Launch of an SM-3 missile from the cruiser USS Lake Erie in February 2008 on an intercept course with a disabled American reconnaissance satellite. (credit: US Navy)

The case for a kinetic anti-satellite test ban between the US and China

by Jimin Park
Monday, November 10, 2025

The United States should pursue a new space-related arms control treaty: a ban on high-altitude direct-ascent anti-satellite (DA-ASAT) missile tests with China. First, kinetic ASAT capabilities heighten risks from space debris and endanger space assets. Second, a bilateral test ban could curb debris creation by restricting kinetic ASAT tests. Finally, while critics may argue that this proposal is too narrow in scope and limits US military advantages, a test ban represents a targeted, pragmatic, and interim solution that enhances security for all parties without undermining the military.

Prevention of debris cascades

The US, Russia, China, and India have all conducted DA-ASAT tests.[1] In the future, China and Russia may pursue additional DA-ASAT weapons.[2] However, this trend is concerning because each DA-ASAT test poses a unique danger to space assets. By physically destroying a satellite, kinetic ASATs generate a cascading debris field that could render orbits unusable.[3] The generated debris clouds could remain in orbit for decades or even centuries.[4] In a worst-case scenario, these tests could trigger the Kessler Syndrome: a chain reaction where one debris collision leads to collisional cascades in low Earth orbit, severely hampering civilizational access to space.[5]

Even a single satellite failure from an ASAT test could trigger cascading satellite failure, affecting a wide spectrum of human activities.[6] Without space-based capabilities, the American military would be severely hindered and have extreme difficulty maintaining intelligence, communications, and targeting.[7] Without the ability to use satellites, cell phones and ATMs could not properly function, thereby disrupting global transportation, travel, communications, and economic systems.[8]

Enforcement, compliance, and verification

Beyond a specific altitude in LEO, the bilateral treaty should restrict DA-ASAT tests. Negotiators should target the range of 250–300 kilometers.[9] Treaty enforcement should fall under the Outer Space Treaty. Violators of the testing ban who conduct a kinetic ASAT test would be held liable under the Liability Convention.[10] This convention holds countries liable for all outer space activities, which should include DA-ASAT tests.[11] This treaty would give “language [of the Liability Convention] teeth” and hold rule-breakers liable under a “negligence per se standard.”[12]

Focusing on DA-ASAT tests in negotiations with Beijing increases the likelihood of Chinese compliance. By excluding weapons that pose verification problems, the test ban is verifiable and ensures China’s agreement with the treaty.[13] Treaty compliance can be verified by national technical means or intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance space assets.[14] DA-ASAT tests are easily identifiable, making treaty violations more noticeable.[15]

Responding to key criticisms of a test ban

Critique 1: Chinese non-compliance

Critics may argue that geopolitical adversaries will violate arms control agreements to gain strategic and military advantages.[16] However, this view is overly pessimistic and overlooks the potential benefit of arms control. Despite stalemates and mutual distrust, negotiations on arms control have often been successful.[17] Historically, China has largely adhered to arms control due to Beijing’s desire to gain status in the liberal international order.[18] China’s concerns over US space dominance may incentivize compliance with bilateral restrictions over ASAT testing.[19] Bilateral engagement can improve relations between the two countries, thereby reducing tensions in the ASAT arms race.[20] Even when disagreements over treaty details persist, the mere negotiation itself may convince China to limit DA-ASAT testing.

Critique 2: the status quo is sufficient

In 2022, the US announced a voluntary moratorium on DA-ASAT tests.[21] The UN General Assembly followed by passing a similar resolution, encouraging countries not to conduct these tests.[22] Opponents may highlight that this measure makes a test ban unnecessary. However, China and Russia vetoed the resolution and India abstained.[23] These efforts are non-binding and lack enforcement; thus, the US needs to negotiate a binding arms control treaty.

Critique 3: the treaty is too narrow

Skeptics of space arms control may contend that a test ban ignores other threats to space systems.[24] Although a test ban does not ban weapons, targeting testing can have stabilizing effects because countries are reluctant to develop and integrate untested weapons systems.[25] If testing is prohibited, “the possibility of [DA-ASAT] deployment and use is pre-emptively eliminated.”[26] This limited scope is precisely why an ASAT test ban could facilitate a successful agreement between the US and China. Limiting negotiations to a narrow sub-issue, such as kinetic ASAT tests, are necessary for reaching consensus for binding space warfare laws.[27] A bilateral ASAT test ban treaty could generate momentum for future arms control agreements.[28]

Critique 4: US military disadvantage

Critics of a test ban may argue that arms control puts the US military at a disadvantage.[29] However, a DA-ASAT test ban will not affect broader US military weapons systems. The primary concern focuses on ballistic missile defense (BMD) systems. A bilateral test ban will “avoid undermining the limited deterrent value of BMD” and “would not prevent the further refinement of existing BMD systems by means of non-collision testing.”[30] An ASAT test ban even allows for testing below a specified threshold, which permits defensive measures and deorbiting of falling satellites.[31]

Conclusion

A US-China ban on high-altitude DA-ASAT tests would provide a feasible, pragmatic, and targeted step towards strengthening space security. By directly curtailing destabilizing kinetic ASAT tests, a test ban would safeguard global space assets from debris cascades. Critics will highlight the limited nature of an ASAT test ban. However, this treaty’s narrow scope makes Chinese compliance more likely and preserves US military flexibility. A binding test ban treaty could catalyze future arms control agreements and stabilize US-Chinese space relations while reinforcing international norms against destructive ASAT tests.

References

1. Kari Bingen, Kaitlyn Johnson, and Makena Young, Space Threat Assessment 2023, CSIS Aerospace Security Project (2023), 4.
2. Defense Intelligence Agency, 2022 Challenges to Security in Space: Space Reliance in an Era of Competition and Expansion (United States Federal Government, 2022), 17–18.
3. Bingen, Johnson, and Young, Space Threat Assessment 2023, 4.
4. Defense Intelligence Agency, 2022 Challenges to Security in Space, 4.
5. Sarah Thiele and Aaron C. Boley, “Investigating the Risks of Debris-Generating ASAT Tests in the Presence of Megaconstellations,” The Journal of the Astronautical Sciences 69, no. 6 (January 3, 2023): 1797–1820.
6. Max Mutschler, Arms Control in Space: Exploring Conditions for Preventive Arms Control, (2013): 149–160.
7. Jessie Oppenheim, “Danger at 700,000 Feet: Why the United States Needs to Develop a Kinetic Anti-Satellite Missile Technology Test-Ban Treaty,” Brooklyn Journal of International Law 38, no. 2 (2013).
8. Oppenheim, “Danger at 700,000 Feet,” 789–791.
9. Ross Liemer and Christopher F. Chyba, “A Verifiable Limited Test Ban for Anti-satellite Weapons,” The Washington Quarterly 33, no. 3 (June 25, 2010): 149–63.
10. Oppenheim, “Danger at 700,000 Feet,” 787–788.
11. John Byrne, Robin Dickey, and Michael P. Gleason, A Space Policy Primer: Key Concepts, Issues, and Actors, 2021. The Aerospace Corporation, 22.
12. Oppenheim, “Danger at 700,000 Feet,” 787–788.
13. Alexi Arbatov, “Arms Control in Outer Space: The Russian Angle, and a Possible Way Forward,” Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, (2019), 157–158.
14. Mutschler, Arms Control in Space, 154
15. Ben Baseley-Walker and Brian Weeden, “Verification in space: theories, realities and possibilities,” Disarmament Forum (2010), 47.
16. Colin S. Gray, “Space Arms Control: A Skeptical View,” Air University Review 37, no. 1 (November–December 1985): 73–86.
17. Michael Gleason, “Charting a Path Control through the Space Arms Control Verification Challenge,” The Aerospace Corporation, 2024
18. Wendy Frieman, China, Arms Control, and Nonproliferation (London: Routledge, 2014), 174.
19. David A. Koplow, “Deterrence as the MacGuffin: The Case for Arms Control in Outer Space,” (2019).
20. Christopher A. Ford, Arms Control in Outer Space: History and Prospects, Arms Control and International Security (Washington DC: 2020), 9.
21. Jeff Foust, “More Countries Encouraged to Commit to Halt Destructive ASAT Tests,” SpaceNews, April 17, 2023.
22. Foust, “Encouraged to Halt Tests,”
23. Foust, “Encouraged to Halt Tests,”
24. Grey, “Space Arms Control,” 81–83.
25. Mutschler, Arms Control in Space, 156.
26. Jinyuan Su, “Towards an Effective and Adequately Verifiable PPWT,” Space Policy 26, no. 3 (2010): 152-162.
27. Eytan Tepper, The Laws of Space Warfare: A Tale of Non-Binding International Agreements, 2024, Maryland Law Review 83, no. 2 (2024).
28. Oppenheim, “Danger at 700,000 Feet,” 790.
29. Grey, “Space Arms Control,” 81–83.
30. Mark A. Gubrud, “Chinese and US Kinetic Energy Space Weapons and Arms Control,” Asian Perspective 35, no. 4 (2011): 617-641.
31. Oppenheim, “Danger at 700,000 Feet,” 787–788.

Jimin Park is a masterÆs student at Georgetown’s School of Foreign Service with a focus in Asian Studies. He holds a B.A. in Political Science and a B.A. in Global & International Studies from the University of Kansas.

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