Bloomberg quoted Eli Niewood, MITRE vice president, air and space forces, as part of a story about reports that Russia may be planning to launch a nuclear-powered antisatellite weapon.
While experts say that Russia could not detonate a nuclear burst in space without affecting its own satellites, it may believe that the United States is more dependent on these systems and has more to lose.
“If conflict were close to China or Russia and we were operating at longer range, space might be more important to us than it might be to them,” Niewood said. “There’s lots up there that is not hardened.”