“This is certainly not a regular occurrence as a potential space weapon hangs over low Earth orbit itself and turns it into a ‘shooting gallery.’” But intelligence has been received from two member nations within NATO that “there is a ‘zone-effect’ anti-satellite weapon being developed in Russia with the potential to fill Starlink orbits with ‘clouds of pellets which are mm in size.’ The goal here is to destroy dozens or even hundreds of satellites during a ‘single operation.’”
1. Role of Starlink in the War Situation in Ukraine
Since its rapid activation in February 2022, the Starlink influence has proved nothing but life-saving for the Ukrainians’ communication services. It only took SpaceX moments to activate Starlink after Ukrainians received an appeal from their Minister of Digital Transformation, and terminals arrived the next day. Starlink’s connections were accessed by over 150,000 Ukrainians per day by May of the same year, and this facilitated command and control and drone attacks. Low Earth Orbit constellation’s speed and resilience have made it an elite asset of C4ISRT. It is the least Crimea would want.
2. Technical Concept of the “Zone-Effect” Weapon
The supposed Russian network would strike an orbit of 550 km with hundreds of thousands of dense pellets at orbital velocities, focusing on the orbital zone of the Starlink satellite network. Orphaned pellets that were merely millimeters in size could bypass the current systems for the detection of space objects and easily strike the satellite at orbital velocities of 7-8 km/s merely for devastating damage to the solar panels and satellite functionalities without even striking the satellite itself. This process, according to Brig. Gen. Christopher W. Horner, is merely “blowing up a box full of BBs.”
3. Physics and Debris Hazards
“Historical ASAT tests demonstrate what can happen,” writes Jane Qiu in “Scienceodashvia simpledarwinian.railgun.org the likeliest outcomes would appear both hazardous and highly unpredictable.” The Asian test in 2007 blasted its FY-1C satellite into a thousand pieces, creating ‘more than 3,400 bits of traceable debris and thousands more that remain in orbit to this day.’ ‘A 10 cm object moving at LEO orbital velocity would pack a kinetic energy punch capable of a seven kg TNT blast.’ ‘The impactors in the Russian scheme would be smaller, yet density and velocity would make these deadly for delicate satellite electronics. The debris belt would produce a cascade effect via the Kessler syndrome, rendering broad belts of orbits unusable for decades.
4. Legal and Strategic Constraints
Although WMDs are prohibited in the Outer Space Treaty, they are prohibited in terms of their use in orbit, and cloud pellet ‘weapons’ are excluded. As indiscriminate weapons, this weapon may therefore violate the law of distinction and even further the law of proportionality since it would be incapable of discriminating between military and civil targets like satellites. A reason this weapon may be precluded for use can well be that all these LEO systems utilized by the Russians may blind it.
5. Countermeasures and Strategies of Resistance
However, to offset these effects, technology and actions need to be simultaneously considered. The Existing debris monitoring infrastructure is not able to detect objects with millimeter accuracy, and therefore the shield and/or maneuvering design has limited capability. Swarming technology, based on redundancy provided by constellations such as Starlink with thousand satellites in orbit, could also face mass losses through “zone effect” attacks. Concepts being explored include rapid launch protectors and jam protectors to resist unkinetic attacks. “Bodyguard” protection satellites, proposed in France, could have an ability to destroy pellet-releasors before they can be launched.
6. Russia’s Broader Counterspace Toolkit
There already has been a Russian reversible space weapon such as GPS and SATCOM jamming that has been developed tactically in Ukraine. This has impacted Western-provided precision strike weapons and unmanned aerial vehicles. Russia demonstrated direct-ascent ASAT in 2021 on Cosmos 1408 that was an orbital debris-generating attack that revealed strategic intentions of producing orbital debris. This particular pellet weapon is indicative of denial and strategic ambiguity.
7.Vulnerability of Starlink to Other Telecommunications
Starlink’s satellite dominance in LEO communications affords Elon Musk an unprecedented level of geopolitical influence. Musk’s orbit control, as demonstrated by its blackout of Kherson in September 2022, highlights the effect of a single private entity’s flexibility in action on the battle environment. “Control focus concerns military strategists who insist on service non-denial clauses in agreements.” With respect to ASAT threats by pellets, Starlink’s significance in Ukrainian battlespace environments makes it an attractive asset both technologically and politically.
8. Implication to Global Space Security
“Zone-effect” strikes not only pose potential threat to Starlink satellites, but also to all orbital satellite constellations that share common orbits. Its indiscriminate potential also raises the probability of neglect of responsible space norms and rapid development of the space weaponization trend. Without development of global space security agreements that are fully enforceable and orbital debris removal technology, one zone-effect strike might bring future space degradation.
The development of the potential Russian “pellet cloud” ASAT weapon is one area at which physics and space security intersect, and one might say that the message to space security professionals is that the next space battle might not involve laser-equipped satellites and intercontinental missile threats, but clouds of “invisible and deadly” pellets drifting through the highways through which our satellites travel.
