"United States national security is critically dependent upon space capabilities, and this dependence will grow," the strategic document says.

"The United States will preserve its rights, capabilities, and freedom of action in space; ... and deny, if necessary, adversaries the use of space capabilities hostile to US national interests," it says.

"Freedom of action in space is as important to the United States as air power and sea power."

The text also rejects any treaties forbidding space weapons: "The United States will oppose the development of new legal regimes or other restrictions that seek to prohibit or limit US access to or use of space."

The US government assured this new policy was not a first step toward a weaponization of space.

"It's not a shift in policy," White House spokesman Tony Snow told journalists traveling aboard Air Force One, the president's plane.

"The notion that you would do defense from space is different than the weaponization of space," he added.

The new policy has raised some eyebrows.

"While this policy does not explicitly say we are not going to shoot satellites or we are going to put weapons in space, it does, it seems to me, open the door toward that," Theresa Hitchens, director of the Center for Defense Information, told AFP.

According to Hitchens, this reading was confirmed by a series of US army documents that clearly express interest in space weapons.

She noted the new policy also represents a significant shift from its 10-year-old predecessor initiated under then-president Bill Clinton.

"This is a much more unilateralist vision of space. The United States in this policy seeks to establish its rights but fails to acknowledge the rights of other countries in space, where the Clinton policy was very careful to acknowledge the rights of all nations in space," Hitchens said.

The United States currently enjoys supremacy in space, while Russia has lost most of its means and China is still in the development phase.

The Americans are the only ones capable of using satellites for combat operations and are doing it better and better if one compares the two wars in the Gulf and wars in the Balkans, Afghanistan and Iraq, Michael O'Hanlon, an expert at the Brookings Institution, testified during a congressional hearing in June.

But the US supremacy in space faces threats from other countries. "The United States is in particular concerned about China," Hitchens said.

"While both China and Russia have been promoting a space weapons ban, it is clear to me that the Chinese at the same time are considering ways to do damage to US space assets," she said.

Before becoming the secretary of defense, Donald Rumsfeld warned against a "Space Pearl Harbor" and insisted US interests needed to be better protected.

earlier related report
Under New Policy US Could Block Foes In Space
Washington (AFP) Oct 18 - A new US national space policy document says the United States may deny access to space to "adversaries" seen as interfering with its security or national interests.

The document, released earlier this month to replace a ten-year old national space policy, also rejects any move to ban space weapons, while embracing development of a robust commercial space sector.

"United States national security is critically dependent upon space capabilities, and this dependence will grow," the text states, placing space policy squarely in the service of national security.

The document directs the secretary of defense to "develop capabilities, plans and options to ensure freedom of action in space and, if directed, deny such freedom of action to adversaries."

"Freedom of action in space is as important to the United States as air power and sea power," it says.

"The United States will oppose the development of new legal regimes or other restrictions that seek to prohibit or limit US access to or use of space. Proposed arms control agreements or restrictions must not impair the rights of the United States to conduct research, development, testing and operations or other activities in space for US national interests," it says.

But Washington wants "to foster the use of US commercial space around the globe and to enable a dynamic, domestic commercial space sector," pledging to assist the private sector in that regard and streamline licensing of commercial space activities.

President George W. Bush authorized a new national space policy on August 31, and the document was quietly released by the White House on October 6.

Members of Congress and other governments, including Russia, have been briefed on the new policy, an administration official told The Washington Post.

"This policy is not about developing or deploying weapons in space. Period," the official told the daily, speaking on condition of anonymity.

New arms-control agreements are not needed because there is no space arms race, the official was quoted as saying.

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