All US military weapons above the level of rifle or automatic weapon rely on space to function effectively. The Pentagon has used the phrase weapons system to describe the weapons of war for many years now. Space is a key element of all modern weapons systems.

Target selection is one aspect of the space dimension of these systems. Cameras and listening devices onboard spy satellites help determine what gets selected as a target. Military communication satellites speed the information to and from various decision-makers. Then the Global Positioning System series of satellites is used to pinpoint the targeting of what is to be killed or destroyed. Refinements are constantly being added to the system as a whole and to its component parts. To summarise, we assert that vital elements of US weapons systems are already in space and are as essential to those systems as a gunsight is to a gun.

Conversely, when battle platforms using lasers, particle beams and high-speed bullets are established in space there will be major earthbound components included in those weapons systems. The decision making for these weapons will be made from the ground. There will also be airborne components as well. They will rely on the same targeting system described above.

Informational war is another warlike activity, which uses both space and earthbound components to do its work. Satellites and ground stations work in tandem to intercept and interfere with commercial and personal communications. Stealing and distorting information can cause great personal harm and disrupt economic activity on a wide scale. Information is power as never before.

For decades into the future the US will have as a priority to protect and expand its position of military dominance in space. Keeping a monopoly on an expanding space power capability is a cornerstone of US military doctrine.

The ground stations and to a lesser extent the airborne resources which a potential enemy might use for war making can be readily identified, targeted and destroyed by a country (the US) that possesses and wants to keep its overwhelming advantage. The Persian Gulf War demonstrated that reality. Even after battle stations are established in space the weakest link in any system will be the ground stations essential to its functioning.

Anti-satellite weapons are a priority in any war with space dimensions, that is to say in any war which the US might fight in the future. In order to keep others from using its satellites for their own purposes the US can selectively turn off the cameras and listening devices and scramble their transmissions. When this is not enough an ability to destroy will be developed and used. Much of this work will continue to be done under cover of the secret black budget process.

There is a blurring of lines regarding civilian and military use of space with regard to NASA and the US Space Command. The Space Shuttle could easily become a space warship. In a sense it has already crossed the line in the past when astronauts have released spy satellites during classified shuttle missions. The shuttle could in the future be sent to pick up another country's satellite and remove it from space. Astronauts could also be directed to disable or destroy satellites making them into nothing more than space junk. General Joseph Ashy, former director of the US Space Command, suggested this direct involvement in acts of war when he proposed that current astronauts become the core of a new cadre of space warriors in an August 1996 interview in Aviation Week and Space Technology.

The issues outlined above cry out for a global response. Very specific changes in international space law need to be enacted with appropriate enforcement mechanisms.

Preceding that there needs to be widespread education leading to a change in attitudes among citizens of all countries if we are to reverse the trend towards more and more warmaking in and from space. Collectively we must demand that cooperative and peaceful means become the standard for sharing the common resources of space.