I had an idea for a 'space cleaner' and I have no clue if it is actually viable but I figured that I would share it anyway.<p>1) Create a suborbital and reusable rocket that launches and lands vertically.<p>2) Launch it upwards so that it approaches the target satellite near its apogee.<p>3) Around the apogee, it releases a stream of gas in the path of the debris<p>4) The gas will dissipate quickly, but the goal is for the cloud to buffer the satellite and take some speed away without directly colliding with it and making space junk. I figure suborbital gas molecules would impart a decent amount of slowing force on the object.<p>5) The sounding rocket then returns to earth and can be re-launched for multiple successive passes at the target satellite.<p>Would this work?
The tools to fight space junk are also anti-satellite tools.<p>It's only a matter of time before somebody deploys a baby deathstar that moves satellites around by pulsed laser ablation. Otherwise LEO is going to be unsafe at any speed.