Corrected entry: Instead of blowing up an entire mountaintop communication facility, why didn't the military just destroy the Landsat 7 satellite? Either command it to self-destruct by burning up on an atmospheric re-entry or destroy it with anti-satellite weapons that already exist. Or just simply command the satellite to power-down.
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Correction: With the dome in place, no one on the outside knew what the aliens were doing. The only way to stop them was to destroy the transmitters.
Mark Andrew
At around 1 hour 13 min into the movie, the pentagon is literally talking about the possibility of the aliens wanting to use Landsat7 to communicate with their home world. So they did know that the aliens were probably going to do that. Even if they weren't completely sure about it, they could've just destroyed it as a precaution. They could've launched a missile at it or put another satellite on a collision course.