I see we had roughly the same thought at roughly the same time....
Off-topic:
Do any of you have thoughts on the impending declaration of independence in Kosovo? Specifically, how likely is it that Russia will respond by recognizing South Ossetia, Abkhazia, etc.?
If all the long-term strategic implications mitigate against this action, as both Dan and Peter argue, perhaps this really is a case of human security concerns outweighing national security concerns.
Um, why does a satellite need so much rocket fuel? Answer: It's not a satellite....at least, not entirely.
As to the question from Aldous, French political scientist Bertrand Badie says all hell could break loose when Kosovo becomes independent as ethnic enclaves in Macedonia, the Bosnian Serbs and others may well agitate for breakaway. Here's a Badie quote:
As to Kosovo, although the ethnic nature of the cleavage hasn’t escaped anyone’s attention, it would be facile to reduce this conflict to a clash between communities: it is above all the grandiose, authoritarian Serbian project devised by Milosevic that was at the source of the destabilization of this area. The antagonism between Albanian-speaking Muslims and Serbian Kosovars was not a one-way street and the international community should have known better than to promote the inter-ethnic rationale that has further polarized a situation that, in reality, is quite complex.
"Um, why does a satellite need so much rocket fuel? "
The answer is: so it can maneuver on orbit to avoid anti-satellite weapons, or to a new orbit to replace another satellite destroyed by an ASAT weapon.
You know, just the sort of thing observers said the U.S. wasn't able to do a few months ago when the Chinese conducted their 1960s-era ASAT test.
David Johnson
Chandler, Arizona
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