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Starlink is redeploying to 300 miles. Many consider Kessler to be impossible at 300 miles. Any unpowered satellite at a 300 mile orbit will deorbit within a couple of months. But a collision means fragments which deorbit faster because they have a higher surface/weight ratio, and because orbit disturbances lower that time considerably. Any single disturbance that raises aphelion lowers perihelion.
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A smaller player like North Korea and Iran would not have as much to lose. Iran is doing something similar today, suicide bombing everything it can.
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Iran also has a space program with Satellites: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iranian_Space_Agency
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These LEO satellites are low enough that I imagine a Kessler situation would self-resolve within a few years.
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