We Totally Shot A Satellite Out Of The Sky In One Try
 Thursday, February 21st, 2008

Here's some more proof that the U.S. has the best military in the world.  (I'm biased on that, I admit.)  Last night, the U.S. Navy shot down one of our dead spy satellites in outerspace, while it was traveling at 17,000 miles per hour, 153 miles above the Earth.  Now, if you don't think they know what you're Googling, you're out of your mind.

Just kidding.  Kinda.

But in all seriousness, Marine Gen. James Cartwright gave a Pentagon briefing this morning and said that the direct hit to the spy satellite rid us of a toxic threat to the environment, as the satellite was holding a fuel tank the size of...well, it was big.  To the tune of 1,000 pounds of frozen hydrazine propellant.

Don't start freaking out - it was our own spy satellite that we lost control of in December or '06.  Here's the video of the launch and the hit:

Former Assistant Secretary of Defense Philip Coyle reported to Space.com that he thinks there were ulterior motives for the Pentagon shooting the satellite down, besides just eliminating a risk to the environment.

"The spy agency doesn't want some part of the satellite to fall into the wrong hands," Coyle said.  "I don't think that's being emphasized enough as a motivation for NRO to want this thing to be shot down."

He also said, "Number two, poke the Chinese, because we're showing them not only that we can shoot down a satellite in a test without creating a lot of debris like they did, but we're also showing them we can do it any place in the world...and a third reason is to show off our missile-defense capabilities such as this."

So what?  Poke away!  And for that matter, when are we going to move the location of the 2008 Olympics?

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