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Peace on Earth, Peace off Earth, Peace with Earth

More Space or More War?

Arthur R. Woods, first published on May 26, 2013 - The Space Option Website.

The choice of using space technologies for either peace or for war and how that choice may influence the implementation of the Space Option is critical to our future. Simply stated, humanity must soon make a choice between “more space” or “more war”.

 

redstone-mercury

At a very early age, I became aware of the “cosmic choice” which is inherent in space technology as illustrated in the image above. A Redstone mobile guided ballistic missile with a nuclear warhead is pictured in the photo on the left. In the right photo we see the lift-off of the Mercury-Redstone carrying the Alan Shepard, the first American astronaut, to the edge of space. Here we see the same launch vehicle being used for two distinct different purposes: one designed for invoking mass destruction and one designed for opening the space frontier to human exploration. These two images are very personal to me because my father worked with the Redstone as part of the mobile liquid oxygen team while he was in the U.S. Army and later, at Cape Canaveral, he worked for Air Products, Inc. which supplied the liquid propellants for the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo rockets.

Having grown up in the vicinity of the US Space center in Florida during the Cuban missile crises which brought the world to the brink of nuclear war in 1962 and working there during the Apollo program in the summers of 1967 and 1968, I experienced both the fear of imminent nuclear war as well as the enthusiasm and the excitement of humankind going to the Moon – both of these emotions were shared by everyone across the US and, to some extent, around the world.

In his book The Overview Effect, Frank White had this to say:

“War and space exploration are alternative uses of the assertive, exploratory energies that are so characteristic of human beings. They may also be mutually exclusive because if one occurs on a massive scale, the other probably will not.” (1)

If we think about the implications of this statement and if we believe that the Space Option is important to the survival of our species, wouldn’t common sense tell us that space technologies that are developed specifically for the purposes of war should be avoided and banned from space? So what is the current situation?

There is obviously a lot about the militarization of space that most of us do not know about. For example, what is the ultimate purpose of the US Air Force’s X37B - a reusable robotic space plane that can stay in orbit for months before returning to Earth. Its 2010 mission lasted 222 days and the most recent launch was in December last year. (2)

In the news recently was a report of China launching a missile and, according to the words of a US defense source, "It was a ground-based missile that we believe would be their first test of an interceptor that would be designed to go after a satellite that's actually on orbit”. Was this another Chinese Anti-Satellite (ASAT) test – a follow-up to their 2007 ASAT mission? Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Hong Lei told reporters: "I want to emphasize that China has consistently advocated for the peaceful use of outer space and opposes the weaponization of outer space as well as an arms race in outer space." The Pentagon later reported that: "We tracked several objects during the flight but did not observe the insertion of any objects into orbit and no objects associated with this launch remain in space." So one can assume the Chinese statement was accurate and they were complying with their obligations under The Outer Space treaty which they have signed and ratified. (3)

On Wikipedia we find that the Outer Space Treaty - formally the Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space, including the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies - forms the basis of international space law. Among its principles, it bars States Parties to the Treaty from placing nuclear weapons or any other weapons of mass destruction in orbit of Earth, installing them on the Moon or any other celestial body, or to otherwise station them in outer space. It exclusively limits the use of the Moon and other celestial bodies to peaceful purposes and expressly prohibits their use for testing weapons of any kind, conducting military maneuvers, or establishing military bases, installations, and fortifications (Art.IV). (4, 5)

The treaty also states that the exploration of outer space shall be done to benefit all countries and shall be free for exploration and use by all the States. The Outer Space Treaty was opened for signature on January 27, 1967 and, as of May 2013, 102 countries are States Parties to the treaty, while another 27 have signed the treaty but have not completed ratification. However, the Treaty does not prohibit the placement of conventional weapons into orbit.

When it was written, The Outer Space Treaty focused on weapons of mass destruction, the immediate threat of the time, in efforts to control conflict and the use of force against space objects. Today, some forty-six years later, it is the use of conventional weapons in space that is becoming more dominant and more difficult to manage, particularly as the capabilities of space-based technologies advance and more countries including North Korea, Iran, Israel, Pakistan and India have developed or are developing the ability to place assets - including military assets - into space. At some point these military assets will need to be countered and, in the case of conflict, neutralized.

Thus when countries are developing military strategies and policies emphasizing “Full-Spectrum- Dominance” - whereby a joint military structure achieves control over all elements of the battlespace using land, air, maritime, space, and even cyber based assets as was outlined in the Joint Vision 2020 document released on May 30, 2010 by the US Department of Defense, other countries become worried about their survival and are motivated to develop countering strategies. (6,7) 

To address the limitations of Article IV of the Outer Space Treaty, in February 2008, China and Russia jointly submitted to the Conference on Disarmament a draft Treaty on the Prevention of the Placement of Weapons in Outer Space and the Threat or Use of Force against Outer Space Objects (PPWT). The United States rejected the PPWT in 2008, and the provisions of the proposal have raised questions among other members of the Conference on Disarmament, yet the Russian Federation and the People’s Republic of China continue to press for its adoption.

An analysis of this proposal and the potential strategic advantages can be read in a Space Review article by Michael Listner. (8)

In the current geo-political situation we find that the United States, its NATO partners and other alliances are engaged in numerous wars and skirmishes around the world. Yet, the economies of the US and those of many of the NATO member states continue to suffer setbacks while their national debt levels continue to increase in astronomical proportions. So we must ask, what are the benefits for pursuing all of these conflicts? Are the US and NATO countries national security really so threatened by the peoples in Asia and Africa where most of these conflicts are taking place? Or, is it the knowledge by our leaders that there is scarcity of dwindling resources on our finite planet and hegemony needs to be asserted? Is it that the military-industrial complex has an insatiable appetite for a nation’s treasury and an exorbitant influence over its government? Is it an East-West competition for the future with the US, Europe and Israel on the one side and China, Russia and Iran on the other? Or is it simply the perpetual myth that “war” is good for the economy because it creates jobs at home (while creating misery elsewhere)? If any of the above reasons are the prevailing motivations – war is surely not the answer.

Ludwig von Mises, the free-market economist, wrote that "war prosperity is like the prosperity that an earthquake or a plague brings. The earthquake means good business for construction workers, and cholera improves the business of physicians, pharmacists, and undertakers; but no one has for that reason yet sought to celebrate earthquakes and cholera as stimulators of the productive forces in the general interest." He goes further to say that: "Wars are harmful, not only to the conquered but to the conqueror. Society has arisen out of the works of peace; the essence of society is peacemaking. Peace and not war is the father of all things. Only economic action has created the wealth around us; labor, not the profession of arms, brings happiness. Peace builds; war destroys." (9)

If most, if not all, of the many conflicts in the world today could be ended, a lot of people would obviously live much more pleasant and comfortable lives and begin enjoying their part of our magnificent planet and maybe even begin dreaming about a trip into outer space. In the countries where the shooting is taking place the people could finally have some respite from the constant fear of unpredictable death and destruction and, in the countries pursuing the conflicts, needed resources could be used to address their own critical problems. If the conflicts were about securing resources we could turn our attention and apply our creativity to harvesting the infinite resources that lie beyond Earth’s atmosphere. The skills and the technologies of the military-industrial complex could easily be re-applied and re-focused to conquering the space frontier. East and West as well as North and South could pool their resources in cooperation and friendly economic competition. And humanity may eventually learn that “peace” is always better for the economy than “war”.

The above may be obvious to most but someone may surely ask: How do we get from here to there?  In a recent article Llewellyn H. Rockwell recognizes that we are in an historical moment and he proposes six steps on the path to peace that are worth considering:

  1. Our rulers are not a law unto themselves. i.e. they are subject to the same moral laws as the rest of us.
  2.  Humanize the demonized. We should make aware of the impact of wars on the target populations.
  3.  If we oppose aggression, let us oppose all aggression.
  4.  Never use "we" when speaking of the government – especially when talking about a government’s foreign policy.
  5.  War is not "good for the economy" - simply stated military spending is not related to job creation.
  6. Support the free market? Then oppose war - we cannot have peaceful cooperation and peaceful exchange of goods where people are killing each other. (9)

The prime directive of all living entities is to survive, be it an individual, a corporation, a government or anything else. But if the survival strategy of a particular entity endangers the survival of other entities and ultimately its own survival, as well, then a change of strategy is necessary. What is needed can be called “strategic intelligence” which is the collection, processing, analysis, and dissemination of intelligence that is required for forming policy at a national or international level. (10) At a global level - strategic intelligence - tells us that the survival policies of any one government should never endanger the survival prospects for the entire global community – not only for humanity - but for all living entities sharing our planet as well.

In the case of the Space Option, which I believe is vital to the survival prospects of humanity and indeed, to all life on this fragile and finite planet floating in the vastness of the cosmos, any military activities in space including the use of conventional weapons and/or space-based military systems and technologies should be banned as such activities may prevent humanity choosing the Space Option.

This brings us back to Frank White’s observation: “war and space exploration may be mutually exclusive because if one occurs on a massive scale, the other probably will not”. Thus, applying our strategic intelligence to making a choice between “more space” or “more war”, the choice for humanity should be obvious.

References: 

  1. The Overview Effect by Frank White 
    http://www.amazon.com/The-Overview-Effect-Exploration-Evolution/dp/1563472600 
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overview_effect 

  2. Space.Com US Military's Robot Space Plane Settles Into Mystery Mission by Leonard David 
    http://www.space.com/19893-military-space-plane-x37b-mystery.html

  3. The Telegraph US fears after Chinese missile test 
    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/10063455/US-fears-after-Chinese-missile-test.html

  4. Wikipedia: Outer Space Treaty 
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outer_Space_Treaty

  5. Wikisource: The Outer Space Treaty of 1967 (complete text) 
    http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Outer_Space_Treaty_of_1967

  6. Wikipedia: Full-spectrum-dominance 
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Full-spectrum_dominance

  7.  U.S. Department of Defense:Joint Vision 2020 Emphasizes Full-spectrum Dominance 
    http://www.defense.gov/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=45289

  8. The Space Review: An exercise in the Art of War: China’s National Defense white paper, outer space, and the PPWT by Michael Listner, Monday, April 25, 2011 
    http://www.thespacereview.com/article/1828/1

  9. LewRockwell.com: Another Nail in the Neocon Coffin by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. 
    http://lewrockwell.com/rockwell/manifesto-for-peace212.html

  10.  Wikipedia: Strategic Intelligence 
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_intelligence