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The Sunday Times of London ran an article titled Nasa to put man on far side of moon, which detailed U.S. plans to send a substantial expedition to the far side of the moon - the side that never faces the Earth.
What the Times misses is that the far side of the moon is, like the bottom of the oceans and unlike any other area in Earth's orbit, pretty impervious to monitoring. That makes it a great place to put nuclear weapons and other weapons of cataclysmic destructive power. Unlike the depths of the oceans, however, whoever gets there first can pretty easily keep everyone else out. That's because even a single bullet fired from the moon at an approaching rocket could result in utter annihilation of the rocket, with no warning and no recoverable wreckage. Bullets are cheap. Space rockets are very expensive. Do the math.
It is of critical importance that the United States or other free nations take this step now and assume military control of the moon, while they can afford to develop such an infrastructure, because the alternative is that an unfree nation, such as China, will take this step later and hold a Damocles' sword over the human race in near-perpetuity.
We should just nuke China now, while we still can.
I think it was Eisenhower who decided not to do that. It was discussed, specifically nuking their first nuclear reactor. It's important to seize the high ground, and the moon is the high ground.
Posted by: Sterling on March 20, 2006 03:40 AMIt's important to seize the high ground, and the moon is the high ground.
Mars, bitches!
Posted by: mike on March 20, 2006 04:36 AMMaybe, but it's a lot harder to hit the Earth from Mars than from the moon.
Ever read The Moon is a Harsh Mistress? Let me give you the key takeaway: the moon has no atmosphere and low gravity, and sits at the top of the Earth's gravity well, so hurling big things at the Earth from the moon is easy to do. Try to imagine the strategic importance of being able to shoot a dozen or so rocks per hour, each the size of a freight car (let's say 75 cubic meters), at specific cities on Earth, striking at a relatively modest 15000 m/s. Limestone weighs about 1500 km per cubic meter, so if my physics isn't too rusty, that means ((1500 x 75) x 15000^2)/2, which comes to a kinetic energy of 12,656,250,000,000 joules. The original Hiroshima blast released about four or five times that amount of energy. Thus a single catapult weapon on the moon could generate a rate of fire sufficient to level two or three cities per hour, using rocks.
I won't even get into the potential of particle beam weapons or X-ray lasers, sighted on the near side of the moon but powered from the far side. Suffice to say, the moon gets so hot in the sun that you could put simple steam boilers on the surface and the solar heat alone would operate them. No need for fancy, fragile solar collectors, just put big steel bladders of water on the surface and the steam pressure will spin turbines located down below. And daylight lasts for two weeks.
Posted by: Sterling on March 20, 2006 05:21 AMSterling
Couldn't the threat you posit - evil chinks throwing rocks by catapult at western cities - be countered just as well with satellites positioned so as to catch or zap these projectiles, either with huge nets or with some kind of a ray gun?
Or couldn't we just pre-empt chinky plans by nuking the moon to bits before they get their evil mitts (with their limestone rocks) on it?
Or - best yet, couldn't we send up a key operative, well-versed in the ways of danger and the backways of derring-do, to hole out there, waiting for the chinks to rig up their limestone-rock-hurling catapult, when the secret Sterling operative can cut the cords of the devilish medieval weapon and save the world?
Posted by: Claude de Bigny on March 20, 2006 11:38 AMCouldn't the threat you posit - evil chinks throwing rocks by catapult at western cities - be countered just as well with satellites positioned so as to catch or zap these projectiles, either with huge nets or with some kind of a ray gun?
We're not talking about ICBMs with delicate navigation electronics carrying 200 pound nuclear devices likewise composed of delicate electronics. We're talking about a rock the size of a train car, moving 15000 meters per second. You don't stop something like that - you just get out of its way.
Others have suggested nuking the moon.
Posted by: Sterling on March 20, 2006 01:12 PM99 - Ah, another one of those wonderful "pre-emptive wars". You better be sure you get all 1.3 billion of them. I'm not sure I like those odds.
Sterling - We should build a force field to prevent the dropping of limestone blocks. A means of heating the rocks to extreme temperatures through friction and burning them up.
We should also invade Egypt pre-emptively for amassing an enourmous stockpile of tactical Limestone Blocks.
Posted by: Gherimiah on March 20, 2006 02:53 PMI don't think there's actually limestone up there - I couldn't find any number identifying the mass of moon rock so I fudged it by using limestone. At least some of the moon is basalt, which is substantially denser than limestone.
The main operator in the equation is the velocity, not the density of the rock. I mean, if you hit a tank with a rubber ball traveling at 15000 m/s, the ball would probably go right through it, and the pressure wave would kill the men inside.
There was a supposedly undeployed U.S. kinetic energy weapon system from the late 70s or early 80s called "Thor" which relied on this principle. Basically, the idea was to send up satellites filled with segments of teflon-coated rebar with mounted, articulated fins and rudimentary on-board processors. The idea was to simply point a few dozen of the steel bars in the direction of an enemy armor or fleet formation, and drop them out of orbit. The processors would identify targets and arc towards them on re-entry, striking at about 10,000 or 12,000 m/s. Just one would obliterate a tank, a handful could sink an aircraft carrier, etc.
And the beautiful thing is nobody on the ground would have a freakin' clue what was happening. There'd just be tanks and other vehicles detonating spectacularly but without apparent cause.
Posted by: Sterling on March 20, 2006 03:14 PMWe really need a strategy or weapons systems guy here at Memefirst. Someone who really understands these issues and can shock the shit out the Yurpeens with graphic descriptions of sheer destructive power.
Posted by: Sterling on March 20, 2006 03:19 PMSAC, every day is April 1st around here.
Sterling, I think that NASA is going to use their now infamous "Space Elevator" design to equip your military base on the moon.
Posted by: Sanford on March 20, 2006 06:06 PMSigh... okay Sterling: let's outline the cost and complexity of getting some time of milling equipment on the moon, in order to develop projectiles that have reasonably accuracy over two hundred and forty fucking thousand miles. What level of precision will be necessary (after all, this isn't the sort of thing you can field test -- miss and you as much chance taking out Bejing as Boston) to insure the correct vector, and shape to insure this big rock doesn't become, um, a little rock, like most of the space junk that finds its way in? I bet that global warming is even a part of libural gook conspiracy to destroy the atmosphere to insure the Red Rockets don't break up on entry.
Let's remember that the most recent attempt at routine launches into space fails about 1 out of every 15 tries (that would be the space shuttle), and the payload capacity is a couple of plants and high science experiments.
I can see it now, a Chinese gulag modelled on the Shawshank Redemption, with Morgan Freeman providing wistful insights about freedom as Chinese forced labor rubs down moon rocks with rock blankets.
Meanwhile, in the time it took me to type this, about 30 acres of arctic ice disappeared.
Posted by: 99 on March 20, 2006 10:03 PMThat's the problem with this blog -- it is hard for a seriously superb thinker like myself to get a look in with my fabulously rare, eloquently written and well-structured posts about, for instance, the future of the American Conservative movement, in the face of this incredible sub-pre-teen comic-book drivel!
Frankly I would read this post to the end before I would mine, it is an absolute gobsmacker of delusional fantasy and quite gripping. It has made a deep impression on me, as indeed one of Sterling's "moon missiles" would were it to land in the trackless wastes of the plain of his unbelievable inanity.
Posted by: eurof on March 20, 2006 10:15 PMI note from Sterling's links that the space catapult he refers to is called the "Lunatron". Presumably this is because the inventor thought it would be good for firing lunatics like Sterling at distant enemies. I believe it was originally known as the "Sterlingtron", but the inventor realised that implied it would be used on one occasion only, and wanted to expand the addressable market. I paraphrase:
"The lunatron is a railroad, set on the Moon and used as a space catapult. Metal containers would be accelerated on the tracks (several kilometers long) through the use of electromagnets; then they would be slowed down suddenly, so that their content, lunatics, would be sent into space at very high speed (that device would send loads at 2.4. km/second). After two days of flight on a predefined trajectory of 65000 kms, the lunatics would arrive at a preset destination -- their own arses."
Posted by: eurof on March 20, 2006 10:26 PMMy tinfoil hat is still at the dry-cleaners. when it comes back I'll try to process this post. in the meantime, please pass the ducttape...
Posted by: bafc23 on March 20, 2006 11:20 PM...in the face of this incredible sub-pre-teen comic-book drivel!
I aim to please.
Presumably this is because the inventor thought it would be good for firing lunatics like Sterling at distant enemies.
The "inventor" was Arthur C. Clarke, who is also credited with inventing the communications satellite (and the space elevator). He intended it as a way to transport raw minerals off the lunar surface without expending the kinds of reactive gases that are in short supply on the moon. In his novel, The Moon is Harsh Mistress, Robert Heinlein describes how such a device might be used to bombard the surface of the Earth with considerable precision. (Since the moon does not revolve relative to the surface of the Earth, it would be relatively easy to calculate the speed and attitude necessary to strike specific spots on the Earth's surface. Escape velocity from the moon is substantially less than the speed at which objects would strike after accelerating down Earth's gravity well, so a partial lunar orbit might be practical to slingshot objects launched from the far side back down toward the Earth.
Of course, if the 1960s-era German spacewarp engine design turns out to work, then all these concerns are irrelevant.
Posted by: Sterling on March 20, 2006 11:58 PMThe problem isn't the feasibility of the weapons system Sterling describes - it's devilishly effective.
The problem is getting the thing up there in the first place. We're talking about a complex piece of machinery which has to be capable of quarrying large blocks of moon rock to use as ammunition, load them onto the launcher, and then fling them. This is necessarily a big machine, and it would take a lot of effort to put it up there in the first place. Almost certainly, humans would have to go up there to build it, over some period of time. So, in essence, putting the weapon system Sterling describes up there is along the same lines of cost and complexity as building a lunar base.
Putting a man on the moon was difficult and expensive. Yes, technology is better now, and of course we have learned much from having done it before. Nevertheless, what Sterling proposes is far from a trivial undertaking.
More crucially, it would be impossible to do in secret. Let's say that China discovers that the US is building this rock-launcher on the moon. Might they not just nuke the thing before it's complete?
Posted by: Lurker on March 21, 2006 03:40 AMWell, there's one sure way to get it up there: Orion.
Posted by: Sterling on March 21, 2006 01:41 PMFor those of you who choose not to read the entire Orion article, or are unable to grasp the key point, it is this:
...the Orion design would have worked by dropping fission or thermonuclear explosives out the rear of a vehicle and detonating them 200 feet out and catching the blast with a thick steel or aluminum pusher plate.
Fallout is a problem, but there are several ways to mitigate it, including launching from Antarctica where there are a) no people b) few electronics to be damaged by EMP and c) where the magnetosphere is very close to the Earth, so charged particles would mostly be released above it, and thus would not return to Earth.
Isn't this fun stuff?
Posted by: Sterling on March 21, 2006 02:06 PMCan we get this discussion back on track, please. So ya think that basalt is climbable?
Posted by: michelle on March 21, 2006 03:07 PMSterling, I'm warning you. Go ahead and invade as many Middle Eastern countries as you like, that's one thing. But detonating nuclear weapons in Antarctica? Then you'll have my sister to answer to.
Posted by: Felix on March 21, 2006 03:19 PMFelix
Your sister is European, isn't she?
I think the funniest thing about Sterling's manic gesture is his delusion that he is actually appalling, disgusting and horrifying us limpwristed Euros with the awesome muscle of American power, as opposed to what we are actually doing, ie egging him goodnaturedly on.
The second funniest thing is that whilst Agent Sterling may occasionally pretend he doesn't take this kind of tomfoolery seriously, he actually does. Very, very seriously indeed. As Lurker observes above, Sterling's plan to invade the moon by sending up a nuclear-bomb-powered spaceship to preempt evil Chinks from catapulting us with big rocks "is far from a trivial undertaking".
Either way, Antarctica is safe. Anyway, isn't it all parcelled out amongst the family of nations, and protected by a fearsomely-worded UN resolution of some sort?
The Yanks are a bust flush, now this Iraq gambit and general GOP socialism has spiralled them off into a cesspit of debt. The Chinks won't even need to go to the moon to lob limestone rocks at them soon - the US is busily ceding its power, no need for the Chinks to concoct lunatic and evil plans of the sort Agent Sterling concocts for us here.
Posted by: Claude de Bigny on March 21, 2006 03:53 PMSterling actually wrote of the need to "shock the shit out the Yurpeens with graphic descriptions of sheer destructive power."
He wants there to be a permanent contributor to memef to do this! That plan certainly gets my vote, even if I dont have a vote as I'm European.
Posted by: Claude de Bigny on March 21, 2006 03:55 PMSterling: let's revisit that last great watertight exercise in engineering, the missle defense system. My recollection is it took ten years and several tries, the last couple actually including preprogramming the interceptor missles about where the targets would be for it to 'work' (and that even missed a couple of times).
Posted by: 99 on March 21, 2006 04:46 PM99 - The missile defense program that is seen is not the true missile defense program. I suspect that interceptors are merely the last ditch, probably third tier, in case anything gets through the first and second tiers - satellite and airborne anti-missile systems which the U.S. Gov't is not telling anyone about. Not because the Russians, Chinese, etc won't find out, but because the Iranians and North Koreans probably won't find out. The point is that if North Korean launches a long range or suborbital missile, I expect the U.S. Air Force will down it before it reaches the stratosphere. There's also some reason to believe that the U.S. Air Force has the capability to briefly "disturb" portions of the magnetoshphere and ionosphere, causing disruption of even shielded circuitry that passes through it and possibly blocking most communications through it, which means that the USAF could potentially disrupt any northern hemisphere suborbital or orbital rocket launch.
Claude wrote:
I think the funniest thing about Sterling's manic gesture is his delusion that he is actually appalling, disgusting and horrifying us limpwristed Euros with the awesome muscle of American power, as opposed to what we are actually doing, ie egging him goodnaturedly on.
The second funniest thing is that whilst Agent Sterling may occasionally pretend he doesn't take this kind of tomfoolery seriously, he actually does.
I can take it seriously and find it amusing at the same time. And yes, I think this sort of talk does make a lot of Yurpeens itchy. But it's foolhardy to leave the high ground to your enemy.
Posted by: Sterling on March 21, 2006 10:57 PM99 - The missile defense program that is seen is not the true missile defense program. I suspect that interceptors are merely the last ditch, probably third tier, in case anything gets through the first and second tiers - satellite and airborne anti-missile systems which the U.S. Gov't is not telling anyone about. Not because the Russians, Chinese, etc won't find out, but because the Iranians and North Koreans probably won't find out. The point is that if North Korean launches a long range or suborbital missile, I expect the U.S. Air Force will down it before it reaches the stratosphere. There's also some reason to believe that the U.S. Air Force has the capability to briefly "disturb" portions of the magnetoshphere and ionosphere, causing disruption of even shielded circuitry that passes through it and possibly blocking most communications through it, which means that the USAF could potentially disrupt any northern hemisphere suborbital or orbital rocket launch.
Claude wrote:
I think the funniest thing about Sterling's manic gesture is his delusion that he is actually appalling, disgusting and horrifying us limpwristed Euros with the awesome muscle of American power, as opposed to what we are actually doing, ie egging him goodnaturedly on.
The second funniest thing is that whilst Agent Sterling may occasionally pretend he doesn't take this kind of tomfoolery seriously, he actually does.
I can take it seriously and find it amusing at the same time. And yes, I think this sort of talk does make a lot of Yurpeens itchy. But it's foolhardy to leave the high ground to your enemy.
Posted by: Sterling on March 21, 2006 10:57 PMThe missile defense program that is seen is not the true missile defense program. I suspect that interceptors are merely the last ditch, probably third tier, in case anything gets through the first and second tiers - satellite and airborne anti-missile systems which the U.S. Gov't is not telling anyone about.
Except for you?
Posted by: sac on March 21, 2006 11:21 PMIt's inductive reasoning. Failure of a ground-based interceptor means total failure, there's no second shot. The military doesn't build things that way. They like redundancies, as does NASA. So there must be space-based and air-based components that take a first and maybe a second shot, before the last shot is taken. There are probably also aggresive countermeasures to interfere in navigation and detonation of enemy missiles.
In college I knew an Air Force ROTC cadet in the "missileer" program. In addition to teaching me some truly disturbing marching cadences, he also explained missileer culture to me. See, the officers who man those silos know that they have to launch quickly because there may be an inbound nuclear warhead heading right at them. Even after they launch, the risk is not abated.
So the plan is for them to go up above ground with all the small-arms ammunition they can carry, and fire their M-16s into the air, on the off-chance that a round might strike an incoming warhead and damage it sufficiently to prevent detonation. Said he, "The odds are a million to one against, but they're the only odds we get to play."
So yeah, there is more to the system than they're saying. There has to be. The interceptor defense is the one we tell everybody about, and then there's the other system (or five) that we keep to ourselves.
Posted by: Sterling on March 22, 2006 03:21 AMSterling, by carving up chuncks of moon rock, wouldn't we be destabilizing the orbit of the moon? I'm not a planetary physicist, but it seems that the mass of the moon might somehow be important to keep it revolving around our little planet. Otherwise, let's say we ship whoever we don't like at the time 15 rocks that each weigh around 112,500 kgs, that net mass change in the moon might begin to make it spin out of control. I think that high tide is over-rated anyways.
Posted by: Sanford on March 22, 2006 06:21 PMThe moon is kind of big, Sanford. My recollection from school is that it gets heavier every year as result of collecting interplanetary detritus (as does the Earth), so I doubt there's much risk in it.
But thanks for your concern.
Posted by: Sterling on March 22, 2006 07:10 PMIf it's that big, it might be a little hard to defend. After all, those finely milled, hyper precise, um, catapults (excuse, I need to stifle a giggle) won't be much use on local targets.
Posted by: 99 on March 22, 2006 09:21 PM99 - I already went over this. A vessel originating on Earth and heading for the moon would be a big, fat target from the perspective of someone on the moon. Also, the difficulty of obtaining reconnaissance photos of the far side of the moon would make any kind of assault on it equally difficult.
Posted by: Sterling on March 23, 2006 04:17 AMIf your Moon Unit Sterling was on the far side of the moon, the "side that never faces earth" how would it umm see the missiles from er earth racing towards it to throw mega rocks at it? Similarly if its lunatron is constantly pointing AWAY from earth how could it ever hit it?
Of course you could say that it would slingshot rocks at earth through a short demi-orbit, but then wouldn't you have to attach rockets to the rocks to manage that, which would diminish the cheapness and nastily simplistic brutality of the weapon? This latter quality is what seems to be its largely pornographic attraction to you.
Furthermore, please also calculate the effect of the earth's atmosphere on the rocks, which you imply would shoot car sized missiles. How much missile would be left after burning through the atmosphere? Also if you are using earth orbit to direct the weapons at particular cites, rather than smashing through the atmosphere at a perpendicular angle, would not there be extra wastage and slowing of the missile? This would diminish the destructive power significantly. How do you know you would have built a $10 trillion, highly innacurate 120mm mortar?
Thank in advance you for the answers, I would like them by friday. Get to work!
Posted by: eurof on March 23, 2006 06:08 AMEurof, you are jumping the gun, or rather, the medieval-style limestone rock Hurler. All this niggling about precise detonatory perpendiculars is just so much wood for the trees.
We should salute Sterling's expedition as the only realistic means of bringing democracy to the moon, save it from falling into the hands of the even more lunatically murderous Chinks.
As with Iraq, the main thing is to give the moon democracy. It will be the first planet to benefit from this style of elective oligarchy and this will help stabilise the whole region. Once we're there, we can start worrying about how precisely to use our position to blow up the earth.
In the meantime, I must tip Agent Sterling on to the distinctly treasonous tone of your queries.
Posted by: Claude de Bigny on March 23, 2006 08:16 AMSterling, I think you missed the point there. Why would we build a weapon with a limited lifespan? 75cbm is a lot of rock (think a 48' High Cube Ocean container for example) and at the weight, if you started pelting anyone for long, you'd change the rotational mass of the moon. Think of it this way, it you start with a ball, and take weight from only one side, sooner or later it's going to change the rotation of the moon, potentially upseting little things like the tides here on terra firma. Sure, it might not be an instant change, but I imagine that there are much better ways to implement foreign policy. Get back to work on the particle beam and the warp drive there Sulu.
Posted by: Sanford on March 23, 2006 06:11 PMHello,
Probably my releasd paper about the schematic design of a practical spacewarp can be considered as one of your favorites. That's placed on: http://arxiv.org/abs/gr-qc/0511086
The aim of this email to you is providing the possibility of introducing it to more numbers of people which I believe that's in favor of improving the science and a service to the mankind. However, your personal opinion on my work is important to me too. I guess you might be able and/or interested to help me at least via making a link of the above address within your page(s) or presenting it to more media. So, please give a clear answer to my request.
Best Regards
M. Mansouryar
www.mansouryar.com
P.S.: A simplified description of my work is viewable on:
http://www.centauri-dreams.org/?p=561
http://www.americanantigravity.com/articles/455/1/Iranian-Einstein%3F
http://extremetechnology.blogspot.com/2006/03/macroscopic-tranversable-spacewarp.html
http://www.stardrivedevice.com/links.html
Posted by: M. Mansouryar on April 11, 2006 06:27 PM