Lash-Up

Prologue

The sleek, streamlined object arced gracefully upward, its presence revealed only by the light reflecting off its hull as the sun emerged from behind Earth. Below, a new day was dawning in the Pacific basin, but the vehicle’s electronic brain ignored the aesthetic beauty of a perfect sunrise. Its attention was focused solely on its intended target.

Hurled into space at tremendous velocity, the dartlike vehicle was coasting now, its solid rocket motor expended. Only its attitude control thrusters still worked. Settled into its orbit, the vehicle’s sensors scanned the space ahead of it, diligently searching for the satellite that the projectile’s masters wanted eliminated. Its flight path had been carefully planned, with an interception distance on the order of a few hundred meters. In theory, it would be virtually impossible for the projectile’s sensors not to see the target. With cold, calculated precision, the vehicle gazed at the heavens. It didn’t have long to wait.

The vehicle’s radar picked up the satellite at five hundred miles, and an imaging infrared sensor immediately confirmed the target’s identity. The projectile’s flight computer calculated a small course correction to ensure optimal warhead performance. Puffs of steam and nitrogen gas from the attitude control thrusters quickly altered the vehicle’s course ever so slightly, but it was enough to ensure that it would pass just in front of the oncoming satellite. An arming signal was sent to both warheads.

At a combined speed of nearly nine thousand miles per hour, the two spacecraft devoured the distance between them in just over three seconds. The projectile’s radar kept a sharp electronic eye on the target’s range, and at two hundred meters, the flight computer sent the firing signal.

The explosively pumped microwave generator detonated first, sending a focused multigigawatt electromagnetic shock wave toward the satellite. It was similar to the electromagnetic pulse, or EMP, created by a nuclear explosion, but a high-powered microwave warhead creates its intense burst of energy at a much higher frequency, making it far more difficult to defend against. Even though the satellite’s precious electronics were radiation-hardened, they weren’t designed to stop such a massive blast of microwave energy delivered from such a close distance.

Infiltrating through the numerous communication antennas, the intense electromagnetic energy created localized power surges that fried the microprocessor chips and other semiconductor devices on the satellite’s sensitive circuit boards. With one short burst, the spacecraft was completely disabled — it could no longer receive, process, or send any data.

Not content with merely lobotomizing its target, the projectile’s second warhead detonated, propelling a focused stream of hundreds of tungsten pellets toward the hapless satellite. Striking at a speed of nearly eighteen thousand miles per hour, the tiny BB-sized fragments, along with some copper shrapnel from the first warhead, tore huge holes in the satellite’s body, ripped off antennas, and shredded solar panels.

Mangled beyond recognition, the satellite careened past the interception point, a trail of debris following in close formation. With its orbit altered and slowly tumbling from the high-speed impacts, the satellite, nothing more than space junk, continued its flight around Earth.