Jeff Foust has a roundup. With (so far) one idiotic comment.

Here is a good quote posted at Edward Ellegood's blog (he offered no link I could find) Daily Telegraph quote?:

When it comes to its strategic interests, Beijing does not care much about making a mess, particularly 530 miles up in space. And despite appearances, what really matters to China is not whether its military and its space program can catch up with America's. China is neither claiming a "balance" nor trying to challenge America across the board. Economically, it believes in the American dream — more, perhaps, than America itself. Internationally, it does not desire to impose an alternative model to America's on the Middle East, or Europe — or at all.

Instead, it has a set of limited but clear strategic goals, to last it for the next two decades. By that time, it hopes, its economy, society, maybe even politics will have changed so that anything is possible. One of those goals is to develop the ability to retake Taiwan, which it wants to "reunite" with the Motherland, by force if necessary. That also means deterring Taiwan's ally, America, from intervening to save it. Another is to ensure no-one interferes with its general "sovereignty". A third is to ensure its economy cannot be disrupted...They look up and see America's single greatest strength — the extraordinary satellite technology that enables it to know where its enemies are and bomb them. And they realized its greatest strength was also its weakness, because while a human can fight back, a satellite cannot.

Going forward, this suggests to me that getting China's economy hooked on satellite usage would be a terrific way to discourage Chinese ASAT programs.

More cooperation with civilian Chinese space efforts rather than less cooperation would give the Chinese more to lose if indeed there were a space war and that gives us greater deterrence.

The Chinese military is developing ASATs because it believes that this is necessary in order to fight and win future wars that might be against the United States, or any other more advanced power.

Whether China itself needs satellites is a secondary consideration (especially since, as a continental power, it can rely upon landlines/fiber optics for comms, and its primary target is 100 miles offshore, and can be easily infiltrated, obviating the need for satellite recon). A China that relied on comsats, but which was confronted with a Taiwan that was going independent, is a China that would be every bit as likely to use ASATs as a China that did not rely at all on Comsats.

Now, there might be a political pressure-point, if the world were to make it clear that a China that littered the orbital pathways with debris would be a China that was economically blockaded. But that would require agreement on the part of the EU, Japan, etc., all of whom would be losing markets.

Witness the stunning success of such efforts w/r/t Iran and the IAEA, or in the wake of Tiananmen.