Please keep
Vice President Kamala Harris away from the Space Force. Instead of visiting America’s southern border or even Ukraine, Vice President Harris went home to California for a big speech at Vandenberg Air Force Base on Monday.
"Space is exciting!" Harris cooed in that faux-bright tone we use on 6-year-olds confronting broccoli at dinner. "It affects us all and it connects us all," she continued. Spoiler alert: it gets worse.
With Space Force service members arrayed behind her for the big speech, Harris announced the
U.S. would halt "destructive satellite tests," where your missile blows up your own, old satellite on orbit. "These tests are dangerous and we will not conduct them," said Harris. Then she called on all nations including China and Russia to join the ban.
Here’s the kicker: the U.S. has no plans to blow up satellites. The only true American anti-satellite test took place in 1985. It was actually a pretty cool event, involving an Air Force F-15 fighter and a special missile. Then in 2008, the U.S. shot down a broken spy satellite, carefully timing the impact so the chunks would burn up in the atmosphere.
But that’s it. That’s the whole U.S. record, two anti-satellite shots. For Harris to make a unilateral pledge, to stop something the U.S. wasn’t doing anyway, was bonkers.