Always remember the magic words: dual use technology. The people pushing these aren't saying to you that they want to build data centers in space because conventional data centers are at huge risk of getting bombed by foreign nations or eventually getting smashed by angry mobs. But you can bet they're saying that to the people with the dual-use technology money bag. Or even better, let them draw that conclusion themselves, to make them think it was their idea - that also has the advantage of deniability when it turns out data centers in space was a terrible solution to the problem.
It is far easier to build them at remote places and bunkers (or both). Even at the middle of the ocean will make more sense and provide better cooling (See Microsoft attempt at that).
You can take out a data center in space with an accidental collision of a small runaway satellite. Taking out a data center in the middle of Oregon would be significantly harder and will invite massive retaliation.
At this point I wouldn't be surprised if a non zero number of pitch meetings start with, "in order to not disrupt your life too much as the mobs of the starving and displaced beat down your door"
The only vaguely valid dual use technology I can see coming out of this is improving space-rated processing enough that deep space probes sent out to Uranus or whatever can run with more processing power than a Ti-82 and thus can actually do some data processing rather than clogging up the deep space network for three weeks on an uplink with less power than a lightbulb
Nah, they are pretty similar in difficulty for interception - the first US ASAT program used essentially the same Nike Zeus missiles used for ABM duty during the late 50s
not really. Suborbital vehicles achieve orbital heights. It's actually probably easier since you don't need a payload. The velocity alone will do the trick.
