A guided road is against treaty as well, say it’s a grey area but it really isn’t.
A rod from space impacting with the presumed force equal to a nuclear bomb is in fact a weapon of mass destruction and the language of the treaty is nuclear or other weapons of mass destruction.
It’s worded that way specifically so captured space bound objects can’t be redirected and used as weapons like Heinlein described in the moon is a harsh mistress.
I mean you have to put a nuclear amount of energy into the rods with chemical energy. Why not skip a step and just drop a big conventional explosive?
The idea is that it’s too fast to ever intercept, is extremely penetrating, and you don’t have to send a bomb to orbit in violation of treaty.
But all the really cool versions use rail guns and asteroid mining.
A guided road is against treaty as well, say it’s a grey area but it really isn’t.
A rod from space impacting with the presumed force equal to a nuclear bomb is in fact a weapon of mass destruction and the language of the treaty is nuclear or other weapons of mass destruction.
It’s worded that way specifically so captured space bound objects can’t be redirected and used as weapons like Heinlein described in the moon is a harsh mistress.
Yes, a reasonable person would interpret it that way, but
“Why would anyone use a gun when you can just use a hand-held explosive?”