It's military Spencerianism: ideas and institutions have survival and reproduction value (for the ideas and institutions, not for the mere races which may follow them at a particular moment). The value of ideas and institutions is proven on the battlefield.

The military transformation encompassed by the United States is unprecedented. There is no competition; no one else is even in the game. The superiority is self-perpetuating and exponential.

And it is such an easy yoke and light burden for the world, for are not asking for subservience. In the words of a great American President, "All we ask is to be left alone."

We need to start inluding Luna next to Alaska on our national maps.

A couple of decades ago it was pointed out that all you need to do is to be able to launch gravel into the proper retrograde orbits as far out as geosynchronous, and you can wipe out in a matter of minutes any technological advantage that comes from having satellites.

And you don't need satellites to lob nuclear warheads around.

Mr. Ortega;

The problem with that technique is that it's an "area effect" weapon – there's no protection for your own satellites.

Since we're all riding our hobby horses lately, I'll get on mine and say that what we need even more than this Air Force plan is cheap orbital lift capability. Right now they're talking about what sort of gun goes on the tank they're powering with a scooter engine. Amatuers study tactics, professionals study logistics. The most logistical issue here is life capability.

If you've got the lift capability, you can just wipe out everything and relaunch what you need. This was one of the few places the USSR had a superiority over the USA. Had someone wiped out all of the satellites, the Soviets would have been operational again in months, while the USA would likely have taken years.

AOG,

What I don't understand is how the Soviets managed such a powerful lift capability even though Baikonur is so far from the equator.

Nobody talks about deterrence anymore. The key is survivable second and third strike capability. The discussion seems to presume that other powers can restrain the U.S. from asserting its non-nuclear supremacy by threatening nuclear war, which is nonsense. North Korea's national survival is not directly threatened by our invasion of Iran, or vice versa. Do we expect the entire world to band together in an anti-American suicide pact?

Eugene;

Being near the equator is helpful, but hardly critical. The Soviets did well because it was a competition between a massive, state funded bureaucracy and a massive, state run bureaucracy.

In an odd way, the Soviet's cheap and dirty approach was an advantage. Because their satellites weren't as sophisticated as ours, they had to be replaced more often. This both made the system as a whole more survivable and gave the Soviets a lot more practice in launching. Meanwhile, we handicapped ourselves by having NASA do both research and operations. Not a good idea.