrifugal or rail guns being very useful. No propellant to worry about.

Another tactic that would be effective is little thrusters that you could launch at an enemy. Once they latch on they ignite and push the enemy craft away or out of control. If the enemy craft did not have any opposing thrust there would be nothing they could do about it.

And to be too cliché, lasers would be potent weapons in space. Again, a little weakening of a hull or a breach is all it takes. I would imagine sonic weapons could be usefull to rattle or weaken seals and such. Again: Break the hull pressure just a tiny bit and its good night.

But all this is kind of moot. By the time we are advanced enough to be in space combat type scenarios, newer weapons will certainly be available that we may not be able to imagine right now.

I like space combat .

Shattered OUT...

Nukes, lots of nukes.

Nuclear weapons pack the biggest punch of any weapon and in space carry none of the usual disavantages against yourself. They would be ideal multipurpose tools and weapons, and require no real technology to develop.

They would also be an excellent weapon to use against any populations on the planet, with highly effective effects. Orbital nuclear launchers are ideal platforms, so why not allow them to duel with each other?

Lasers are wonderful, but require large power sources, and alot of new tech, kinetics are difficult to use in a place so large as space, thus the one thing that will get you a hit and not require a massive launching vehicle would be small, tactical nuclear weapons. Humans will never outgrow the need to "nuke 'em."

Spacewarfare will be conducted like this, kinetic weapons for total distruction and precision laser weapons for search and seizure(of the vessal) I think that Space Warfare is gonna concentrate on Capturing enemy unit's as that's one extra unit to add to your force. It's completely feasible in Space. Just send a breaching frigate with a bunch of space marines on board heh.

[edit on 25-8-2005 by sardion2000]

The Marines would be vulnerable in transit. And space ships are far to fragile to try and capture, the wrong component goes boing and its all over. Space war wouldnt be like 16th century naval combat where you try to caputure your enemies ships.

Kinetics, Lasers and Nukes. Nothing else.

As for space being to vast to make kinetics effective, a sensible weapon would shoot out a cloub of projectiles, filling space with them, also slight manuvering ability would allow them to cluster or intercept incoming fragments.

Then you get hit by a 10 kilo nuclear missile that has targeted you and you find yourself at its epicenter, and get promptly incinerated.

Missiles can be shielded from lasers, and kinetics with missiles and anti missiles in space is trying to hit your bullet with a bullet, and we all know how effective that is.

Well I doubt humans will be in the ships at all. The life support and habitat modules, supply distribution would be inefficient. In the future the nation with the best computers will win. Tracking and shooting down incoming missiles and evading enemy missile shields will be to enormous for humans. So wed have to program computers to do it. The ships would effectivly be computers with guns

well would ther even be a need for ships at all? what if you launch a craft a faster than light from the surface of a planet, and onto another planet, no need to exist in real space at all, there be no targets

Originally posted by tiddly54
well would ther even be a need for ships at all? what if you launch a craft a faster than light from the surface of a planet, and onto another planet, no need to exist in real space at all, there be no targets

Faster than light targets are interceptable as it would take several years for a Faster Than light craft to go from point A, to point B far away. You're making the targets, and these craft go in a predictable straigth path.

If you're going to colonize other planets, you need to chart space.

Shattered OUT...

Well, "current" war in space will be between satellites... Gas propelled missiles on the older models, lasers and EMP weapons on newer versions. It'll be all about blinding the enemy and making them unable to see what's going on by taking out satellites. Currently though, much of what's up there is pretty old, so much of it may not even work (assuming of course, that such weapons are already up there, which seems likely, during the height of the cold war). We've launched some recent military satellites, but who knows if they are weapons or observation in mission....??? Of course, we'd likely be violating some treaties there, but I doubt that's really been a concern of any particular side....(getting caught is the concern).

Originally posted by ShatteredSkies
Faster than light targets are interceptable as it would take several years for a Faster Than light craft to go from point A, to point B far away. You're making the targets, and these craft go in a predictable straigth path.

If you're going to colonize other planets, you need to chart space.

Shattered OUT...

Hmm well that would imply you had a faster than faster than light craft.
Or you already had units ready.

Originally posted by devilwasp

Originally posted by ShatteredSkies
Faster than light targets are interceptable as it would take several years for a Faster Than light craft to go from point A, to point B far away. You're making the targets, and these craft go in a predictable straigth path.

If you're going to colonize other planets, you need to chart space.

Shattered OUT...

Hmm well that would imply you had a faster than faster than light craft.
Or you already had units ready.

What I meant was that, if doesn't matter how fast you're going, you're still moving in a straight line, thus your course can be intercepted by anything as fast as you, remember that all you need is something slightly faster than you or as fast, then you can be intercepted.

The safest way to be transported around the galaxy without rick of being intercepted by other ships, is to be transported through a wormhole(granted wormholes are controllable).

All though Worm holes will probably never be controllable, the theory is sound, that to go from point A, to point B, the easiest way is to simply fold the space in between the two points so that the two points are right on top of each other with no space time in between. Is this right? I'm no Physics professor, so I'm not sure if that's how the basis of Wormholes works, but I think that's how.

Shattered OUT...

Originally posted by ShatteredSkies
What I meant was that, if doesn't matter how fast you're going, you're still moving in a straight line, thus your course can be intercepted by anything as fast as you, remember that all you need is something slightly faster than you or as fast, then you can be intercepted.

Not really, unless your already IN space and OR starting off at or quite near the point of origin then you would be behind the target and not catch it.
Mind you IF you have a faster than faster than light drive then yeah your right.

Originally posted by Uncle Joe
As for space being to vast to make kinetics effective, a sensible weapon would shoot out a cloub of projectiles, filling space with them, also slight manuvering ability would allow them to cluster or intercept incoming fragments.

Wouldn;t those fragments, post dangers too, in the long run.

I'm no space guy, but as far as I know, they could be caught in obrit by the Earth's Gravity.

So, Kintenic weapons are out. Missiles also cause fragments, they should be taken out too. So whats left is probably Energy weapons.

But seriously, destroying stuff in space, WILL leave behind tons of space fragments, which will be dangerous. Imagine having your TV stallite taken out by a bullet shot out from its barrel, 3 years ago (>....>