Did the Navy shoot down the satillite to show Iran they can put one down their

[Les B]

chimney? Does a complete success mean Israel got the message?

[GIOSTORMUSN]

NO, the satellite was shot down because it had a degrading orbit, and the fuel for it was a very toxic one. There was no guarantee that the fuel cells would burn up during the re-entry into the earth's atmosphere. The other part was the satellite was a spy type one, the guarantee of it's destruction was needed, so using a missile to shoot it and pretty much destroy it so that it would burn up on re-entry was needed.

[newjerseyguy]

Yeah right, we launched a multibillion dollar satellite and let it go out of control just so we could shoot it down and impress the Iranian government.

[sudonym x]

Last year, China shot down one of its satelites, we had to show that we can do it too. Just another arms race. Some day we humans will be destroying each other's space equipment as part of a war, so don't be surprised when your cell phone stops working during a war.

[Spock (rhp)]

showing Iran that we could put one down their chimney isn't a bad idea though.

their military and the ruling mullahs probably already know this, and it wouldn't hurt to remind both them and their people that we can do it easily. a nice, messy conventional starburst about 9pm offset 50 km southeast from Tehran and 25km high in the sky ought to make some of them sit up and take notice.