This post contains spoilers for The Expanse and Kim Stanley Robinson’s Mars trilogy.
Will we have war in space? We’ve certainly been using space technologies to conduct war on Earth for decades, but so far, space travelers themselves have not had to experience the violence of war during their journeys. In fact, cooperation in space between astronauts whose home governments are on decidedly unfriendly terms has been a celebrated aspect of the International Space Station.
But what about in the more distant future, when humans are living and working in outposts and stations far from Earth’s battlefield monuments? War in space might turn out to be technologically simpler than it is on Earth: after all, humans living in space will be surviving inside fragile bubbles of habitable air. Distance might be the only protective factor for a space settlement under threat of attack. If an aggressor can be bothered to launch enough mass in their target’s direction, victory may be as easy as poking a hole and letting the air out.
Science fiction, of course, is full of examples of how easy mass murder and destruction would be in space— and I don’t just mean imaginary technologies like the Death Star. In The Expanse series, a terrorist acting in the name of the Belter people who have spent generations mining the asteroid belt uses that expertise to drop rocks into Earth’s gravity well, killing billions and rendering the planet barely habitable. In Kim Stanley Robinson’s Mars trilogy, both sides of the multi-book struggle for control of Mars use life control systems or terraforming technology to increase the oxygen levels in their enemy’s territory, then spark fast-moving fires.
But none of these gruesome scenarios answer my initial question: Will we have war in space? Studying human history can give the impression that war is inextricable from human society, and in fact some social scientists argue that war is indeed an inescapable part of human nature. This would make war inevitable in space, if humans manage to establish a permanent presence there.
But others have argued that anthropological and archaeological evidence does not support the idea that war is present in every human society, and that in fact there are several examples of ancient societies with no evidence of warfare for periods lasting thousands of years. Obviously, humans are capable of waging war, but we’ve also developed many alternative, less-violent methods for resolving conflicts.
Perhaps the belief that war is innate and inevitable is a self-fulfilling prophecy. Conflict in space is inevitable once enough humans get there, each bringing along their own motives, ideologies, and priorities. But what if we set ourselves the difficult work of optimism, and focus on adapting nonviolent conflict resolution methods for space rather than bemoaning a dark and unavoidably violent future? Allow yourself to imagine the strange and wonderous experiences of our descendants in space: going their whole lives without ever seeing an ocean, a blue sky… or a war memorial.
War in Space
This is a brief but nice overview of the subject. Steven Pinker would argue that society has been honing alternative methods of conflict resolution for a long time, and that we are already reaping those rewards. Hopefully this will continue. As an amateur graphic artist and occasional citizen-activist in the space community, I've also addressed the issue of conflict in the space arena:
https://twitter.com/Jon_Alexandr/status/1643844094798725120
https://twitter.com/Jon_Alexandr/status/1638644838219522050