"China has fired high-power lasers at U.S. spy satellites flying over its territory in... a test of Chinese ability to blind the spacecraft," Defense News is reporting. And, at least in theory, those lasers might be able temporarily take offline America's most powerful orbiting spies, like the giant electro-optical Keyhole spacecraft or radar-based satellites like the Lacrosse.
starfire-optical-range-laser3.jpgNow, the article is a little short on details. "It remains unclear how many times the ground-based laser was tested against U.S. spacecraft or whether it was successful," the story says.
And there's a touch of hyperbole in the piece. According to the article, a recent Pentagon report "acknowledge[d] China has the ability to blind U.S. satellites, thanks to a powerful ground-based laser." That's not exactly right. What the report actually says isn't quite so definitive:
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