Comment by nradov
14 days ago
Well obviously you need to have a supply of replacements in stock. From a military perspective, think of satellites as rounds of ammunition that will be expended during a conflict.
14 days ago
Well obviously you need to have a supply of replacements in stock. From a military perspective, think of satellites as rounds of ammunition that will be expended during a conflict.
I think it'd be more apropos to compare them to fighter jets/tanks vs bullets
Not really comparable. A new Starlink satellite costs ~$1M. A new F-35 costs ~$100M, and some of the guided missiles it carries actually cost more than the satellite. The militarized Starshield satellites probably cost more than their Starlink cousins but still I think you get the point that there are orders of magnitude differences in unit cost.
And a bullet costs $0.0001, so it's off just as much in the other direction.
Also, your focus on cost was not the point. The point was numbers necessary. You need $lots of bullets, but you don't need any where near the same number of jets/tanks. You don't need $lots of satellites. You need a much smaller number closer to the number of jets/tanks. At least based on Starlink constellation numbers.
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