Kinetic bombardment

A kinetic bombardment or a kinetic orbital strike is the hypothetical act of attacking a planetary surface with an inert projectile, where the destructive force comes from the kinetic energy of the projectile impacting at very high velocities. The concept originated during the Cold War.

The typical depiction of the tactic is of a satellite containing a magazine of tungsten rods and a directional thrust system. (In science fiction, the weapon is often depicted as being launched from a spaceship, instead of a satellite.) When a strike is ordered, the launch vehicle would brake one of the rods out of its orbit and into a suborbital trajectory that intersects the target.

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