The Nation: Targeting a Hunter-Killer

Even as the SALT talks inch toward the elusive goal of limiting the arms race, weapons designers are creating ever newer generations of lethal hardware.

Last week Defense Secretary Harold Brown confirmed what defense experts have long suspected: the Soviets have developed a "hunter-killer" satellite, straight from Star Wars, that can track down orbiting U.S. spacecraft — and wipe them out. Said Brown: "The Soviets have an operational capability" to destroy "some" American satellites and have thus raised at least the possibility of a Soviet-U.S. space war. Added Brown: "That is somewhat troublesome."

The trouble comes in the form of a beetle-shaped Soviet...