The Pentagon wants to launch a nuclear thermal rocket in 4 years

MILITARY TECH

- KYLE MIZOKAMI

PICTURE THIS : WORLD WAR III IS JUST hours away. In the cold vastness of space, enemy robotic spacecraft are slowly adjusting their orbits and preparing to launch a surprise attack on the US’s fleet of satellites. The uncrewed craft, with robotic arms strong enough to disable a satellite, are creeping up on American spacecraft, about to deal a knockout blow to the US military.

But down on Earth, US Space Force guardians have been keeping track of the assassin craft, knowing that in order to present as low a profile target as possible, they have just enough fuel for one attack. At the last minute, after the enemy satellites have committed to attack, the command activates the nuclear thermal propulsion (NTP) engines on the American satellites, quickly boosting them into a higher orbit and safely out of range. Later, as the enemy satellites careen unpowered into the infinite void of space, the same engines, powered by uranium, will safely return the American sats to their positions in low-earth orbit.

This capability could arrive sooner than you think. In April 2021, the Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) announced that it commissioned General Atomics, Blue Origin, and Lockheed Martin to build the Demonstration Rocket for Agile Cislunar Operations (DRACO): the world’s first NTP system for spacecraft.