BlueBloggin

   BEIJING (Reuters) - China is concerned by U.S. plans to shoot down an ailing spy satellite and is considering what “preventative measures” to take, the Foreign Ministry said on Sunday.“The Chinese government is paying close attention to how the situation develops and demands the U.S. side fulfill its international obligations and avoids causing damage to security in outer space and of other countries,” spokesman Liu Jianchao said.

President George W. Bush has decided to have the Navy shoot the 5,000-pound (2,270 kg) satellite with a modified tactical missile after security advisers suggested its re-entry could lead to a loss of life, U.S. officials said on Thursday.

“Relevant departments in China are closely watching the situation and studying preventive measures,” Liu said in a brief statement posted on the Foreign Ministry’s Web site (www.fmprc.gov.cn).

On Saturday, Russia’s Defense Ministry said the U.S. plan could be used as a cover to test a new space weapon.

It will be the first time the United States has conducted an anti-satellite operation since the 1980s. Russia also has not conducted anti-satellite activities in 20 years.

China launched a ground-based missile into an obsolete weather satellite in January 2007, drawing international criticism and worries inside the Pentagon that Beijing has the ability to target critical military assets in space.

U.S. Missile to Destroy Satellite

The United States will shoot down one of its own satellites. There are fears that America might enter a military space race with China.

The United States has abstained from anti-satellite tests for over 20 years. This latest development follows China’s shooting down one of its satellites last year in a missile test. That action drew U.S. and Russian condemnation.

Putting the Pentagon’s coming action into that context, “The ramifications of the operation are diplomatic as well as military and scientific,” writes the International Herald Tribune.

According to Gary Payton, a senior Pentagon official, the Chinese have been trying to intimidate the United States. He concluded that “space is no longer a sanctuary; it is a contested domain.”

The Economist says that should the two countries enter a protracted struggle for dominance in space it could deteriorate into a costly arms race, from which the United States has the most to lose. The magazine judges it surprising that the U.S. government has been reluctant to discuss a space weapons ban.

So, both Russia and China are raising their collective eyebrows at the US plan to shoot this mysterious toxic satellite while still in space.

Little wonder there is a lot of interest in this decision … in 2000 a US missile test failed. Russia states these tests violate the violation of the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile treaty. China is tense after US criticism of China’s own missile destruction of a weather satellite in 2007 and recent accusations of spying.

BEIJING (Reuters) - China is not running a spy network in the United States and Washington should cease its allegations of espionage, the foreign ministry said on Thursday, days after the U.S. Justice Department arrested four for spying. “We demand the U.S. side abandon its Cold War thinking and stop its gratuitous criticism of China,” he added, saying other unnamed countries had made similar “irresponsible” remarks.American officials with access to the intelligence on the test said that the United States kept mum about the anti-satellite test in hopes that China would come forth with an explanation.

It was more than a week before the intelligence leaked out: a Chinese missile had been launched and an aging weather satellite in its path, more than 500 miles above the earth, had been reduced to rubble. But protests filed by the United States, Japan, Canada and Australia, among others, were met with silence — and quizzical looks from officials in China’s Foreign Ministry, who seemed to be caught unaware.

Another US contradiction?

   Missile Defense Future May Turn on Success of Mission to Destroy Satellite

WASHINGTON — The order by President Bush for the Navy to launch an antimissile interceptor to destroy a disabled satellite before it falls from orbit carries opportunity, but also potential embarrassment, for the administration and advocates of its missile defense program.

   A lot rides on the results of this missile event. US promises to pay for any damages resulting from this satellite … this insurance must be incredible. The satellite itself seems a grand excuse for the USA, but not for China. This is a foreign policy and diplomatic faux paux from a country in the throes of political Alzheimers.

Filed under: China, DOD, DoubleSpeak, Foreign Policy, Missile tests, Satellites, diplomacy, distress, global community, spy