China fires lasers at US satelites

I've noticed that no one as posted about this yet and so I thought I should start a thread.
The Daily Telegraph is stating that China is using high powered lasers to blind US spy satelites and that it is being kept quiet because the US wants China's co-operation regarding Iran and North Korea.
does any one know what type of lasers china are using and if this does permanent damage to the delicate sensors systems on board the satelites.

Heres a link to the news article.
www.telegraph.co.uk.../news/2006/09/26/wchina226.xml

[edit on 27-9-2006 by Kurokage]

Very interesting find Kurokage! I'll make a reaserch upon that and be back with some info

Thanks Russian Boy.
I find it strange that nothing has been said about this, maybe the US are doing the same thing, a "tit-for-tat" so to speak. Does the US have the same capability, a working model or just prototypes?? and if they did retaliate would this cause an escialation of the situation??

edited to say "Thanks Kinglizard"



[edit on 27-9-2006 by Kurokage]

I think I've heard this news before, I know china did a lot reach on opitcal weapons, but I'm not sure if they can work as well as the article claims.

But one thing I do know, they have a laser blind device on their ZTZ99 tanks for blinding enemy tanks' optical devices, and apparently ZTZ99 tanks are the only tanks in the world equipped with such device.

[edit on 9/27/2006 by warset]

Not to be a butt,but I already posted a thread about this. "China's Lasers versus America's Satellites".

www.abovetopsecret.com...

[edit on 27-9-2006 by SpeakerofTruth]

[edit on 27-9-2006 by SpeakerofTruth]

You can build a laser to blind optical based satellites now, and you could also potentially build a microwave laser to try to fry the curcuit boards(unlikely since they are hardened against such things due to the environment they reside in). We have shot lasers to the moon and have it bounce off a mirror back to us. The recharge time of the capacitors must be killer though. Also, to my knowledge, there is no way to detect laser attacks unless it's shining through particulate heavy atmosphere.

I've find some earlier news talking about china is going to build a laser anti satellite device, these news are posted in 1998-1999

www.worldnetdaily.com...
www.taiwansecurity.org...

It might be true that china has already completed their device and is currently testing it, like the article claimed, and the US kept quiet about this because of NK issues.

[edit on 9/27/2006 by warset]

Russia used a laser to blind a US CIA worker or something when a US helecopter was buzzing thier Elctronic Intel ship. The camera man actually took a photo of the laser coming out one of the superstructur's windows, aimed right at him. The laser messed the dudes eyes up for a few days or something. Saw it on Discovery or one of those shows.

Originally posted by BASSPLYR
Russia used a laser to blind a US CIA worker or something when a US helecopter was buzzing thier Elctronic Intel ship. The camera man actually took a photo of the laser coming out one of the superstructur's windows, aimed right at him. The laser messed the dudes eyes up for a few days or something. Saw it on Discovery or one of those shows.

that's laser blinding gun you are talking about, chinese armed police has a few of those too



It's different from building an anti satellite device in terms of technology requirments.

[edit on 9/27/2006 by warset]

Originally posted by sardion2000
Also, to my knowledge, there is no way to detect laser attacks unless it's shining through particulate heavy atmosphere.

A sufficiently powerful laser, such as any type that is powerful enough to cause sustained burning or one that is used to beam into space will most likely be visible to the naked eye. There are pen lasers commercially available with beams that are visible at any angle.

This isn't a find. Wolf Blitzer reported on this on the Situation Room.

This is whats going on.

Is China moving in on the U.S.?
Thats a question people should be asking.

I would think that a laser would be bending by the magnetic fields of the earth thus making targeting very difficult, unless you had some receiver to point in on. Hence, I would think that in order to hit a satellite with a laser from earth you would have to have had or have access to its transponder. This sounds to me like an inside job, which does not surprise me, but targeting random stuff in the earth’s orbit the size of a large truck seems like something that is not plausible at the current state of technology. In addition, you would have to compensate for speed, there are many factors playing in here, you would not just be aiming and shooting.
(So I theorise that if they could hit a satellite, they could target meteors and other junk in orbit, which I highly doubt. However, most satellites are in low orbit, so there are not a lot of stuff in-between them and us of course.

Also as thousand said, it would be visible from a distance of around 100 miles from the point of origin!

You have to remember that laser does not act like radio waves, laser is concentrated photons in one specific spectre (mostly red or blue,) and like everything else they are influenced by many factors like magnetism and gravity.

EDIT: Typo


[edit on 27-9-2006 by Tetragrammaton]

Thanks Warset!

Yeah I'd Imagine that the one ment to fire into space would be substantialy different on technological terms. Was wondering what the laser weapon used in that incedent was. The photo was creepy too. The beam was comming right out of the shadows upbehind the wheel house, on the superstructure. The beam shaft wasn't even visible just the circular part when it's aimed right at you.

Didn't the US use a magnetic pulse gun fired from a window across the street from the Kremlin or someplace in Moscow to create a short in their computer room(one of them at keast) so that US personel dressed up as Russian firefighters could have an excuse to enter the room and optain certain files or plant bugs. I saw it on the same program about 2 years ago. Sorry I don't have a link to it or anything.

Not saying that it's not possible but I would take "news" like this with a grain of salt.

Originally posted by Tetragrammaton
targeting random stuff in the earth’s orbit the size of a large truck seems like something that is not plausible at the current state of technology.

We have been bouncing a laser off a 3 foot reflector that was left on the Moon during the Apollo missions.

sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov...

also....

We can hit inbound missiles going mach 4 with "killer" high energy laser systems.

I bet hitting a satellite on a known orbit wouldn't be that difficult.

Originally posted by Kurokage
I've noticed that no one as posted about this yet and so I thought I should start a thread.
The Daily Telegraph is stating that China is using high powered lasers to blind US spy satelites....

Come now, in all seriousness, they are simply playing laser tag.
Awesome game.

Btw, the US has, for years, been doing such with both Russian and Chinese satelites.

Originally posted by kinglizard

Originally posted by Tetragrammaton
targeting random stuff in the earth’s orbit the size of a large truck seems like something that is not plausible at the current state of technology.

We have been bouncing a laser off a 3 foot reflector that was left on the Moon during the Apollo missions.

sunearth.gsfc.nasa.gov...

also....

We can hit inbound missiles going mach 4 with "killer" high energy laser systems.

I bet hitting a satellite on a known orbit wouldn't be that difficult.

Indeed we are though I am sure both the reflector and the missiles send out radio waves, for instance this is speculation, the reflector transmits a radio wave we use as a homing beacon to adjust and pin point the laser in on.

The missile again transmits a radio signal towards its target area, which we be use to accurately hit it with the laser.

A spy satellite should not be sending out detectable radio waves, it should be in stealth mode; hence, it should be an object no larger than a truck, sending out no light. How do you track that amongst all the junk we have in orbit?
The only reason they could find it is that this satellite is a satellite and moves in a particular orbit, though I speculate that hitting it with a laser is hard. Remember that missiles are not outside our stratosphere, and thus cannot be affected by the magnetic energy field that is around earth.

But you are right if the spy satellite in question is a large truck sized metallic object sending out light and radio waves it will not be a problem to hit it, though you would probably miss a couple of times before accurately hitting it.

I have no beef in this case I just offered my two cents, as I stated I did not say it was impossible, I would just think that the CIA or who ever ordered the satellite to be send up, did a better job in making the satellite harder to detect.

I would speculate that it is in a ten to twelve hour orbit at speeds around one to two thousand kilometres per hour, hence it should only be snapping pictures and have passive listening mode on for around 2 hours while it is over China. It then has eight to ten hours of time on each revolution to send the information needed directly or relay through other satellites all ready in orbit.

A two hour delay seems better than getting no information at all would you not agree Lord Reptile?


[edit on 28-9-2006 by Tetragrammaton]

Read the first article in this Link

Heres two little extracts I find interesting

According to the article, a recent Pentagon report "acknowledge[d] China has the ability to blind U.S. satellites, thanks to a powerful ground-based laser." That's not exactly right. What the report actually says isn't quite so definitive:

Evidence exists that China is improving its situational awareness in space, which will give it the ability to track and identify most satellites. Such capability will allow for the deconfliction of Chinese satellites, and would also be required for offensive actions. At least one of the satellite attack systems appears to be a groundbased laser designed to damage or blind imaging satellites.

Finally, with regard to laser blinding -- it is not as easy as it sounds to "blind" an optical satellite with a laser. I'm no physicist, but as I understand it, imaging satellites usually work in several wavelengths, meaning first of all you'd have to have lasers in all the colors that match those wavelengths to blind the sat, not just one single wavelength laser beam. Secondly, because of the way imaging sats work, taking pictures of strips of the Earth using strips of pixels, you'd have to figure out how to blind all the pixels -- which apparently is so hard as to be well nigh impossible. And I note that as far as I know, we haven't gotten that far with Starfire, so what makes us so sure the Chinese are ahead of us there?

Originally posted by Tetragrammaton

I am sure both the reflector and the missiles send out radio waves, for instance this is speculation, the reflector transmits a radio wave we use as a homing beacon to adjust and pin point the laser in on.

The reflector on the moon is simply an aluminum box containing 100 fused silica half-cubes that serve to reflect energy back to it's source. It' been sitting on the moons surface for 25 years now...It transmits no signal.

Here is a photo of the reflector.

Originally posted by Tetragrammaton
The missile again transmits a radio signal towards its target area, which we be use to accurately hit it with the laser.

The high energy laser systems rely on radar for tracking and targeting.

Originally posted by Tetragrammaton
A spy satellite should not be sending out detectable radio waves, it should be in stealth mode; hence, it should be an object no larger than a truck, sending out no light. How do you track that amongst all the junk we have in orbit?

Mostly with Phased-array radars that can scan and track huge areas of space with one sweep. They are capable of detecting (I believe) anything onion size and above. Most of the debris in orbit is monitored. A car sized satellite orbiting earth looks like a 10,000 pound elephant sitting in your living room.

Well radar is radio waves, and your debate style is kind of, like an ostrich I had some other points but never mind that. Therefore, they hit a box with laser from 400.000 kilometres away going at a circular speed of 1000 kilometres per hour. Impressive, I would think that the mirror had some thought other than coordinates to home in on since the mirror is no longer, where they put it. The mirror in question has proven that the moon is moving away from us and over large distances; they would have missed it at some point unless they knew that before measuring and they did not, since the mirror proved that.

However, true, tracking a satellite like object weighing around 5 tons should not be the hardest thing, though I do not know what kind of orbit these satellites are in, if they are using the same orbit as the thousand of other satellites in orbit etc.

Moreover, if they made the SPY satellite from radio wave reflecting material, they should be fired, since their IQ is not proportional to the task.

In addition, to clarify I never said this was an impossible task!