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ASAT Weapons: Enhancing NATO’s Operational Capabilities in the Emerging Space Dependent Era

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Modelling and Simulation for Autonomous Systems (MESAS 2019)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNISA,volume 11995))

Abstract

After more than 60 years of human activities in outer space, society is highly dependent on space based technologies.

A State that aims to enhance its capacities in the sectors of defence, communication, Earth monitoring and emergency management needs to invest in the Space sector. This instigated enormous investments by private and public entities in order to develop Space programmes and deploy satellites in orbit.

Satellites are used for both military and civilian purposes and are developed in order to establish a state of security. The military applications of satellites vary from reconnaissance, early warning and telecommunications to meteorology and geodesy.

States, recognising these strategic advantages space based assets provide and their importance in the modern theatre of operations, sought the development of technologies capable of neutralising them, in order to deprive the adversary of these advantages. This introduced a new type of weapons, the Anti-Satellite Weapons (ASAT), which can be both hard-kill (kinetic energy weapons, explosions) and soft-kill (jamming, cyber attacks) in nature. The US, Russia, China and now India have developed and tested these weapons which can drastically change the established Space ecosystem.

The paper will demonstrate that, the development and use of ASAT creates a new field where NATO and its member States can enhance their operational capabilities in order to safeguard their security and defence. Additionally, given the ultra-hazardous nature of Outer Space, security concepts should extend beyond cyber security to cyber defence and eventually also cyber resilience.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Sapienza University of Rome, Piazzale Aldo Moro 5, Rome, Italy

    Antonio Carlo

  2. National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Solonos 104, Athens, Greece

    Nikolaos Veazoglou

Authors
  1. Antonio Carlo
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  2. Nikolaos Veazoglou
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Antonio Carlo .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. NATO Modelling and Simulation Centre of Excellence, Rome, Italy

    Jan Mazal

  2. MIRPA Lab, University of Palermo, Palermo, Italy

    Adriano Fagiolini

  3. Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Brno University of Technology, Brno, Czech Republic

    Petr Vasik

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Carlo, A., Veazoglou, N. (2020). ASAT Weapons: Enhancing NATO’s Operational Capabilities in the Emerging Space Dependent Era. In: Mazal, J., Fagiolini, A., Vasik, P. (eds) Modelling and Simulation for Autonomous Systems. MESAS 2019. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 11995. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-43890-6_34

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-43890-6_34

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-43889-0

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-43890-6

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

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