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@ireneista @dalias Navigation is a big one. Especially in dense forest, over open ocean, in bad weather, etc. GPS makes things much much better.

On the plus side, GPS birds live high enough up that they're unlikely to be affected by LEO clutter. The big concern is during launch and orbital insertion, when you're still down low. But it's unlikely we'd reach a truly apocalyptic Kessler situation where LEO is so full of debris you're guaranteed to be struck within minutes. Just "lifetimes are unacceptably short".

So you might need a slightly more energetic booster to lift it up to the working orbit quickly so it doesn't spend too long in Kessler-land, and might lose a few percent of your replacement GPS craft to impacts on the way up, but it wouldn't be a complete denial of higher orbits.