Space Force

[uppi]

So does this mean every satellite is pressurized for its internal components sake? If it loses pressure due to say foreign object does that make it basically die due to temperature death?

No. Gases are the most easy way to understand temperature, but the concept is not limited to gases. In solids, you need to consider the collective motion of many atoms which you can describe as virtual particles ("phonons"), but there is an equilibrium temperature as well. Since all parts of a satellite are usually connected, you can use heat transfer via solids as well as radiative heat transfer to move heat around. The engineering gets more complicated, because if something gets too hot, you cannot just slap a fan on it. In the end it is usually worth the effort, because pressuring a satellite has a lot of drawbacks which you want to avoid.

 

[Takhisis]

But [the Space Force]'s also in some respects condoning the weaponization of space.

Need we say more, then? Even Microsoft employees are stating that they are not war profiteers.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Need we say more, then? Even Microsoft employees are stating that they are not war profiteers.

As a curiosity, has there ever been any war profiteers that didn't state that they weren't war profiteers?

 

[Broken_Erika]

As a curiosity, has there ever been any war profiteers that didn't state that they weren't war profiteers?

War Profiteers Inc.
-Death and Misery is our Business.

 

[Takhisis]

As a curiosity, has there ever been any war profiteers that didn't state that they weren't war profiteers?

Well, there's the arms industry. They just go on and sell and shrug off the criticisms.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Need we say more, then? Even Microsoft employees are stating that they are not war profiteers.

The tricky part is that it is already weaponized and will continue to be increasingly weaponized regardless of whether the US has a Space Force. I also think there is a legitimate role for the military to play in space, so I don't reject the premise on the face of it. Space assets provide authentication for arms treaties and also help prevent unnecessary wars and man-made humanitarian disasters through good intelligence.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Well, there's the arms industry. They just go on and sell and shrug off the criticisms.

They say that they provide necessary equipment for the security of the nation. Even they don't answer to 'war profiteer.'

 

[hobbsyoyo]

So does this mean every satellite is pressurized for its internal components sake? If it loses pressure due to say foreign object does that make it basically die due to temperature death?

There was a thread on Reddit where someone asked, 'how close do you have to be to the sun for space to be room temperature?'. There was a digression where someone very smart like @uppi explained that space doesn't have a temperature in the normal sense but essentially the answer is that for most objects, they will reach equilibrium near room temperature in the region of space that the Earth basically occupies +/- 0.1 AU. Which is ultimately why Earth is more or less room temperature to begin with.

Not to derail, just saw that on Reddit and thought of you.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

The secretary of the Air Force is resigning. Heather Wilson was seen as an opponent of the Space Force and when the Trump administration asked her to provide a budget estimate for standing up a new Space Force as an independent service, she said it would cost roughly $13 billion. She was likely right on the money but Trump and Co saw this as her trying to torpedo the whole effort and said they would fire her if she didn't shape up on the subject. She went back and made up some much lower numbers but it looks like she started a job search right then and there. She's going to be the president of the University of Texas, El Paso. There were rumors that Trump and Co wanted to make her the next Secretary of Defense but looks like they screwed the pooch on that.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

The new Space Development Agency got started last week and I think that'll be the only component of the Space Force that gets through Congress. The intent is to create a new, space-focused R&D branch within DoD to give space the attention that it often misses out on. Of course, I think that we could solve this problem by reigning in the Air Forces' propensity to raid space budgets to pay for overruns with the F-35 et al without standing up a new agency. And Mike Griffin (who I believe is going to head up the SDA) is one of the most inept administrators our government has ever had so I think this whole thing will not be successful and will be wound down after 2020.

There is also more general problems with the DoD right now in that the acting Secretary of Defense came over from Boeing and has shown every sign of being a corrupting influence as he's steered money away from Lockheed's F-35 and toward Boeing's F-15EX against the wishes of the Air Force and against his own explicit promises not to do so. I think the scandal that is brewing is going to suck whatever air remains out of the arguments in favor of the Space Force.

 

[Takhisis]

From what I've been reading she had business ties in post-Soviet Russia once upon a time. Wouldn't that have counted as a security risk?

 

[hobbsyoyo]

From what I've been reading she had business ties in post-Soviet Russia once upon a time. Wouldn't that have counted as a security risk?

Not so long as she was disclosing them, there was nothing improper about them and she made no effort to conceal or misconstrue them. The break in at the Watergate isn't what brought down Nixon, it was the cover up that undid him. The same goes for much of the legal jeopardy that Trump's cohort is in - their efforts to perjure, witness tamper and otherwise cover-up their misdeeds get them in much worse trouble than if they had just fessed up. And with Heather Wilson's Russia ties, it's entirely plausible there was nothing untoward there. As much as the right likes to project that there is some massive witch hunt to get them, the fact is that for supposedly blameless people they do an awful good job of acting like witches, if you catch my meaning.

 

[Takhisis]

Yes, I do. I realised, a few seconds after posting that, that with the Drumpf and the GOP business ties to Russia is not a bug but a feature in any case.

btw I've been reading the comments on the news article's home website. Is the defence/aerospace community that trolltastic habitually, or is the vitriol something specific to the Space Force proposal?

 

[hobbsyoyo]

It's pretty characteristic of comment sections on websites in general rather than peculiar to that website - it's not even a real forum and therefore it gets a lot of transient people who drive-by poop post with no consequences. That said, aerospace is traditionally very conservative. To make it worse, SpaceX has been a massively polarizing force that has added new fault lines along with the traditional liberal/conservative ones. There are distinct pro- and anti-SpaceX (or more generally pro- and anti-"NewSpace") camps now that don't map neatly to political affiliations which gives every discussion a distinct free-for-all flavor these days.

The Space Force debate is diagnostic of that whole mess because it tends to pit people from all different flavors against each other. Even here I alternate between tepid support and vitriolic hatred of it, depending on what aspects of it we're talking about.

 

[zazazuzu]

'Space Force' has nothing to do with reality. It's entirely a product of the imaginations of several generations of science fiction geeks who grew up reading it, or watching it in the cinemas or on television. All that 'Space Force' is or ever will be are two words.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

'Space Force' has nothing to do with reality. It's entirely a product of the imaginations of several generations of science fiction geeks who grew up reading it, or watching it in the cinemas or on television. All that 'Space Force' is or ever will be are two words.

I don't think this is true. There are valid reasons for a Space Force and I think most of the ridicule it gets comes down to hatred of Trump. Though that's probably a good reason to ridicule the idea because a Space Force headed up by a Trump appointee who is likely going to be a disaster.

 

[Lexicus]

I'm not a fan of the idea of militarizing space in general.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

The Air Force is changing the way promotions are done so that space cadets in uniform have a chance to advance. Previously, space professionals had to compete with officers of all other types to get promoted within the air force which meant combat pilots snagged the lion share of promotions. Space professionals don't serve in 'combat' roles (even if they are in fact, supporting combat directly) so they would get passed up. Worse, pilots saw careers in space fields to be deadends but because they were they only people getting promoted, they'd end up with space commands. So they'd be doing something they didn't understand and didn't want to do.

The new system will be such that space professionals will only compete with other space professionals for promotions within the air force. There are critiques of this system but it's overall a step in the right direction and it's something the other services were already doing for their distinct specialties.

In other news, the Space Force is basically dead. Even the parts that did pass like the Space Development Agency (SDA) are under attack by Congress and being forced to justify their existence. Congress is making tentative moves to sideline the SDA and overall I think the broader Space Force initiative is dead. Do to its association with Trump, I don't think any future president will revisit this idea for a long time. It is good though that the Air Force is taking a lot of the criticism they've gotten to heart and is making moves to rectify the situation.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

In other news, the Space Force is basically dead.

Well now I have to eat my words.

A bill to establish a separate Space Force is expected to pass Congress.

How did it come about? The Democrats said they would go for a Space Force if all federal employees would be given 4 weeks of paid parental leave and the White House agreed to those terms. This is could be kind of a major win for social justice because it sets precedent that paid parental leave will be rolled out wherever the Democrats have a bargaining position. Should they take the White House and/or the Senate, I could see them making it law nationwide.

The Space Force will be a part of the Air Force and not a fully independent branch. It will have a similar structure as the Marines and an analogous relationship with the Air Force that the Marines have to the Navy.

I'm super happy that all federal employees get paid parental leave now. I also support the Space Force as a concept but I have serious reservations about how it's going to be run and whether or not it will just become another big giveaway to the defense industry will little value to the taxpayer.

https://spacenews.com/air-force-leaders-enthused-as-space-force-legislation-heads-to-house-floor/

 

[uppi]

4 weeks of parental leave, limited to federal employees? I guess the appropriate term is 'baby steps'.