HARDER THAN THEY THINK: Could China and Russia really destroy Starlink? Only with a boomerang. Though the lawfare is already underway.

So, how might China and Russia go about countering Starlink? The Chinese team proposed three possible actions in an “escalation ladder,” starting with legal and diplomatic measures aimed at whipping up international pressure against further expansions of Starlink on the grounds of collision risks in LEO.

The next step is more technical, with coordinated filings with international regulatory bodies for frequency bands and orbital slots to limit SpaceX’s ability to grow Starlink. At the same time, the escalation ladder proposes using electromagnetic jamming of Starlink to block it in certain regions.

Finally, the coup de grâce would be the “physical destruction” of Starlink through a cyber war and anti-satellite weapons. Reporters at The Insider, Der Spiegel, and Le Monde suggested this might involve a cloud of high-density projectiles that could destroy Starlink satellites upon collision. The presentation by the Chinese CASC researchers didn’t specify the means of such an attack.

The problem is that there are over 10,000 Starlink satellites, and SpaceX can literally launch them faster than Russia and China can shoot them down with conventional antisatellite weapons. A nuke, or a huge space-junk-creating kinetic-shrapnel weapon might work, but at the cost of making Low Earth Orbit inaccessible for everyone.

I should also note that it’s been the US position since the Carter Administration that an attack on a US satellite is an attack on the United States.