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It's no great mystery that military forces around the world are involved in space. Interestingly, Great Britain launched a communication satellite system for military use called Skynet (see video below). No word about any terminator robots from the future searching for John Connor though.
The idea of manned Star Wars type fighter crafts zipping around in space making extreme maneuvers is fictional. Such a craft with have to be completely surrounded by thrusters, even then I'd suspect maneuvering would still be very slow. However, it's possible that fleets of robotic type spacecrafts with rapidly rotating weapon turrets could be used in a space war, or used as explosive devices that attach themselves to the hull of a target craft. It's also possible for either ground-based equipment or equipped on aircraft to inflict damage or destroy satellites or possibly spacecraft.
Although there are international treaties that agree on using space only for peaceful purposes, that doesn't eliminate the possibility that some nation may decide to ignore the treaty.
When the United States detonated the 1.4-megaton (MT) STARFISH2 device on July 9, 1962, at 400 km altitude, a total of 21 satellites were in orbit or were launched in weeks following. Eight suffered radiation damage that compromised or terminated their missions.3 Information concerning the fate of the remaining 13 satellites is not publicly available.
"The idea of manned Star Wars type fighter crafts zipping around in space making extreme maneuvers is fictional. Such a craft with have to be completely surrounded by thrusters, even then I'd suspect maneuvering would still be very slow."
Space operas like Star Wars use an almost direct translation of aerial dogfight and bomber shots from WWII. No relationship with reality is needed to promote action. "2001, a Space Odyssey" DID try to get the science right, with the end result that we got a space shuttle that looked a lot like the spaceplane in the movie. It was widely reported that the choice for NASA was between a space station or a shuttle, but not both. The shuttle was a stretch too far, witness the return to simpler methods of getting to space. The Skylab was a treehouse. IMO, it would have been WAY cooler if we had a nice roomy rotating space station like the one in the movie.
As an indicator of just how earthbound we really are, consider that the plot lines of a lot of science fiction places interplanetary and intergalaxy travel on similar time scales as the old voyages of exploration of the 1500 - 1800 era.
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The Universe: Space Wars
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