(thread) the narrative that Eisenhower, JFK, and Johnson pursued the militarization but not weaponization of space is flawed. It marginalizes the hedging strategy behind nuclear ASAT deployment and places weapons "in space" in a special category (1) (2) securing freedom of space for sat recon was the overriding priority, but there was also a view (esp. in JFK and Johnson admin) that the US needed to be able to destroy "hostile space systems"

(thread) Historical context on the US reaction to Soviet FOBS and why it matters: in short, public hysteria can lead to overreaction by political leaders 1) After Khrushchev made the comment "we sent Gagarin and Titov to Space, but we can replace them with other load and send it anywhere on Earth” some U.S. officials began to raise fears about Soviet orbital nuclear weapons