[zaga_fan]

It's a pretty common sci-fi theme but if you apply any force to a object moving in space, it will change its trajectory. Smaller, faster computers and better telescopes, including space based ones, allow astronomers to compute orbital paths faster and more accurately than ever before and that capability is quickly improving.

Applying a force or repeatedly applying force to an object whose orbit already brings it close to Earth on a periodic basis would theoretically allow scientists to guide the object toward a specific target on Earth. Even something as simple as painting half of an asteroid black or white would affect its orbit to some degree. Detonating a high explosive or tactical nuclear weapon would definitely alter an object's orbit by a measurable amount.

The key for some country to pull off such a feat would be to identify a large object that would pass within a few hundred or thousand miles of Earth with no intervention and apply a small, carefully calculated force well in advance of its next approach to Earth. Another application of force could be used to "fine tune" the object's trajectory on its final approach.

There would be no point in cataloging large objects whose orbits make them potential threats to our planet if scientists believed that we would be powerless to do anything to protect ourselves if threats are identified with enough advance notice. If science can provide the planet with some protection against objects with near earth orbits, then those same objects are potential weapons in the hands of other scientists.

Here is a description of NASA's Near Earth Object program. Please read it and imagine adapting the defensive strategies discussed into a secret weapons program.
I don't think that the idea is far-fetched at all. We may not face this threat in our lifetime but our children or grandchildren could easily see the threat become a reality.

I'll give it a read.

Keep in mind that I haven't read the info before posting...
but it seems to me that knocking something away from the earth and knocking something onto the coast of the United States seem worlds apart.

With an object that big and moving that fast - if the math wasn't perfect you could knock something where you don't intend it to go (that pretty much goes without saying)

I know we can track an object's path, but to know how much force it would take to knock it into a specific target you would need to know it's weight.
The only way I would know to get that data would be to apply force and then see how it affects it and then go from there.
You're also dealing with objects that aren't perfectly spherical. Hitting it with a certain force isn't the only thing to think about. You would have to take into consideration where to apply that force.

My doubts are definitely reasonable ones, but I would imagine the greatest minds in the world are working on them right now. I would imagine there are countless factors that I've not even mentioned - that's just what I thought of at first.

I'll check out the link.
I'm sure it will be pretty interesting.