LONDON: The U.S. and China have set up an emergency “space hotline.”
Sadly, the connection will not be used so the two countries can gab about aliens, but is instead a way to avoid a satellite-related space war, U.S. assistant secretary of state Frank Rose told the Financial Times.
China and the U.S. (as well as Russia) have been rapidly investing in weaponry that can take down satellites that power orbital networks used for military operations. Knocking these satellites offline could mean that ground troops are left without critical weaponry. Rose tells the Financial Times that China has been testing out its satellite-killing technology. But to avoid the chance that a test or accidental manuever sets off a space war, this new hotline gives the U.S. quick access to the appropriate people in Beijing, and vice versa.
A year ago, alerts about collisions, approaches would have to go through China’s ministry of foreign affairs, Rose says. That meant a winding path from Joint Space Operations Center to the Pentagon to the State Department to the U.S. embassy in Beijing, and finally to the correct contact. With the hotline, officials can cut out the middlemen.
