Space Legal Regimes, Militarization, and Weaponization of Outer Space

ABSTRACT The prevailing arms race in outer space is considered as a right of self-defense of states, which is bestowed by international law. States adhere and espouse to legal regimes, but maintain a right of self-defense. Often, states leverage loopholes in these regimes for pursuing space-centric military interests for maintaining power, hegemony, survival, balance of power, or deterrence. Prevention of an Arms Race in Outer Space negotiations for restraining active military space weapons systems have remained on the agenda of the Conference on Disarmament, though deadlocked from advancing given the consensus decision-making model and the opposition of some states, especially the United States. Lack of interpretation of a definition and loopholes in the law provide spacefaring states freedom to pursue strategic interests by amalgamating space with terrestrial warfighting capabilities. The dependence on space assets encourages space powers to formulate polices of space assurance, space dominance, space situational awareness, and space offensive and defensive strategies. By many accounts, space is, or will be, weaponized with negative impacts on international, regional, and national security dynamics. This article investigates the extent to which international law mitigates these negative impacts associated with the militarization and weaponization of space.