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Threat Chaos

Richard Stiennon

US to shoot down spy satellite

By | February 14, 2008, 10:13am PST

Summary: This news just in. The Bush administration has decided to attempt to shoot down the failed spy satellite that was due to enter the earth’s atmosphere sometime in coming weeks. I can see why they might want to do this. First, it could reduce the hazard from large chunks of satellite falling [...]

This news just in. The Bush administration has decided to attempt to shoot down the failed spy satellite that was due to enter the earth’s atmosphere sometime in coming weeks. I can see why they might want to do this. First, it could reduce the hazard from large chunks of satellite falling on into a populated area. Second, there might be some fear that secret technology could fall into the wrong hands. And third, it would be a great demonstration of the US’ anti-satellite capabilities.

All well and good. What if the missile misses? Talk about embarrassing. I just hope somebody gets some good video of the event

.

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Richard

http://blogs.zdnet.com/threatchaos/?page_id=455

Biography

Richard

A former ZDNet blogger, Richard Stiennon is an industry consultant. Most recently he was Chief Marketing Officer for Fortinet, Inc., the largest privately held security vendor. prior to that he was Chief Research Analyst at IT-Harvest. And before creating IT-Harvest, he was VP of threat research for Webroot Software, Inc. the leading commercial anti-spyware solution.

Previously, Richard was VP Research at Gartner, Inc. where he covered security topics including firewalls, intrusion detection, intrusion prevention, security consulting and managed security services for the Security and Privacy group. He is a holder of Gartner's Thought Leadership award for 2003 and was named "One of the 50 most powerful people in Networking" by NetworkWorld magazine. His speaking engagements have included conferences and meetings throughout North and South America, Hawaii, Tokyo, Tel Aviv, Istanbul, Milan, Munich, Hannover, Madrid, London, and Cannes.

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I think Richard gets a "duh" ! ! !
Mr_Wizard 15th Feb 2008
" I can see why they might want to do this... there might be some fear that secret technology could fall into the wrong hands."

After a re-entry thru the atmosphere that would pretty much destroy it? At least as far as recovering a technology...
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Ha ha!
MGP2 14th Feb 2008
"The bush administration..." I hope the miniscule "b" was intentional (to match his miniscule intelligence). ;-p
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If He is so dumb, how is it he is getting his agenda accomplished and thwarting the
democrats almost every step of the way? don't forget they're the majority.

If he's dumb, what does that make them?

Even if you don't like the guy, he's beating his opposition at every single turn. Doesn't
sound like something s dumb person could pull off to me.
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That would be President Cheney following his and former President Bush's agenda. Vice President bush is a talking head.
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RE: US to shoot down spy satellite
weberdan@... 14th Feb 2008
Is this gonna put even more space junk into orbit? Because it's crowded up there already.
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No, it will not
CMKRNL 14th Feb 2008
It should not put ny more junk up there.

First of all the satellite already has a decaying orbit, so it's already coming down.

second, the missile most likely won't have an orbital trajectory

and lastly, the effects of an impact or explosion will only further destabilize the
orbit(s) of all involved hardware.
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What I think is interesting . . .
JLHenry 15th Feb 2008
is what no-one is saying, except as aside - They've known about this satellite for awhile now, but were just going to let it crash into the ocean, or some unpopulated area, like Skylab did.

But something's changed that is forcing them to shoot the thing so it doesn't hurt anyone. I wonder where the Trajectory would've put it? Must be a BIG populated region to go to this trouble . . .
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I think Richard gets a "duh" ! ! !
Mr_Wizard 15th Feb 2008
" I can see why they might want to do this... there might be some fear that secret technology could fall into the wrong hands."

After a re-entry thru the atmosphere that would pretty much destroy it? At least as far as recovering a technology...

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