Fire Hydrant of Freedom
Politics, Religion, Science, Culture and Humanities => Politics & Religion => Topic started by: Crafty_Dog on July 06, 2010, 03:14:22 AM
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I posted this yesterday in the Hall of Shame thread, and use it here today to kick off this thread.
Amongst the long list of areas of strong disagreement I have with Obama is what he has done/is doing with US efforts in space. My understanding is that our edge in space forms a essential cornerstone of our military strength via our abilities to look down, to communicate, , , and other matters. This is why the Chinese are so intent on killer satellite technology (as well as hacking our military computer networks)-- so they can blind us and incapacitate our communications.
That our CinC has selected policies that leave us having to pay the Russians to give us a ride into space (on top of depending on them as a supply route to Afghanistan) is jaw dropping to the point of wondering about the man's sanity , , , or patriotism. I gather he now is absolving the US of any intention of acting independently in outer space as well.
With regard to the following, Krauthammer spoke of "PC psycho babble". He is right:
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http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/obamas-new-mission-for-nasa-reach-out-to-muslim-world-97785979.html
Obama’s new mission for NASA: Reach out to Muslim world
By: Byron York
Chief Political Correspondent
07/05/10 2:50 AM EDT
In a far-reaching restatement of goals for the nation’s space agency, NASA administrator Charles Bolden says President Obama has ordered him to pursue three new objectives: to “re-inspire children” to study science and math, to “expand our international relationships,” and to “reach out to the Muslim world.” Of those three goals, Bolden said in a recent interview with al-Jazeera, the mission to reach out to Muslims is “perhaps foremost,” because it will help Islamic nations “feel good” about their scientific accomplishments.
In the same interview, Bolden also said the United States, which first sent men to the moon in 1969, is no longer capable of reaching beyond low earth orbit without help from other nations.
Bolden made the statements during a recent trip to the Middle East. He told al-Jazeera that in the wake of the president’s speech in Cairo last year, the American space agency is now pursuing “a new beginning of the relationship between the United States and the Muslim world.” Then:
When I became the NASA Administrator — before I became the NASA Administrator — [Obama] charged me with three things: One was he wanted me to help re-inspire children to want to get into science and math, he wanted me to expand our international relationships, and third, and perhaps foremost, he wanted me to find a way to reach out to the Muslim world and engage much more with dominantly Muslim nations to help them feel good about their historic contribution to science, math, and engineering.
Later in the interview, Bolden discussed NASA’s goal of greater international cooperation in space exploration. He said the United States, more than 40 years after the first moon mission, cannot reach beyond earth’s orbit today without assistance from abroad:
In his message in Cairo, [Obama] talked about expanding our international outreach, expanding our international involvement. We’re not going to go anywhere beyond low earth orbit as a single entity. The United States can’t do it, China can’t do it — no single nation is going to go to a place like Mars alone.
Bolden’s trip included a June 15 speech at the American University in Cairo. In that speech, he said in the past NASA worked mostly with countries that are capable of space exploration. But that, too, has changed in light of Obama’s Cairo initiative. “He asked NASA to change…by reaching out to ‘non-traditional’ partners and strengthening our cooperation in the Middle East, North Africa, Southeast Asia and in particular in Muslim-majority nations,” Bolden said. “NASA has embraced this charge.”
“NASA is not only a space exploration agency,” Bolden concluded, “but also an earth improvement agency.”
Read more at the Washington Examiner: http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/blogs/beltway-confidential/obamas-new-mission-for-nasa-reach-out-to-muslim-world-97785979.html#ixzz0spO08kib
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........I feel the need to respond but aside from "that does it we have a nut in the white house" I really do not have any articulation. I would understand downgrading NASA to being the space science promotion agency, but the reaching out to international contacts? (Isn't that deparment of state stuff?) and a specific group?! No, I do not think so.
I hope Rutan, Air Force and the others come up with some sort of cargo hauler before the GPS/ COMSAT systems start collapsing, along with the experimental satellites. There are so many technologies Nasa brought into the practical use category in an effort to explore space, that we simply would not have an America as we know it now.
We are going to NEED to be in space anyway, there are so many resources, materials, and just plain elbow room, up there.............
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NASA to Put Muslim on Moon Using Muslim Technology
by Scott Ott for ScrappleFace · Comments (21) · ShareThis · Print This Story
(2010-07-08) — The White House today announced a bold new program consistent with NASA’s top priority to help Muslims “feel good about their historic contribution in science and math and engineering,” as the space agency’s chief, Charles Bolden, recently told al Jazeera TV.
http://www.scrappleface.com/?p=4718
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Where to next? And when?
For NASA, as it attempts to squeeze a workable human spaceflight program into a tight federal budget, the answers appear to be “somewhere” and “not anytime soon.”
When the space shuttles are retired this year — and only one flight remains for each of the three — NASA will no longer have its own means for getting American astronauts to space.
What comes next is a muddle.
The program to send astronauts back to the moon, known as Constellation, was canceled last year.
In its place, Congress has asked NASA to build a heavy-lift rocket, one that can go deep into space carrying big loads. But NASA says it cannot possibly build such a rocket with the budget and schedule it has been given.
Another crucial component of NASA’s new mission — helping commercial companies develop space taxis for taking astronauts into orbit — is getting less money than the Obama administration requested. Companies like Boeing and SpaceX that are interested in bidding for the work do not yet know whether they can make a profitable venture of it.
When it comes to the future of NASA, “it’s hard at this point to speculate,” Douglas R. Cooke, associate administrator for NASA’s exploration systems mission directorate, said in an interview.
A panel that oversees safety at NASA took note of the uncertainty in its annual report, released this month. “What is NASA’s exploration mission?” the members of the Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel asked in their report.
The panel added: “It is not in the nation’s best interest to continue functioning in this manner. The Congress, the White House, and NASA must quickly reach a consensus position on the future of the agency and the future of the United States in space.”
A nagging worry is that compromises will leave NASA without enough money to accomplish anything, and that — even as billions of dollars are spent — the future destination and schedule of NASA’s rockets could turn out to be “nowhere” and “never.”
In that case, human spaceflight at NASA would consist just of its work aboard the International Space Station, with the Russians providing the astronaut transportation indefinitely.
“We’re on a path with an increasing probability of a bad outcome,” said Scott Pace, a former NASA official who now directs the Space Policy Institute at George Washington University.
A NASA study, completed last month, came up with a framework for spaceflight in the two next decades but deferred setting specific destinations, much less timetables for getting there. One of the study’s conclusions was that trying to send astronauts to an asteroid by 2025 — as President Obama had challenged the agency to do in a speech last April — was “not prudent,” because it would be too expensive and narrow.
Instead, the study advocated a “capability-driven framework” — developing elements like spacecraft, propulsion systems and deep-space living quarters that could be used and reused for a variety of exploration missions.
Meanwhile, in Washington, the fight is less of a conflict of grand visions than a squabble over dollars and the design details of a rocket.
Last fall, in passing an authorization act for NASA, which laid out a blueprint for the next three years, Congress called for NASA to start work on the heavy-lift rocket. It also said that the design should be based on available technologies from the existing space shuttles and from Constellation; that the rocket should be ready by the end of 2016, and that NASA could have about $11.5 billion to develop it.
At the time, Senator Bill Nelson, a Florida Democrat who helped shape the NASA blueprint, said, “If we can’t do it for that, then we ought to question whether or not we can build a rocket.”
The blueprint, signed into law by President Obama in October, gave NASA 90 days to explain how it would build the rocket.
Two weeks ago, the agency told Congress that it had decided on preferred designs for the rocket and the crew capsule for carrying astronauts, but could yet not fit them into the schedule and constraints.
“All our models say ‘no,’ ” said Elizabeth Robinson, NASA’s chief financial officer, “even models that have generous affordability considerations.”
She said NASA was continuing to explore how it might reduce costs.
A couple of days after receiving the report, Senator Nelson said he had talked to the NASA administrator, Maj. Gen. Charles F. Bolden Jr., and “told him he has to follow the law, which requires a new rocket by 2016.” He added, “And NASA has to do it within the budget the law requires.”
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The track record for large aerospace development projects, both inside and outside of NASA, is that they almost always take longer and cost more than initially estimated. If costs for the heavy-lift rocket swell, the project could, as Constellation did, divert money from other parts of NASA.
Thus, many NASA observers wonder how the agency can afford to finance both the heavy-lift rocket and the commercial space taxis, which are supposed to begin flying at about the same time.
“They’re setting themselves up again for a long development program whose completion is beyond the horizon,” James A. M. Muncy, a space policy consultant, said of the current heavy-lift design. “The question is, what does Congress want more? Do they want to just want to keep the contractors on contract, or do they want the United States to explore space?”
He called the situation at NASA “a train wreck,” one “where everyone involved knows it’s a train wreck.”
Constellation, started in 2005 under the Bush administration, aimed to return to the moon by 2020 and set up a base there in the following years. But Constellation never received as much money as originally promised, which slowed work and raised the overall price tag.
When Barack Obama was running for president, he said he supported the moon goal. But after he took office, he did not show much enthusiasm for it. His request for the 2010 fiscal year did not seek immediate cuts in Constellation but trimmed the projected spending in future years.
The administration also set up a blue-ribbon panel, led by Norman Augustine, a former chief executive of Lockheed Martin, to review the program. The panel found that Constellation could not fit into the projected budget — $100 billion over 10 years — and would need $45 billion more to get back on track. Extending the space station five years beyond 2015 would add another $14 billion, the group concluded.
The panel could not find an alternative that would fit, either. It said that for a meaningful human spaceflight program that would push beyond low-Earth orbit, NASA would need $128 billion — $28 billion more than the administration wanted to spend — over the next decade.
If the country was not willing to spend that much, NASA should be asked to do less, the panel said.
Last February, when unveiling the budget request for fiscal year 2011, the Obama administration said it wanted to cancel Constellation, turn to commercial companies for transportation to low-Earth orbit and invest heavily in research and development on technologies for future deep-space missions.
The Obama budget requested more money for NASA — but for other parts of the agency like robotic science missions and aviation. The proposed allotment for human spaceflight was still at levels that the Augustine committee had said were not workable.
In pushing to cancel Constellation, one Obama administration official after another called it “unexecutable,” so expensive that it limped along for years without discernible progress.
“The fact that we poured $9 billion into an unexecutable program really isn’t an excuse to pour another $50 billion into it and still not have an executable program,” said James Kohlenberger, chief of staff of the White House’s Office of Science and Technology Policy, at a news conference last February.
At the same news conference, Lori Garver, NASA’s deputy administrator, noted that Constellation, without a budget increase, would not reach the moon until well after the 2020 target. “The Augustine report made it clear that we wouldn’t have gotten to beyond low Earth orbit until 2028 and even then would not have the funding to build the lander,” she said. But with the new road map, NASA may not get to its destinations any faster. As for the ultimate goal of landing people on Mars, which President Obama said he wanted NASA to accomplish by the mid-2030s, it is even slipping further into the future.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/19/science/space/for-space-mess-scientists-seek-celestial-broom.html?_r=1&nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha23
The most obvious sign that there is a lot of junk in space is how much of it has been falling out of the sky lately: a defunct NASA satellite last year, a failed Russian space probe this year.
While the odds are tiny that anyone on Earth will be hit, the chances that all this orbiting litter will interfere with working satellites or the International Space Station are getting higher, according to a recent report by the National Research Council.
The nonprofit group, which dispenses advice on scientific matters, concluded that the problem of extraterrestrial clutter had reached a point where, if nothing was done, a cascade of collisions would eventually make low-Earth orbit unusable.
“NASA is taking it very seriously,” said Mason A. Peck, chief technologist for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
There is a straightforward solution: dispose of the space junk, especially big pieces, before they collide and break into smaller ones. Researchers are stepping in with a variety of creative solutions, including nets that would round up wayward items and drag them into the Earth’s atmosphere, where they would harmlessly burn up, and balloons that would similarly direct the debris into the atmosphere. Also on the table: firing lasers from the ground. Not to blow things up, which would only make more of a mess, but to nudge them into safer orbits or into the atmosphere.
Just last week, researchers at a top Swiss university, the Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne, announced that they were designing CleanSpace One, a sort of vacuum cleaner in the sky — an $11 million one — that will be able to navigate close to a satellite and grab it with a big claw, whereupon both will make a fiery death dive.
The Swiss have only two satellites in orbit, each smaller than a breadbox, but they are concerned about what to do with them when they stop operating in a few years.
“We want to clean up after ourselves,” said Anton Ivanov, a scientist at the institute’s space center. “That’s very Swiss, isn’t it?”
The space junk problem is so old and widely acknowledged that it even has a name: the Kessler Syndrome. In 1978, Donald J. Kessler, who led NASA’s office of space debris, first predicted the cascade effect that would take place when leftover objects in space started colliding.
Today, Dr. Kessler is retired in North Carolina but still contemplating the issue — and the need to clean up. “The sooner they do it, the cheaper it will be,” he said. “The more you wait to start, the more you’ll have to do.”
With so many items whizzing around at more than 17,000 miles per hour and shattering as they crash, the threat to working satellites, which are vital to hurricane tracking, GPS systems and military surveillance, has grown more immediate. Three years ago, a derelict Russian satellite slammed into an Iridium communications satellite, smashing both into tens of thousands of pieces. The Air Force currently tracks 20,000 pieces of orbiting space junk, which includes old rocket parts and dead satellites.
For now, the risk is real but manageable. Satellite operators can dodge the big debris and armor their satellites to withstand impact with smaller pieces. But eventually, if not cleaned up, low-Earth orbit would become too perilous for people and satellites.
MORE
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I wonder if there is any gold on Mars? The trip could pay for itself
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http://news.discovery.com/space/mars-prospecting-ores-gold.html
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http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2154405/Secret-mission-accomplished-Americas-secret-space-plane-land-YEAR-orbit--knows-did-there.html
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Wow.
http://www.youtube.com/embed/XRCIzZHpFtY?rel=0
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In Space, the Next Great Game
February 1, 2013 | 0301 GMT
Friday marks the 10th anniversary of the Space Shuttle Columbia accident. Although the U.S. government ended the shuttle program in 2011, the United States continues to compete with numerous other countries around the world for a geographic and technological advantage in space. Increased global interest in space exploration and the benefits it could provide on earth illustrate space's continuing strategic importance. After falling behind Russia in the ability to send people into space, the American public and private sectors are working to lower the costs of sending people and material into space, an essential hurdle to gaining that sought-after advantage.
Several countries have announced in recent months actions to pursue space-related advances. Russia and the European Space Agency both announced plans for moon-related missions. China plans to put 20 new satellites into orbit in 2013 and attempt to land an unmanned vessel on the moon in the same year. This follows benchmark achievements for China in 2012, including manned docking operations with its space laboratory, Tiangong-1. Japan plans to test new launch technology in 2013 aimed at increasing operational efficiency and decreasing costs. There have also been smaller advances made by other interested states, including South Korea's successful launch of an indigenous satellite into orbit and Iran's reported launch of a monkey into space this week.
The competitive nature and the geopolitical importance of space is inherently militaristic since satellites control global communication and navigation. A huge portion of the U.S. military command, control, communication, computers, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance capabilities are reliant on this infrastructure, which is instrumental in projecting force and maintaining situational awareness throughout the world.
Most of this infrastructure is relatively indefensible and have few, if any, replacement options. This makes it a prime target for any advanced state in conflict with the United States. Although there is no evidence to suggest that any non-state actor has the ability to threaten space, this is not likely to be a permanent condition. The ability to lift small payloads into orbit trickles down to ever-smaller private enterprises and "rogue" nations like North Korea or Iran, who -- while they may lack refined targeting and maneuverability -- can put debris into orbit in a disruptive and possibly dangerous manner.
More nations building space-based infrastructure could be advantageous to the United States, who leads in this capacity. As these other states continue to build their own infrastructure and rely on its capabilities, a natural deterrence develops. Each side thinks twice before attacking the others because it opens them up to similar retaliation. Compounding this, more nations involved in space could lead to a degree of interconnectedness, meaning that any attack could be perceived as an attack on all countries cooperating with the targeted country. This could spur an international response, a reason for further deterrence. Given that the United States holds most of the physical infrastructure and concurrently relies on it, other actors may see that as incentive to attack it in an attempt to level the playing field in the event of hostilities.
An important step toward further development of space is the increasing affordability of the launch. The space shuttle sought to increase affordability as a reusable launch vehicle, but the cost savings of the program never fully materialized. To further establish territory in space beyond satellites, the lift cost, or the amount of money needed to get material into space, needs to be reduced.
The estimated cost for a single launch into low earth orbit is roughly $10,000 per pound. However, SpaceX, a private company operating in the United States, is set to test a rocket system in 2013 that claims to have reduced lift costs to less than $1,000 per pound, which is considered a reasonable baseline for affordability. (It is unclear whether this cost includes insurance of payloads.) SpaceX plans to achieve affordability through adjustments in launch technology that will allow for easier mass production of the engines, which would reduce production costs, among other things. Advancements such as this, even in the private industry, could allow the United States to re-establish its role as the eminent leader in space exploration. Japan is also looking to reduce launch costs through technological advances aimed at decreasing costly operation time. The Japanese, by using the Epsilon Launch vehicle, plan to test some of these potential improvements later this year.
The present geopolitical importance of space remains. The establishment of satellites to coordinate terrestrial activity will continue. The management of navigation and communications through satellites remains vital. Additionally, the continued technological advances in making space more affordable brings closer the idea of making it habitable.
The United States was long perceived as the leader of space exploration; when the space shuttle program was shut down, that image was left a bit tarnished. Ten years after the tragic Columbia accident and more than a year since the U.S. shuttle program ended, several nations are competing for a future position in space. Through continued efforts at NASA and the country's growing and robust private sector, the United States remains the primary competitor in the arena, but the field is becoming increasingly crowded.
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Read more: In Space, the Next Great Game | Stratfor
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http://www.jewishjournal.com/israel/article/spaceil_israels_race_to_the_moon
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http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/jul/13/astronaut-buzz-aldrin-presses-need-for-space-explo/
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http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/jul/13/astronaut-buzz-aldrin-presses-need-for-space-explo/
Does Kenya or Indonesia have a space program? Why then do we need one?
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http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/sep/2/us-military-dependence-on-russian-rocket-engines-r/
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https://www.facebook.com/ScienceAlert/videos/10154950439707518/?autoplay_reason=gatekeeper&video_container_type=0&video_creator_product_type=0&app_id=273465416184080&live_video_guests=0
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Stratfor has previously highlighted the importance of commercial and military applications of space travel and space technology. Although the strategies employed change over time and between administrations, maintaining its role as a leader in such technologies is an imperative for the United States — especially as space becomes increasingly crowded.
The new U.S. presidential administration is rolling out a new, but familiar, approach to space exploration and related policy. On Oct. 5, U.S. Vice President Mike Pence led the inaugural session of the National Space Council's latest iteration. The meeting was the council's first in more than 20 years, enabled by U.S. President Donald Trump's decision to reinstate the long-dormant program in June. Although the council directs U.S. space policy, it can't set budgets or pass laws. At today's meeting, key stakeholders from the civil, commercial and military spheres presented testimony advocating their goals and interests regarding space development and exploration. Pence, for his part, outlined the administration's aims in an op-ed published in the Wall Street Journal earlier in the day that focused on, among other things, a shift in focus from conquering Mars to returning to the moon.
The shift was not a secret or a surprise. Many private space companies have already unveiled programs geared toward returning to the moon. Many of the technologies used to return to the moon will also be applicable for a mission to Mars. Travelling to the much nearer celestial body will enable the development of new technologies and the redevelopment of existing ones that will be necessary to explore targets farther away, such as a trip to Mars or even interstellar travel. Although some challenges are unique to interplanetary travel, developing lunar travel could enable fledgling private space companies to be better prepared for an eventual trip to Mars.
The list of entities with viable space programs has changed substantially since the United States made its first trips to the moon in 1969 and in the 1970s. The moon has been deemed a strategic asset by the Trump administration, but it's also become the focus of other nations such as China. The United States is just one of many nations for which a competitive space program remains an important strategic goal. International and the national regulations were among the topics discussed at the Oct. 5 council session. As more countries become involved in space exploration, international regulations and laws will need to adapt.
But it's not just national programs that can influence space exploration and development. In his op-ed, the vice president also alluded to continued reliance on private space companies to maintain U.S. dominance in space. The commercial space sector will be vital to the United States reaching its targets, whether they're focused on the moon or on Mars.
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https://us12.campaign-archive.com/?e=9627475d7f&u=b7aa7eddb0f2bb74bfa4f6cb5&id=3d9f28d05f
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https://www.dailysignal.com/2018/05/24/trump-issues-commercial-space-policy-directive-on-eve-of-anniversary-of-jfks-space-program-speech/?utm_source=TDS_Email&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=MorningBell%22&mkt_tok=eyJpIjoiTlRjeU1qZGpNREprT0RkaSIsInQiOiJmWW5UM1llTE0rRTdmVHJLVW5Sd2g5cjFhTG5NM0Z6UkNjaVdXdkFLSkczMit6QW1mbVV3aDl1YjQxdENsRTYzUDFiakRidWU1R1JvSnpOOE1rQlJjR2lpYlNLSTV4NjFwS2VjQ2JZYWNcL3ZVNDcxZmdGckVLMkpsWDZPNWloNncifQ%3D%3D
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Houston, We Have a Space Force
A new military service isn’t needed to compete above the Earth.
By The Editorial Board
July 4, 2018 3:09 p.m. ET
103 COMMENTS
For most Presidents an event about space regulation wouldn’t produce headline news, but then there’s President Trump. At such an event last month Mr. Trump ordered the Pentagon to develop a de novo military branch dedicated to space. This plan is not ready for the launchpad, even if Mr. Trump is right about the threat.
President Trump’s idea of a “separate but equal” Space Force isn’t novel: The House last year passed a proposal for an independent space branch, and Congress ended up commissioning a study. The argument is that the Air Force is ill-equipped to manage threats from Russia and China, which are aggressively expanding military capabilities in space.
An artist concept of NASA’s Ionospheric Connection Explorer (ICON) that will track how Earth’s weather and space weather interact.
An artist concept of NASA’s Ionospheric Connection Explorer (ICON) that will track how Earth’s weather and space weather interact. Photo: nasa handout/european press agency/Shutterstock
The proponents have a point. The U.S. relies on satellites for essential functions like GPS but also weather and directing military efforts on the ground. The threats include jamming or spoofing signals, hacking, antisatellite missiles, and perhaps more the public doesn’t know. Periodic classified briefings to Congress appear to terrify Members.
A 2016 study from the Government Accountability Office revealed 60 distinct entities that deal with assets in space, either managing or acquiring technology, sprawled across government. The Air Force handles about 90% of unclassified space dollars, though the Army and Navy also have outfits that deal with space. GAO cited all the usual suspects of Pentagon projects, including cost overruns and leadership churn. To her credit, Air Force Secretary Heather Wilson has made fixing some of the dysfunction a priority by streamlining duplicative procurement.
A wholly separate space force would replicate these problems on a larger scale. Branches of the military form their own cultures but also their own civilian workforces and back-end offices to manage operations. Service chiefs compete for dollars from Congress, and budget fights can be more about preserving power centers than national security.
Note too that personnel costs, particularly health care, are already crowding out other Pentagon priorities. Worse, entitlements like Medicare are crowding out Pentagon funding. This means in the future a lower portion of a lower budget will be dedicated to core competencies of war.
Air Force Space Command already employs 36,000 people at 134 locations, and don’t believe those who say these functions would be absorbed by a new Space Force with no added staff. A new headquarters alone would spawn hundreds of new aides and staffers. The Air Force will try to avoid surrendering its personnel and dollars to a new branch, even if the Space Force is designed as a subsidiary, much like the Marines are of the Navy.
Defense Secretary Jim Mattis summed it up last year when this idea was floated in Congress: “I oppose the creation of a new military service and additional organizational layers at a time when we are focused on reducing overhead and integrating joint warfighting functions.”
But Mr. Trump is fixated on the prospect, and in response to his June remarks Secretary Mattis said the Pentagon would start the process. Congress would have to authorize a new branch, but Members of both parties seem willing, albeit after a fight over whose district will host the space cadets.
Yet proceed with caution. Congress is free to dedicate money to research and development in space or do a wholesale restructuring of Air Force Space Command. Congress can also continue to propose discrete ideas. One is Alaska Senator Dan Sullivan’s proposal to put sensors in space that would help missile-defense systems communicate with one another.
Republicans in Congress had to swallow tens of billions in domestic spending this year to win even a modest increase in funding for the armed services. That will be a waste if the GOP sets up a space force that copies and pastes the military’s culture of inefficiency.
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https://www.defenseone.com/politics/2019/02/air-force-has-won-control-space-force/154834/?oref=weekly-wrap&utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=D1_Best%20Of%20The%20Week_021519&utm_term=defense_one_hybrid
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https://www.defenseone.com/politics/2019/02/legislative-hurdle-delays-us-space-command-stand/155220/?oref=defenseone_today_nl
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From a year ago:
Space: The Final Frontier for War?
By Omar Lamrani
Senior Military Analyst, Stratfor
Senior Military Analyst, Stratfor
The nighttime lights of the United States are seen from space.
The U.S. military will continue to debate the relative merits of creating a Space Force that is separate from the other branches of the U.S. armed forces.
In the absence of international standards regulating conduct in space, the risks will grow that the United States, China and Russia will accelerate their own efforts to militarize the theater.
Treaties stipulating a blanket ban on weapons in space are unlikely to succeed in the foreseeable future because of their significant limitations and concerns over the ability to verify compliance.
"Space is a war-fighting domain." It's a mantra that U.S. officials have been stating ever since the Chinese blew up their own weather satellite during an anti-satellite missile test in 2007. Eleven years on, it's a phrase that U.S. President Donald Trump repeated in March in making the case for the creation of a Space Force. Although there is a growing awareness of the militarization of space — and that the area around Earth is indeed a potential theater of war — the Space Force debate remains a predominantly bureaucratic and organizational one. But while enhanced defense in space is important, it alone will not solve the root danger of the growing risk of an extraterrestrial war among terrestrial powers.
The Big Picture
Earth's immediate environs have become vital for humanity, and critical in particular to the world economy and the telecommunications network that supports it. Accordingly, it is important to avoid a war in space, especially since debris from destroyed satellites would cause massive collateral damage to other objects in orbit around our planet. Avoiding conflict in space, however, will require both a sound defense policy and a concerted international diplomatic effort.
See The Second Space Race
Grabbing the Final High Ground
Beyond being just the final frontier, space is also the ultimate high ground. It not only provides the best possible vantage point to surveil activity on earth, it also greatly facilitates navigation, communication, targeting, and command and control. For the past 70 years, the U.S. military has leaned heavily on space as a force multiplier, integrating it as a critical component of its joint war-fighting capabilities thanks to technological advances in sensors and satellites. Today, U.S. space infrastructure is so vital to the country's military operations that it has become practically indispensable. But this reliance on space has also become a vulnerability — a dynamic that has not escaped the attention of competitors and adversaries such as China and Russia, which have also bolstered their own space capabilities over the past two decades.
Driven by these trends, the U.S. military has focused on improving its defenses in space so it can better defend against and counter an attack on its space assets. In short, the United States — along with its adversaries — now views space as a war-fighting domain similar to the land, air, and sea domains.
Time for a New Service?
This is where the debate over a Space Force comes in. The United States has four military services (the Army, Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps) under the auspices of the Department of Defense whose primary responsibilities are to train, organize and equip their forces. A fifth branch of the armed forces, the Coast Guard, is under the Department of Homeland Security. Until now, the Air Force has primarily overseen the national security aspects of space through the Air Force Space Command, which was established in 1982, but the creation of a Space Force would result in a sixth branch of service.
The main driver behind the creation of a Space Force is the idea that the U.S. Air Force is unable to provide as much capability in space as an independent and specialized service would provide. In general, proponents of a new force have argued that the Air Force has not done enough to prioritize space and that its other missions distract it from its focus on the world above. Specifically, such commentators have criticized the Air Force for devoting too little money to space, acting too slowly in acquiring materials for space, failing to promote its personnel involved with the space mission and, finally, dismissing space as a domain in which to wage war. Air Force leaders and their supporters have acknowledged the veracity of some of the issues but suggested that the best way of solving the matter is not to create an entirely new service that will drive up costs and create overhead, but to implement reforms within the Air Force to better enable it to tackle the space mission. In effect, it's not so much a debate centered on the merits of added defenses in space as it is a debate over bureaucracy and organization.
And in a case of history repeating itself, it's also a debate that is familiar to the Air Force, seeing as the institution experienced a similar tug of war before it became the United States' newest service after World War II. The argument was so fierce that it even resulted in the court-martialing of Brig. Gen. Billy Mitchell (widely regarded as the father of the U.S. Air Force) in 1925 after he vehemently accused the Army and Navy leadership of failing to prioritize air power. The crucible of World War II, however, demonstrated to all that the Air Force not only had its own distinct strategic and operational concepts but that it also could directly affect combat as much as other services could (especially thanks to strategic bombing and the advent of the nuclear bomb).
Space Force is not so much a debate centered on the merits of added defenses in space as it is a debate over bureaucracy and organization.
As U.S. officials weigh the merits of creating a Space Force independent of the Air Force, questions regarding cost (it might cost more than $10 billion just to establish the service), congressional oversight and organizational inertia ensure that the process will remain slow and subject to much discussion. What is clear, however, is that the country's leaders will devote more attention to space in the years to come. At present, the United States relies on 10 unified commands with distinct geographic and functional areas of responsibility that are not directly tied to any service for the country's joint war-fighting needs. To that end, authorities would likely create a unified command (similar to U.S. Strategic Command that deals with nuclear deterrence) to focus solely on space before considering the formation of a standalone Space Force.
Whatever organization ends up taking the lead in space, the United States will significantly increase its attention and funding for the national security mission in space. Beyond the use of space for navigation, communication, command and control, and surveillance, the country is also assuming the mission to deter and even fight a war in space. Such a task requires the country to track more foreign satellites, defend its own satellites from attack, counter with its own attacks if necessary and even take advantage of space's perch as the ultimate high ground — potentially to deploy ballistic missile defenses. In fact, the 2019 National Defense Authorization Act requires the U.S. military to not only begin work on developing new warning satellites to spot ballistic missiles but also to develop weapons to intercept the incoming projectiles from space.
Taking Earth's Battles Outside
The U.S. move to beef up its defenses in space is understandable given the increasing attention the frontier is receiving from its closest competitors, China and Russia. Both countries continue to develop their anti-satellite capabilities, including specialized maneuvering satellites that could be deployed to either conduct repairs on other satellites or interfere with them in a nefarious way. Nevertheless, in the absence of parallel diplomatic efforts and a wider comprehensive strategy to establish international standards for conduct in space, the U.S. move to strengthen its defenses in space could drive the Russians and the Chinese to accelerate their own space militarization efforts. For instance, the United States could technically use interceptors, which are essential to a space-based ballistic missile defense system, to destroy other satellites — a fact that is bound to drive Beijing and Moscow to establish their own deterrents in space in the absence of significant transparency or agreements.
Because any space conflict would produce large amounts of space debris that would ruin the orbiting assets of all countries -– and devastate the world economy in the process -– the only way to win a war in space is to not fight one.
The 1967 Outer Space Treaty is the world's foundational and governing document on space. The agreement bars members (including the United States, Russia and China) from placing nuclear weapons in space and mandates only non-military activity on the moon and other celestial bodies. The pact does not, however, enact restrictions on the placement of conventional weapons in space, and subsequent efforts to impose such limits, including the 2006 Space Preservation Treaty, have failed.
Such blanket treaties are unlikely to succeed in the foreseeable future because of their significant limitations, as well as concerns over the ability to verify compliance. The United States has especially voiced concern in this regard, repeatedly voting down such initiatives in addition to noting that the treaties fail to take into account the ability of terrestrial anti-satellite weapons to damage space assets. Nevertheless, the dim prospect of any blanket ban on weapons in space should not limit the effort to engage in transparency and confidence-building measures, which could provide a foundation for more narrow arms control agreements that limit specific aspects of the increasing militarization of space or the scope of such activities over the long term.
Whether or not U.S. defense in space is best served by the creation of a new service is an organizational question that will attract debate over the next few years both inside and outside the military. What the question does not address is the need to incorporate a simultaneous and concerted effort to establish international norms in space to prevent a destabilizing, militarized space race. Because any space conflict would produce large amounts of space debris that would ruin the orbiting assets of all countries — and devastate the world economy in the process — the only way to win a war in space is to not fight one. To that end, space should increasingly be seen through a prism akin to that of nuclear deterrence in which the ultimate aim is to prevent a space war from ever occurring. There is a vital need to build up a defensive capacity to deter an attack in space, but this capacity should be tempered by outer space treaties and norms in much the same way as arms control agreements have played a vital role in restricting nuclear arsenals. The future of the world and its neighborhood depends on it.
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Great Power Competition Feeds the Threat Posed by Anti-Satellite Technology
By Omar Lamrani
Senior Military Analyst, Stratfor
Omar Lamrani
Omar Lamrani
Senior Military Analyst, Stratfor
Highlights
As demonstrated by India's latest anti-satellite (ASAT) test, the number of countries willing to pursue ASAT weapons and capabilities in space is growing.
The rising great power competition among Russia, China and the United States is driving ASAT use and development.
ASAT technology produces dangerous space debris that can disable important satellites and challenge the long-term sustainable use of space.
Unfortunately, adequate norms and treaties do not exist to regulate the ASAT risk, and the tense dynamics among global powers suggest they are unlikely to be formed in the near future.
Another country, another test, yet more debris floating through the crowded realm of near-orbit space. On March 27, India became the latest country to carry out an anti-satellite (ASAT) test resulting in debris. India sought to frame the test as a sign of its prowess in space, but on a global level, the event serves as an important wake-up call about the risks of ASAT-related technology.
The Big Picture
Space is increasingly a realm where geopolitical conflicts play out, both through direct combat and through strategic control of various technologies and locations. As the global great power competition heats up, it is driving the development of technologies that put humanity's access to or use of space at risk.
The Second Space Race
More and more countries are developing ASAT technologies for exploration and defense — especially as the great power competition among the United States, China and Russia heats up — which increases the risk that space will be littered with dangerous debris that could collide with important satellites either accidentally or during conflicts. And the tense dynamic among countries with ASAT technology will stall any attempts to develop international norms or treaties to reduce the consequences of space debris and ensure the long-term sustainable use of space.
The Danger of Debris
India's test, despite being carried out at the low orbit of about 300 kilometers (186 miles), created significant space debris; some fragments will take several years to decay. Space debris can collide with and destroy satellites, creating a multiplier effect known as the Kessler syndrome or "ablation cascade": Collision between objects in space (such as through the destruction of a satellite) creates space debris that then collides with other objects and creates even more space debris. The resulting expanding debris field increases the likelihood that satellites could be damaged — either intentionally or accidentally, which would have disastrous effects on humanity's day-to-day functionality. Individuals, companies and entire nations rely on satellites for all manner of navigation, communications, research and security functions. If certain satellites were to be unexpectedly disabled, society and the economy at large would experience dramatic consequences.
Space debris can collide with and destroy satellites, creating a multiplier effect known as the Kessler syndrome or "ablation cascade."
But despite the fact that errant space debris could disrupt airplane navigation, render weaponry inoperable or cut off many forms of communication, countries are still likely to take deliberate actions that create more debris for a variety of reasons.
The Many Causes of Increased Space Debris
In the event of a major war between global powers, adversaries could choose to deliberately impede opponents' use of space by damaging their satellites in a way that also forms major debris fields and interrupts the opponent's space-based expeditionary warfare efforts. And deliberately fomenting space debris would still escalate a situation less than the use of nuclear weapons, so a losing country would be more likely to choose this method, especially if its own satellite constellations had been already destroyed.
The proliferation of space debris can be unintentional, as well. Just as a limited nuclear strike could deteriorate into full thermonuclear war by causing cycles of retaliation and escalation, a similar process could occur in space. An initial limited first strike by one power against an adversary's satellites could trigger a bigger retaliation (and perhaps even be misread as a harbinger of a more extreme offensive), which could then spiral into an all-out battle of satellite destruction. Even without much escalation, the initial destruction of a small number of satellites could trigger major damage to day-to-day affairs on earth.
Even countries not engaging in combat can increase the levels of space debris and drive an ablation cascade. All kinetic ASAT tests inevitably produce a debris cloud that could potentially collide with other objects in space and trigger more debris. This applies especially to tests that occur at a significant altitude, like the 2007 Chinese ASAT test. But India's recent ASAT test at a fairly low altitude of about 300 kilometers still led to significant space debris, with some fragments reaching an altitude above 1,000 kilometers. NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine has stated that the risk of the International Space Station being hit by small debris increased by 44 percent over a period of 10 days as a result of India's test.
Handling the Present and Rising Threat
Millions of pieces of debris currently in orbit already pose a major hazard to the safety of important satellites. Wary of the possibility of satellite destruction, various states and space agencies are increasingly viewing space debris as a serious issue distinctly associated with national security, and they are developing ways to mitigate or reduce debris in space. Technologies in this effort include lasers, robotic arms that can maneuver satellites, magnets and even a 100-kilogram (220-pound) spacecraft featuring a harpoon and net, which British company Surrey Satellite Technology tested in 2018.
Even without much escalation, the initial destruction of a small number of satellites could trigger major damage to day-to-day affairs on earth.
However, these same technologies that can clean up space debris are also ideally suited for missions involving the destruction of enemy satellites, meaning that the better nations become at eliminating debris in the future, the more efficiently they can destroy enemy satellites. During an actual major conflict extending to space, these technologies could be a greater part of the problem than the solution. After all, it's far easier to find and destroy satellites than to clean up the uncountable fragments of space debris produced by disintegrated satellites during conflict.
As the United States looks to expand its investments in space as part of its great power competition with Russia and China, the U.S. military is acutely aware of the risks of a war in space. Today, the United States possesses approximately half of all satellites in orbit and is very dependent on space to wage war. Consequently, its space strategy remains primarily centered on deterrence, though Washington is certainly preparing to defend its satellites and counterattack if necessary. Deterrence alone, however, may not be enough. As more and more countries develop ASAT capabilities, and as other great powers — particularly China — rapidly perfect theirs, conflicts on earth are increasingly likely to extend to space in the form of direct attacks on enemy satellites. Indeed, this outcome is almost guaranteed during any large-scale peer-to-peer conflict between the great powers, especially given the United States' heavy dependence on its space architecture.
An Uncertain Future
Right now, there are no treaties regulating the development, fielding or testing of ASAT weapons. A general taboo against kinetic ASAT tests exists, given the well-known danger posed by space debris, but it has not stopped countries such as the United States, China and now India from conducting ASAT tests. The United States itself likely contributed to the normalization of ASAT technology when it conducted the 2008 intercept of the USA 193 satellite. While the intercept happened at a very low orbital altitude (less than 300 kilometers) and resulted in far less space debris than China's 2007 ASAT test, it still produced considerable debris — and it paved the way for India to conduct a "responsible" ASAT test at about the same altitude later on.
It's far easier to find and destroy satellites than to clean up the uncountable fragments of space debris produced by disintegrated satellites during conflict.
A growing number of voices within the United States are calling to establish and strengthen norms aimed at preventing more space debris. These include the head of U.S. Strategic Command, Gen. John Hyten, who discussed the dangers of space debris on April 9 in the wake of the Indian ASAT test. However, the rising great power competition among strong, space-faring nations is driving mistrust and undermining U.S. efforts — as is the United States' own significant role in dismantling a number of key arms control agreements over the past couple of years. The seemingly imminent demise of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty and the questionable status of New START indicate that it will be less and less likely for nations to establish cohesive norms around ASAT capabilities in the near future. The fact that missiles used as ballistic missile defense interceptors (which many nations have been openly developing) are also applicable as ASAT interceptors adds further barriers to such an effort.
The peaceful use of space will be increasingly threatened not only by active conflict but also accidents, ASATs and miscalculations that spiral out of control. As the competition among great powers propels more technological breakthroughs in space, it also drives the production of space debris, which amplifies the risk that important satellites could be disabled — either intentionally or accidentally.
Omar Lamrani focuses on air power, naval strategy, technology, logistics and military doctrine for a number of regions, including the Middle East and Asia. He studied international relations at Clark University and holds a master's degree from the Diplomatic Academy of Vienna, where his thesis centered on Chinese military doctrine and the balance of power in the Western Pacific.
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This is 2010
04:25
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qtykfyU9CqI&feature=youtu.be&fbclid=IwAR3SpxPdcdbEVcgU0TlXHog9uj34czROjnRoZbJUoq7LQR8SExL5KwV_kGE
Saw a conversation with a Chinese expert on Tucker the other night and he said the Chinese ALREADY have satellites that can come up and kidnap our satellites!
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The Enchantment of Mutually Assured Destruction
By
George Friedman -
October 24, 2019
Open as PDF
One of the most extraordinary facts of history is that during the Cold War the United States and the Soviet Union never launched a war against each other. They probed and prodded on the edges of war, but it never rose to its logical conclusion: nuclear war. When we consider the sophisticated statesmen of 1914 and 1939 who led Europe into catastrophe, it is the world’s good fortune that they were not the ones managing the Cold War. Rather it was being managed by the United States and the Soviet Union, who were meticulously and obsessively careful to avoid war. The irony is that many Europeans tend to regard Americans as cowboys and the Russians as barbarians, and themselves as sophisticated and cautious. Yet it was the European gentlemen who hurled themselves into wars of slaughter, while the cowboys and barbarians did everything they could to avoid war. This is an important point I like to make, especially in meetings with Europeans.
There was of course a fundamental difference between the two world wars and the one that never happened. The Europeans believed that these wars would be contained. The French in 1914 did not appreciate what the machine gun could do. The Germans didn’t appreciate what massed bombers could do in 1939. This was a failure of imagination. There could be no failure of imagination about nuclear weapons. If anything, imagination was insufficient to grasp what they would do. The Europeans should have known what machine guns and bombers could do, but they didn’t. The Americans and Russians could not evade the truth.
Still, each nation had to survive, and to survive it had to know the unknowable: what the real intention was on the other side. In war, surprise with overwhelming forces is the dream. Not knowing your enemy’s intent is the nightmare. Barring information to the contrary, each side should have struck first and fast. That neither side did was not due to their virtue. It was due to the fact that the Soviets in the 1950s could not have launched a massive first strike at the U.S., and therefore the U.S. did not strike either. “Dr. Strangelove” was nonsense intended to depict the thoughtful and careful political and military leaders as demented. They weren’t.
In due course the Soviets developed a first-strike capability, and that was the moment of danger. Whoever struck first, with massive surprise, would survive. The other would not. Wars sometimes arise out of lack of imagination. A nuclear exchange would arise out of a lack of knowledge – not knowing what the other side was capable of, and not knowing each intended, but knowing that if the enemy struck first, he would survive.
What prevented nuclear war was mutual assured destruction. So long as each side understood that an attack would trigger an equal response, war was avoided. The only way to guarantee that was to make certain that each side was aware of the other’s capabilities, and that each side could detect an attack with enough time to respond. By maximizing intelligence and minimizing the probability of surprise, the risk of attacking was overwhelmed by the probability of an equal counterattack. There are those who regarded mutual assured destruction as madness. I have never understood why. We are humans and we go to war, but this war was avoided.
Of Aristotle’s virtues, it was prudence that governed. But prudence could have also dictated a first strike. Prudence was redefined by technology. The Soviets focused on constructing a missile force. As a spinoff of the missile force, they launched a satellite, Sputnik, into low-Earth orbit. The Americans were galvanized to do the same, but propaganda aside, creating satellites opened the door to a prudence of peace. A few years after the first demonstration satellites were launched, so were reconnaissance satellites, which would observe and target enemy missile bases, and years later, satellites that could detect the heat of a missile launch. The satellites made it possible to know the enemy’s capabilities and detect a missile attack with enough warning that a counterattack was possible. No one was really certain that their own or the other side’s systems would work, but no one was certain they wouldn’t. The probability of a one-sided victory through surprise shrank, and prudence dictated avoiding any action that might frighten the other side. The Cold War evolved into a political, or low-intensity, conflict, rather than catastrophe. And the leaders of both sides were shaped to be masters at pressing an advantage without excessively frightening the adversary.
After World War I, intellectuals sought to understand the origin of war in the human psyche, which is what the sophisticated called the soul. Men in particular possess within themselves a rage that, when unleashed, can be satisfied only by violence. They also possess a fear not only of death or harm, but of shame in defeat, or worse, fleeing the battlefield. There is nothing original in this, as Homer wrote about it. The followers of Sigmund Freud sought this dichotomy in the subconscious rage against the primal father. In doing this, they turned war into a compulsion, a necessary part not of history or society but of the very souls of men. The rage would in the end overwhelm fear, and brush aside prudence. I myself learned about this in school at PS 67 in the Bronx, when I insisted on fighting Hector in spite of the fact that he had crushed and would again crush me.
But in the Cold War, and in the satellites both sides launched, we find that reality can impose a prudence that overwhelms the primal rage in men. From space, we could see the enemy and the enemy could see us. Whatever our rage at each other, it could be tempered by prudence. The idea that war is the result of a need so deep it cannot be controlled was shown to be false. The need for war may well exist, but it does not rule.
Space was the sphere that made the war impossible. If you will recall my earlier discussion of enchantment, my detour into space is intended to bring us back to that theme. In much of the world, heaven, or space, is the realm of peace and redemption. It is an enchanted place. The fact that we avoided annihilating each other was not to be found in our souls, which were filled with the rage that haunts us all. Rather it was the fact that we humans, using space, changed the equation between rage and fear. Before World War I and World War II, rage overwhelmed fear, and prudence argued for war. The Cold War remained cold because the logic of technology, and the existence of the heavens, dampened the soul of the angriest warriors. Many died in lesser wars, but our two nations survived. That was quite enough of an achievement in the 20th century.
I am not trying to make enchantment mystical; I am trying to demystify it. But at the same time, those astronauts of all nations who have gone into space have testified to an awesome beauty that was beyond their ability to express. The word they never used was enchantment. It is a sphere that has been the realm of gods, a place where a higher law governs. It has struck me many times that while we have come to think of space as prosaic, as the realm of technicians and budgets, it is enchanting for two reasons. First, it is enchanting because it is beautiful and our bodies float in violation of all laws we know. Second, it is enchanting because it rendered impossible a war that should by all rights have been fought.
There are many technical reasons, but we should stop and consider how extraordinary it is that heaven imposed prudence on the rage Freud wrote of. Whether it can continue to do so is a question for later, but it is extraordinary that the sphere that we had entered for the first time, because of the Cold War, was the place which made that war impossible.
Hence there is a connection among my ramblings, although I am still poking at it uncertainly.
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Sent to me by Big Dog:
https://law.unl.edu/spacecyberlaw/
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http://jordantimes.com/news/features/space-major-legal-void
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https://www.theepochtimes.com/china-plans-to-exploit-10-trillion-earth-moon-economic-zone_3137736.html?utm_source=Epoch+Times+Newsletters&utm_campaign=1a16d0527d-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2019_11_05_11_47&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_4fba358ecf-1a16d0527d-239065853
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Anyone want to sign up to Teslas space program as astronaut?
https://www.yahoo.com/news/tesla-suffers-broken-glass-mishap-during-chaotic-launch-062337919.html
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https://www.theepochtimes.com/the-final-battlefield-establishing-the-united-states-space-command_3162736.html?utm_source=Epoch+Times+Newsletters&utm_campaign=8ed52957f0-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2019_12_04_12_20&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_4fba358ecf-8ed52957f0-239065853
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https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/31445/recently-retired-usaf-general-makes-eyebrow-raising-claims-about-advanced-space-technology
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https://www.theepochtimes.com/china-to-build-space-solar-power-station-pioneered-by-caltech_3180696.html?utm_source=Epoch+Times+Newsletters&utm_campaign=5870c57463-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2019_12_23_01_32&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_4fba358ecf-5870c57463-239065853
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https://bigthink.com/paul-ratner/how-the-kessler-syndrome-can-end-all-space-exploration-and-destroy-modern-life?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=Facebook#Echobox=1577330497
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February 18, 2020 View On Website
Open as PDF
New US Strategy and Technology
By: George Friedman
The world is facing a fundamental strategic and technical shift in both the geopolitics of war and its dynamic. The shift is being driven by the United States’ decision to change its global strategic posture and the maturation of new classes of weaponry that change how wars will be fought.
U.S. Posture
The U.S. has publicly announced a change in American strategy consisting of two parts. The first is abandoning the focus on jihadists that began with al-Qaida’s attack on the U.S. in 2001. The second is reshaping and redefining forces to confront China and Russia. For a while, it had been assumed that there would no longer be peer-to-peer conflicts but rather extended combat against light infantry and covert forces such as was taking place in Afghanistan. After every international confrontation, including the Cold War, the absence of immediate peer threats leads strategists to assume that none will emerge, and that the future engagements will involve managing instability rather than defeating peers. This illusion is the reward of comfort to the victorious powers. Immediately after the fall of the Soviet Union, the belief was that the only issue facing the world was economic, and that military strategy was archaic. The events of 9/11 changed that, but the idea of national conflicts was still seen as farfetched.
The United States is now shifting its strategy to focus on peer-to-peer conflict. Peer-to-peer conflict is not about two equal powers fighting; it’s about two powers that field similar forces. So the war in Afghanistan was between a combined arms force and a totally different, light infantry force. As we saw in Vietnam, the latter can defeat a far more advanced force by understanding the political dimension more clearly than its opponent. Peer-to-peer conflict involves two forces conceiving of war in the same way. Germany invaded Poland and was by far the more powerful force, but Poland conceived of war the same way the Germans did. In this sense, they were peers.
The United States is a global power. Russia cannot wage war in the Atlantic or Pacific. China cannot project decisive power into Europe. The United States can do both. It is not nearly as geographically limited in its warfighting as the other two are. But were the United States to confront them within the areas where they can operate, the question then is the quality of forces, in terms of command and technology.
China’s national interest pivots on its ability to use sea lanes to sustain international trade. Its ability to project land power is limited by terrain; to its south are hills, jungles and the Himalayas, and to its north is Siberia. It could attack westward through Kazakhstan, but the logistical challenges are enormous and the benefits dubious. For China, then, the fundamental problem is naval, deriving from the threat that the U.S. could use its forces to blockade and cripple China.
Russia’s strategic interest rests in regaining the buffer zone from Latvia to Romania. The loss of these states in 1991 eroded the main defense line of an attack from the west. Russia’s primary goal, therefore, is to recover these buffers. Of secondary but still significant importance is holding the North Caucasus south of the Russian agricultural heartland. The threat to this region is insurgency in areas like Chechnya and Dagestan, or an American move from the South Caucasus.
Neither a U.S. naval blockade of China nor an attack on Russia proper from the west are likely scenarios. But national strategy must take into account implausible but catastrophic scenarios, because common sense can evaporate rapidly. Thus the Russians must maintain sustained pressure primarily to the west but also to the south. China must press eastward, in the South and East China seas, to demonstrate the costs a blockade would impose.
The focus for each is not necessarily action but creating the possibility of action and thereby shaping the political relationship. The danger is that the gesture will trigger what had been seen as an unreasonable response. The problem for the United States is that it cannot be sure of Russia’s or China’s reading of American intentions, and therefore, it must be prepared to counter both. War is rarely about hunger for conquest; it is about the fear of being conquered. For Russia, it is fear that the U.S. will try to achieve what Napoleon and Hitler failed to achieve, given the loss of its buffers. For China, it is a fear of strangulation by American naval forces. For the United States, it is fear that Russia will return with force to Central Europe, or that China will surge into the Western Pacific. All such fears are preposterous until they mount to such a point that doing nothing appears imprudent.
A New Class of Weapons
World War II was first waged between German armor and Soviet infantry, and then it became a war of armor against armor. In the Pacific, the decisive war was not of battleships against battleships, but of aircraft against naval vessels and, toward the end, airpower. Much of the battles on islands like Saipan and Guadalcanal were intended by both sides to secure them for air bases. The Cold War, had it turned hot, was conceived of as an upgraded World War II, of armor and air power against armor and air power.
From World War II until the end of the Cold War, peer-to-peer conflict focused on three classes of weapons: armored vehicles, aircraft carriers and manned bombers. After 1967 and the introduction of precision-guided weapons, the survivability of these weapons declined, and massive resources had to be allocated to allow them to survive. Armor had to be constantly upgraded to defeat far cheaper projectiles that were unlikely to miss. Aircraft carriers had to be surrounded by carrier battle groups consisting of anti-air cruisers, anti-submarine destroyers and attack submarines, all integrated into complex computer systems that could counter attacks by precision-guided weapons. Manned bombers flying into enemy airspace could be confronted by sophisticated surface-to-air missiles. The solution was to try to build bombers invisible to enemy radar. The cost of defending these systems that emerged in World War II surged as the cost of destroying them began to decline.
Counters to precision-guided weapons inevitably emerged, and we have reached the threshold of a new class of weapons: hypersonic missiles. These munitions, which can travel at five to 10 times the speed of sound, maneuver in flight and carry sufficient explosives, including sub munitions (smaller projectiles designed to hit multiple targets), make the survival of tanks, surface vessels and manned bombers increasingly problematic. Their speed, maneuverability and defenses against detection decrease the probability that all incoming hypersonic missiles can be destroyed, while they retain the precision of previous generations of weapons.
(click to enlarge)
Russia, China and the U.S. are all working on these weapons. Sometimes they exaggerate their limited capabilities; sometimes they minimize their substantial capabilities. But all have them and are developing better ones if they can. And this changes war from the way it was conceived in World War II and the Cold War. A new system of weapons is beginning to emerge.
The key to the development of hypersonics is range. The shorter their range, the closer the attacker must come. The longer the range, the more uncertainty there is over its location and the more likely it is to survive and be fired, maneuvering in excess of the ability of defending system. So in the South China Sea, it will not be carriers facing carriers. They will be neutralized by hypersonic missiles. Nor will it be armored brigades engaging. The tanks will be neutralized long before they engage. The goal will be to locate and destroy an enemy’s missiles before they are launched and before they can approach their target.
The key will be the ability to locate and track hypersonic missiles and then destroy them. The solution to this is systems in space. The Chinese will not engage the U.S. Navy with its carriers. It will try to destroy them with well camouflaged missiles from land bases. To do this, they must locate the target, which is mobile. Its own platforms being vulnerable, they will rely on space-based reconnaissance. The United States’ primary mission therefore will be to destroy Chinese satellites, find the location of Chinese launchers and launch saturated attacks on them, likely from space.
Modern war, like all war, depends on intelligence and targeting information. Precision-guided munitions move older platforms toward obsolescence, and hypersonics closes the door. The battle must be at a longer range than most missiles have now, and will be dependent on a space-based system for targeting. This means that victory in war will depend on command of space.
Note that the U.S. has now established the U.S. Space Force, which integrated the space fighting capabilities of other services into one. This represents the realization that dealing with peer powers now depends on the command of space. Therefore, the United States’ strategic turn away from jihadists toward Russia and China also constitutes a shift away from the primacy of older platforms. A new strategy and the recognition of the importance of space mean that the decisive battle will not be fought on Earth’s surface.
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https://www.space.com/trump-moon-mining-space-resources-executive-order.html
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https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2020/07/russia-tests-satellite-rams-other-satellites-us-says/167154/?oref=defense_one_breaking_nl
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On Astropolitics
There’s much we don’t know about outer space, but a theoretical approach should begin with what we know about air and naval power.
By: Ridvan Bari Urcosta
The first time space power was used for terrestrial warfare was the Gulf War, during which satellites contributed significantly to military operations in the Middle East. Since then, there has been increasing demand for technology and war modeling for operations in space. Space, it seems, is slowly but surely becoming an essential component of warfare. It is therefore time and prudent to start giving thought to and building a framework for understanding the parameters of space operations and conflicts. If geopolitics concerns all things earthly, then we can refer to how nations interact among the stars — relations among colonies on planets, satellites and space stations, as well as economic cooperation, resource competition and the order around which this is built — as “astropolitics.”
There’s still a lot we don’t know about the physics of outer space, of course. We don’t even know what kinds of technologies we will need to develop to operate there. Even so, a theoretical approach to thinking about space power should start with things we do know: naval operations and air operations. Like the oceans, the expanse of outer space can be thought of as a global commons. This means the two share some inherent characteristics such as long lines of communications and potential strategic chokepoints. Naval power has been used for centuries to secure national interests and project power. And though there is some uncertainty over how relevant aviation and satellite technology will be when used well outside the bounds of our planet, aircraft are nonetheless an important if auxiliary element of war.
With this in mind, we can begin to examine a set of geopolitical principles and imperatives that will determine the future of space power, using sea power as the main intellectual foundation.
Command and Control
For as big as Earth probably seems to a naval officer on the open sea, it’s nothing compared to outer space. On Earth, there are peninsulas and islands and atolls, nearly all of which have been charted, and many of which have existing infrastructure on them already. Once we start to explore the vast of outer space, we will be doing so comparatively blindly. This will make company-level operations centers even more important there than they are here.
(click to enlarge)
Command and control will also be more difficult to achieve. Bleddyn Bowen, an international relations scholar, posits a division between space command and space control. Bowen defines the command of space as securing and/or denying the use of celestial lines of communication that objects and information travel in, from, toward and through. Space control, on the other hand, is more like controlling specific areas of Earth, only in outer space. It is about hegemony — both military and political.
But just as there are chokepoints on Earth, so too will there be chokepoints in outer space. There will, after all, be satellites, ships, colonies and everything else that needs to be supplied and serviced and inhabited. Those chokepoints can be divided into four broad categories:
• Satellites and spaceships with long-term missions, and space stations with crews undertaking military functions near the Earth’s orbit.
• Satellites and space stations in the first and most important celestial communicational line — from Earth to the moon.
• Satellites and space stations between the second important celestial communicational line — from Earth to Mars.
• The satellites, commercial ships and warships, and space stations and independent colonies that will eventually fill the solar system in the distant future. (Likely their missions will be to become commercial, logistical or geopolitical hubs for the assumption of command and control responsibilities.)
Much of this will be impossible, of course, without the use of satellites, warships, drones and unmanned aerial vehicles that will be run by artificial intelligence, without human interference. Carl Dolman Everett connects space warfare with informational warfare, but it is possible to develop this concept and imagine in the future a direct military interaction both on Earth and in space, between the “software” of the great powers. For a space mission, it would be cheaper and safer to send drones with AI to specific and dangerous missions than to endanger a human crew. Both for politicians and for business leaders, this will be an optimal solution. And this is to say nothing about the legal framework of space travel, which doesn’t exist yet. As Jonathan Sydney Koch writes, currently there is a lack of legal framework for the use of space resources found on asteroids and other celestial bodies. In general, their missions, strategically speaking, will be the same as those of warships at sea.
From Sovereignty at Sea to Sovereignty in Space
The oceans required autonomy and independence from ships; given the time and distance between colonies and the metropole, space will require it even more so. The appearance on the global political map of different independent states is determined by geopolitical factors. The metropolis was not able to control the complex social and political entities that colonies became from a remote distance. While they were primitive settlements it was relatively easy, but when the old management started to change, it became impossible.
(click to enlarge)
In case of war or emergency, the crew or settlers in space must have full independence in order to adopt the most adequate decision to their reality; given the serious time delays in communication with Earth, anything less would be impossible for a state that wants to achieve great-power status
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The New ‘Gold Rush in Space’
Russian immigrant Mikhail Kokorich talks about America’s edge in the new era of private exploration, and his own plans for a water-fueled space transport.
By Tunku Varadarajan
Aug. 7, 2020 2:47 pm ET
When the Crew Dragon splashed down in the Gulf of Mexico last Sunday—completing the first manned space mission from American soil in nine years—Mikhail Kokorich was exultant. Which is striking, given that he’s Russian.
Crew Dragon was conceived and constructed by SpaceX, Elon Musk’s space-transport company. “It’s remarkable,” Mr. Kokorich, a physicist and aerospace engineer, says of the mission, “because it marks the transition of space exploration from the nation-state into the hands of private entrepreneurs.”
Mr. Kokorich, 44, is one such entrepreneur. In 2017 he founded Momentus, a California-based company that seeks to revolutionize transport in space by developing in-space transfer vehicles that use water as a propellant. These would “complement low-cost gigantic rockets, like Starship from SpaceX and New Glenn from Blue Origin,” he says. Craft built by Momentus would enable the outer-space equivalent of the connecting flight. A satellite would reach orbit by “ride-sharing on a big rocket,” then transfer to a Momentus vehicle for the next leg farther out.
The choice of water as a propellant, Mr. Kokorich says, would “not only enable extremely low-cost in-space vehicles—built in a ‘Mad Max’ steampunk style—but eventually allow the use of water mined from the moon and from asteroids.” Far-fetched? He points to “binding contracts already with NASA, Lockheed Martin, and the U.S. Air Force,” not to mention dozens of satellite operators and manufacturers. “Hell, Momentus even has a ride-share partnership agreement with SpaceX.”
Now a CEO in the vanguard of rocket science, Mr. Kokorich was born in a house with no indoor toilets and sporadic electricity in Aginskoye, Siberia, population around 10,000. His mother was 19 when she bore him, and he was raised by her parents, both schoolteachers with more education than almost anyone else in town. “I often studied by the light of a kerosene lamp when I was young,” he tells me by Zoom from his house in Los Altos Hills, Calif., where he’s lived since he left Russia in 2014 as part of what he calls “the Putin exodus.”
He pored over more than science textbooks. “I read many American writers,” he says. “Jack London, Mark Twain, James Fenimore Cooper, Theodore Dreiser, Ernest Hemingway. These books helped me understand the importance of human freedoms and the spirit of pioneers.”
Thus he speaks of the Crew Dragon splashdown with a historical sweep. “In terms of managerial effectiveness,” he says, “using private business for space is like Queen Elizabeth I’s hiring of Francis Drake in the 16th century. These are buccaneers in space.” Drake created a multigun ship, “which was the greatest achievement of science and technology of that time.” He leaps ahead to the 17th century: “With the help of the East India Co., the British Empire was built in the East. This laid the economic foundation for victory over Napoleonic France and the Pax Britannica in the 19th century.” Mr. Kokorich says private companies like SpaceX—and, yes, his own—“will be the main driver of centuries of Pax Americana in space.”
America is regenerating its space ambitions as Russia falls ever lower in the space-tech pecking order. “The U.S. is definitely No. 1, then the European Union, then China,” Mr. Kokorich says. “Next, I think India is now comparable with Russia, and maybe even more advanced than Russia in a wider sense.” He attributes “the withering of Russia’s historic might in space” to its being strapped for cash, saddled with a Soviet-era approach that leans too heavily on the state, hampered by international sanctions and export restrictions, and debilitated by a brain drain—of which he is an example: “I am,” he says, “the typical representative of the Putin exodus.”
He says there’s been a tectonic shift in space exploration, from the Cold War superpower rivalry to a “gold rush in space,” driven by private enterprise. Entry barriers are lower because satellites are connected to rockets in an increasingly standardized way, and the cost of hardware has dropped like a meteor. “Ten years ago,” he says, “it cost $100,000 to launch one kilo into space. Five years ago, with cheap post-Soviet Russian rockets, the price fell to $20,000 to $30,000. Today, it’s $5,000.” He says it will drop another order of magnitude, to $500, once Starship—SpaceX’s super heavy, fully reusable rocket—is operational.
Mr. Kokorich believes the extraterrestrial gold rush favors the U.S. “The development of a new generation of reusable methane-fueled rocket engines,” he says, “definitively ended the U.S. dependence on Russian rockets that began when the Soviet Union collapsed.” The choice of the Lunar Gateway as “the next human-habitation platform in space, instead of a space station in Earth’s low orbit, carries with it financial and technical requirements that will effectively make the U.S. the controlling, if not the sole, platform operator.”
He also cites President Trump’s executive order of April 6 on the recovery and use of space resources, which he calls a “great clarifier, reinforcing the view that Americans should have the right to engage in the commercial exploration and recovery of resources in outer space, rather than treating space as some sort of global commons.” In short, Mr. Kokorich says, the U.S. will, “for the foreseeable future, use its market power to set the agenda of international cooperation.”
Numerous major U.S. corporations are already leading players in space. The big tech companies are developing satellite constellations to connect the estimated half of the global population that’s not yet online. “Amazon and the aerospace manufacturer Blue Origin,” he says, “are working on Project Kuiper to enhance global broadband connectivity. With Google’s backing, SpaceX is constructing a satellite constellation of its own. And true to form, Apple is pursuing a space project in secret.” Even Facebook has confirmed a satellite program in the works. All this, he says, is proof of “transnational cooperation driven by an entrepreneurial initiative that serves all mankind,” and of the benefits “afforded by American oversight.”
Mr. Kokorich is happy to see the U.S. leave his native land behind in the 21st century’s space race. In 2014 he moved to the U.S. under an O-1 visa, granted to aliens “with extraordinary ability or achievement.” In 2018, after he and his companies endured years of threats from Moscow, he applied for political asylum in the U.S. The last straw was his detention and four-hour interrogation that year at Moscow’s international airport. He hasn’t returned to Russia since, fearing imprisonment.
Dimitry Rogozin, head of Russia’s state-run space corporation, Roscosmos, suggested recently on Twitter that Mr. Kokorich’s work in the U.S. space industry was akin to that of a Nazi collaborator. The tweet was later deleted. It said that Mr. Kokorich “quickly changed his views after moving to the United States. As they say, nothing personal, only business. The ‘Free World,’ apparently, opened his eyes to many things. #Vlasovites.” The hashtag refers to a Soviet general who defected to Germany, commanded a pro-Nazi force that styled itself the Russian Liberation Army, and was hanged for treason after the war.
Mr. Kokorich says he’s had a political conscience for almost as long as he’s been an entrepreneur. He started his first company in 1995, at 19, “providing explosives and chemical services to Siberian mining companies.” In four years, “we became the largest supplier of explosives in Siberia.” He then returned to finish his studies at Novosibirsk State University, “the best foundry for physicists in Russia.” Mr. Kokorich, not always self-effacing, says he “quickly became one of the most prominent students.”
He came of age in the 1990s, a member of “probably the only generation in the history of Russia that had the opportunity to grow up exposed to political freedom, democracy, a free press, and respect for human rights.” After Vladimir Putin came to power in 2000, Mr. Kokorich grew alarmed by the curtailments of freedoms. He threw in his lot with Open Russia, Mikhail Khodorkovsky’s opposition group, “running several programs for it in Siberia.”
In 2005, Mr. Kokorich started a new company, ChudoDom (or Wonder House), which he describes as “a kind of Russian Bed, Bath & Beyond.” It was the largest home-merchandise retail chain in Eastern Russia and, after 2009, in the whole country.
In 2011, at 35, Mr. Kokorich had what he calls his “midlife crisis” and resolved to “do what I truly love—physics and engineering.” He co-founded Dauria Aerospace, Russia’s first private aerospace company. Flush with cash from selling the retail chain, he gave generously to RPR-Parnas, a liberal opposition party. He also contributed “a substantial amount of money to the organizing committee” for rallies and protests against Mr. Putin in Bolotnaya Square, in central Moscow. These protests, which took place in 2011-12, were “the last time when there was real hope about any kind of democracy, or at least a glimmer of it,” Mr. Kokorich says.
In 2014, an aerospace competitor informed the authorities that Mr. Kokorich had bankrolled the Bolotnaya protesters. That’s when he decided to move to California with his wife and children. This move had consequences that were typical of Putin’s Russia: His company was charged with various allegations of financial impropriety, and eventually shut down.
Yet Mr. Kokorich hasn’t withdrawn from the Russian political fray. Angered that “Putin appropriated the right to govern Russia as a czar,” Mr. Kokorich serves as California coordinator for the Free Russia Foundation, a “nonpartisan NGO that seeks to tell American lawmakers the truth about Russia, and help support an American ‘Russia policy’ that promotes freedom and democracy.”
It surely didn’t help Mr. Kokorich’s standing with the Putin regime that he also favors secession for his home region. He is part Buryat, the northernmost of the Mongol peoples, whose land China ceded to Russia in the late 17th century.
“An independent Siberia,” he says, “has a greater chance of becoming a democratic and liberal state than Russia.” Perhaps, but the odds for extracting water from asteroids seem better than either.
Mr. Varadarajan is executive editor at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution.
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https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/16718/space-dominance-china
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file:///C:/Users/craft/Downloads/mission-space-q4-2020.pdf
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file:///C:/Users/craft/Downloads/mission-space-q4-2020.pdf
Check the link.
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Ah, got if from Defense One. A download.
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Part Two
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8mEdRcdVnxU
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https://americanmilitarynews.com/2021/04/china-building-space-missiles-and-lasers-to-blind-us-satellites-intel-report-says/
China building space missiles and lasers to ‘blind’ US satellites, intel report says
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https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2021/05/nobody-wants-rules-space/173870/
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https://www.defenseone.com/business/2021/05/space-junk-multiplies-pentagon-stuck-tracking-it-civilians/174340/
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Moon mission. Russia and China revealed their plans for a joint research station on the moon. They intend to construct five structures on the moon’s surface. Exploration of the sites will run until 2025, and construction is expected to be completed by 2035.
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https://www.theepochtimes.com/mkt_morningbrief/us-security-expert-warns-of-disaster-as-china-advances-space-program_3866041.html?utm_source=Morningbrief&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=mb-2021-06-21&mktids=c3a3744f42b13790838f974e7d0937ad&est=nqSktH88LeAAl45EbjMJ%2BMhl8FI7n82PvjnuNJKXg%2BHGwDMaLqwdQUkl%2BK8LBH097ZIn
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https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2021/jul/7/china-space-war-threat-growing-exponentially/?utm_source=Boomtrain&utm_medium=subscriber&utm_campaign=dive_deeper&utm_term=newsletter&bt_ee=XcjhNTHfQSOEcAZW1gzjwsXgg%2FXF%2BIrCV%2BcYi4FwIWaGKXH15ooYpgRpoE8NumIh&bt_ts=1625853328143
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' China space war threat growing ‘exponentially’
"One reason for the large-scale build-up is that Beijing’s space infrastructure does not distinguish between military and civilian space systems."
They integrate everything into their military systems
including biomedical research
while billionaires go up in space for joy rides
they are figuring out how they can blast the same into eternity
while we share out viral research with them , they use the same to genetically alter the viruses as mass murder weapons
We invaded Iraq for less......
And of course we hear at home our biggest threat is blacks cannot get to the DMV and get an ID
and
climate change
and we must go back to being reliant on opec
when we were opec free just a yr ago...
yes we are not only being f..t by our mortal enemies
but by (the Dem Party) as well.
:x
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https://www.defenseone.com/ideas/2021/07/chinas-space-program-more-military-you-might-think/183790/
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https://www.defenseone.com/ideas/2021/07/chinas-space-program-more-military-you-might-think/183790/
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Lawmakers want U.S. to collect space trash
Positioning nation at front of industry keeps rivals from writing policy
BY RYAN LOVELACE THE WASHINGTON TIMES
America took on the mantle of the world’s police officer in the 20th century, and Congress is now poised to make the U.S. the galaxy’s garbage collector in the 21st century.
Legislation moving through Congress would fund the development of capabilities to track space trash and establish a federal office to monitor trash and other objects in space.
Advocates for a more aggressive U.S. effort on that front cite the mounting dangers of space trash. A boom in the commercial space industry and increased space exploration by other countries is cluttering the road to the final frontier with piles of space junk and traffic jams.
Sen. Cynthia M. Lummis of Wyoming, the top Republican on the Commerce, Science and Transportation space and science subcommittee, said she is comfortable being identified as the “space junk lady” because she wants the U.S. to take a lead role in developing space situational awareness, space traffic management and space policy for Earthlings. An estimated 4,000 satellites are orbiting Earth. About 1,200 of those were launched last year, and more than 1,200 have already launched this year, Ms. Lummis said. Another 46,000 satellites are expected to flood space in the coming years.
The Department of Defense’s global Space Surveillance Network sensors are working to track 27,000 pieces of space junk, NASA said.
“This junk poses huge risks to our assets in space,” Ms. Lummis said at a Senate hearing last
week. “Even the smallest pieces of orbital debris, I’ve learned that even paint flecks, can cause serious damage. Each collision creates even more debris, so this is a problem that compounds on itself.”
Sen. John Hickenlooper, Colorado Democrat and chairman of the space and science subcommittee, said a 2007 Chinese weapons demonstration left 3,000 pieces of debris hurtling through space at high speeds and a 2009 U.S. satellite collision with a Russian satellite created 1,800 pieces of debris.
Mr. Hickenlooper said the U.S. cannot afford to wait for the next collision while more public and private objects rush into space.
“On highway traffic, and I realize this is a very loose analogy, but traffic increases up to a certain point and then there is a point where things stop, accidents increase, traffic rate slows dramatically, the system begins to fall apart,” Mr. Hickenlooper said. “And I think in that loose sense this is an analogy that we are rapidly approaching that point, where the dramatic increases in traffic are going to wreak havoc if we don’t address them now.”
Mr. Hickenlooper wants the government to fully implement a space policy directive for traffic management and enact the Space Act. The legislation recently passed the Senate as part of the U.S. Innovation and Competition Act, which focused on fostering research and development to counter China.
The Space Act would allocate $20 million to create “centers of excellence for space situational awareness,” where the government develops capabilities to track space trash, and would authorize $15 million for the Commerce Department’s director of space commerce to develop a situational awareness program.
If the U.S. does not write the rules for space, Mr. Hickenlooper said, the European Union, Russia and China will overrule American interests in space traffic management.
Another force shaping space rules will be the billionaires devoting time and money to the space tourism industry and space colonization efforts. Virgin Galactic’s Richard Branson rocketed to the edge of space this month, and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos this week joined the first crewed ride by his Blue Origin space company’s rocket to the boundary between Earth’s atmosphere and space. Upon return, Mr. Bezos said he intended to help “build a road to space.”
Whether Mr. Bezos’ road gets built likely will depend on governments’ willingness to entrust the risk of exploring space to Mr. Bezos and other commercial space entrepreneurs. The model for such a public-private relationship might be found in the defense sector.
“It’s very exciting. Who would have imagined that the private sector would be leading in space? Certainly, when I worked on these issues in Congress 20 years [ago], nobody could have imagined it,” former Defense Secretary Mark Esper said on CNBC. “But it’s the same kind of transition the defense industry went through years ago where the government was leading it and then the private sector took over.”
To clean up space, the government likely will count on the private sector for assistance, Paul Graziani, CEO of the Commercial Space Operations Center, told the Senate panel.
He warned that if the growing problem of space trash is not resolved soon, then low-Earth orbit soon will become “really unusable.”
CLEANING UP: A ship that resupplied the International Space Station was filled with trash and set loose to burn up in the atmosphere. With the advent of space tourism and plans to send tens of thousands of satellites into orbit in the coming years, the “road” Earthlings envision is becoming more crowded and dangerous. ASSOCIATED PRESS
Assets that the U.S. sends into orbit are at risk of damage from space junk. A Defense Department program is tracking 27,000 pieces, which multiply with each collision. ASSOCIATED PRESS
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https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2021/08/if-china-and-us-claim-same-moon-base-site-who-wins/184352/
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https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2021/08/hypersonic-missile-defense-may-depend-low-earth-orbit-satellites/184397/
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https://www.defenseone.com/policy/2021/08/spacesuits-and-lawsuits-put-2024-moon-landing-jeopardy/184457/
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https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2021/10/military-preparing-space-superhighway-complete-pit-stops/186260/
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Note well the last line:
Space Force leader keeps eye on China
Beijing’s buildup of technology poses growing threat to U.S.
BY JOSEPH CLARK THE WASHINGTON TIMES
China is threatening to overtake the U.S. military as the most dominant force in space, says the second in command of the now 3-year-old U.S. Space Force, who warns that Washington must dramatically accelerate its rollout of critical new technologies if it wants to retain superiority over the futuristic war-fighting domain.
The good news, said Vice Chief of Space Operations Gen. David Thompson, is that the Pentagon’s newest branch is showing promise in speeding up the deployment of key assets to counter China’s rapidly advancing capacities, including its growing capability to attack U.S. satellites.
Gen. Thompson offered the assessment in a wide-ranging exclusive interview this week with The Washington Times. He downplayed political division in Congress over the Space Force, which President Trump created in 2019.
The newly minted service is generally backed by Republicans but continues to face sharp criticism from Democrats. With some on the left accusing the former administration of using the force to promote the “militarization” of space, Gen. Thompson brushed aside the heated politics surrounding the first branch added to the U.S. armed services since the Air Force more than 70 years ago.
“In the current environment we’re in, the current politically charged environment we’re in,” the general told The Times, “I don’t think there’s any topic that you’re not going to find differing opinions, strongly held beliefs and polarization.”
Some Democrats are calling for the abolishment of the Space Force.
Gen. Thompson said he and others heading the service are laser-focused not on politics, but the mission at hand. He emphasized that the coming decade will be critical as China and other adversaries field increasingly effective space
EXCLUSIVE
capabilities.
“Since about 2007, potential adversaries, specifically the Chinese and Russians, have noticed how effectively we use space in military operations, and they have begun to develop and build weapons systems that take those capabilities away from us,” Gen. Thompson said.
The coming years, he said, will determine whether the U.S. holds on to the dominance it built before China’s surge in capability.
“History is going to judge what we’re doing right now,” Gen. Thompson said. Although “that’s always the case,” it is particularly true in this “moment in time, given the magnitude of what we have been tasked to do by our nation and its leaders.”
“We’re talking about the decade of the ’20s here. That is the period of concern” to make major strides in space, he said.
The Chinese People’s Liberation Army is building and deploying an array of space warfare tools, including antisatellite missiles and cyberweapons, designed to achieve domination on Earth by controlling space, according to a recent U.S. Air Force report.
The report by the China Aerospace Studies Institute — a part of Air University, the professional military education university system of the U.S. Air Force — also blamed China for spreading a huge amount of space debris, mainly from a 2007 anti-satellite missile test. The test destroyed a weather satellite and left more than 3,400 pieces of floating space junk that will threaten satellites and manned spacecraft for years, the report said.
“China’s military has designated outer space as a warfighting domain — described as a ‘new commanding height of war’ — that China must fight for and seize if it is to win future wars,” it stated. “People’s Liberation Army (PLA) officers and analysts assert that space is the ultimate high ground, and that whoever controls space controls the Earth.”
Others in the national security community have circulated similar warnings, asserting that China has made rapid advancements in space that are quickly coming to rival U.S. capabilities. Beijing’s program has grown in scope and sophistication in recent years.
The most recent Defense Intelligence Agency report on Chinese military power warned that “the PLA’s Strategic Support Force (SSF), established in December 2015, has an important role in the management of China’s aero-space warfare capabilities.”
“Consolidating the PLA’s space, cyber, and electronic warfare capabilities into the SSF enables cross-domain synergy in ‘strategic frontiers,’” the 2019 report said. “The SSF may also be responsible for research, development, testing, and fielding of certain ‘new concept’ weapons, such as directed energy and kinetic energy weapons.”
Gen. Thompson told The Times that China’s space operations increasingly mimic those of the United States. “They watch what we do in space, and they’re replicating it,” he said.
The number of satellites controlled by the PLA is growing from a tight concentration generally hovering over the Western Pacific.
“So much of what’s going on out there in the Western Pacific, that constellation is expanding, so that they can do [operations], eventually, globally,” said Gen. Thompson.
He said China has already developed a “tremendous and exquisite capability to look from space to see, hear, track and defend.”
Most important, the general said, is that China’s acquisition timeline for developing and fielding new space capabilities is shortening. In essence, Beijing is approaching the ability to field new space systems in about half the time it takes the U.S. to acquire and deploy its own systems.
“Not only do they have the ability to adopt new technology and updated capabilities much more quickly, if they’re almost as good as we are today — and they are almost as good as we are — they can cycle these things in very quickly [and] they become better than we are,” he said.
The key challenge facing the Space Force, Gen. Thompson said, is the need to dramatically decrease the amount of time it takes for the U.S. to move new capabilities into operation.
From the outset, the Space Force has emphasized the rapid fielding of new technologies. In 2019, the Pentagon created the Space Rapid Capabilities Office to build never-fielded capabilities on highly condensed timelines.
The goal, said Gen. Thompson, has been to generate two- to three-year turnarounds for advanced space technologies rather than what had become a standard six- to seven-year timeline.
In February, the Space Force commissioned a Space Development Agency to upgrade space-oriented U.S. military systems with a similar emphasis on quicker turnaround times.
“It’s very critical that we accelerate, not just to keep pace, but to stay ahead of the threat of the capabilities the Chinese are provided,” Gen. Thompson said. “We’ve put some processes and organizations in place to do that, and they’re demonstrating early on the ability to do so.”
The Space Force is having success, he said, despite operating with a lean force of roughly 6,400 uniformed members, known as guardians, and about 6,000 civilians. The Space Force is by far the smallest service, following the Marines with close to 185,000 uniformed members.
Despite early successes, Gen. Thompson said, the Space Force still has to show it can deliver.
The service came under fresh scrutiny on Capitol Hill this week after the release of The Heritage Foundation’s 2022 Index of U.S. Military Strength, which asserted that the Space Force does not have the capacity to meet current or future “on-demand, operational, and tactical-live warfighter requirements” put forward by the other services.
The Heritage report gave the Space Force a score of “weak” — the second to lowest ranking on the index — in terms of capacity, capability and readiness.
Democrats, meanwhile, have remained critical for ideological reasons.
Last month, Rep. Jared Huffman of California and three other Democrats introduced the “No Militarization of Space Act,” which would have abolished the Space Force altogether, as an amendment to the House version of the annual defense policy bill.
“The long-standing neutrality of space has fostered a competitive, nonmilitarized age of exploration every nation and generation has valued since the first days of space travel,” Mr. Huffman said upon circulating the amendment.
“Since its creation under the former Trump administration, the Space Force has threatened long-standing peace and flagrantly wasted billions of taxpayer dollars,” the congressman said.
The measure failed, but it signaled ongoing skepticism among lawmakers toward the Space Force.
Gen. Thompson’s comments to The Times suggest that the need to bolster American space capabilities is growing more urgent with rising competition with China.
The general’s remarks coincide with tension between Washington and Beijing over China’s deployment of a record number of provocative sorties into Taiwanese airspace this month, raising fears that direct conflict with China could be closer than imagined.
Given its separate and increasingly rapid development of space capabilities, including offensive capabilities to attack U.S. satellites, China may be preparing for such a conflict to start in space rather than a more conventional realm, Gen. Thompson said.
“We absolutely believe that the Chinese thinking would be if it’s coming to crisis and conflict, they’re going to start this conflict in space,” the general said.
⦁
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https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17907/china-satellite-crusher
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A Space Treaty to Stop the Sky From Falling
Debris in orbit poses dangers to human life and well-being.
By Alexander William Salter
Nov. 16, 2021 12:57 pm ET
Low-Earth orbit is full of junk, and Russia’s antisatellite test Monday made things even worse. According to the U.S. Space Command, it created hundreds of thousands of debris pieces. Moscow’s actions threaten the use of space for all humanity. And Russia isn’t the only country pursuing antisatellite weapons. The U.S. conducted such a test in 1985, China in 2007 and India in 2019.
Orbital debris has been a problem since the dawn of the Space Age. The first piece was the rocket body from Sputnik I in 1957. There are at least half a million pieces the size of a marble, and many millions more too small to track. Because objects in orbit travel at 17,500 miles an hour, even tiny fragments can destroy space assets upon impact.
Space junk poses dangers to human life and well-being. Also on Monday, astronauts aboard the International Space Station had to implement emergency protocols due to close-passing debris—whether from Russia’s test or another source, we can’t be sure. Celestial collisions create a vicious circle: More debris causes more collisions causes more debris. This feedback loop, which space scientists call Kessler syndrome, threatens all orbital activities.
Another major concern is economic damage. Morgan Stanley estimates the space economy, currently valued at about $400 billion a year, could grow to $1 trillion by 2040. Much of that activity, especially satellite internet, relies on low-Earth orbital integrity. The private sector won’t bear the large upfront costs of placing valuable hardware in orbit if celestial trash makes satellite operations too risky.
It’s time for the spacefaring nations to get serious about debris. Before we can discipline hostile actors, we need to wrestle with a subtler foe: bad incentives. The proliferation of debris is a classic tragedy of the commons. Specific orbital slots can be rationed, but orbit itself can’t be owned. Governments bear little of the cost their debris creates for others. The predictable result: too much junk.
While the 1967 Outer Space Treaty prevents governments from extending their jurisdiction into space, they retain authority over objects put into space—including the right to destroy them. International law must change if we want to keep orbit usable.
There’s no way forward but an explicit agreement among spacefaring nations, including America, China and Russia. Striking one is no small task. But the U.S. has a crucial advantage: unquestioned leadership in space capabilities. It should use that position, supplemented by diplomatic and economic pressure, to prevent other nations from making space a junk yard.
A foundational principle of space law is that space “shall be free for exploration and use by all States.” That principle has no force if rogue nations can litter in orbit without consequence. The U.S. should make mitigating space debris a priority. This means leading the charge in curbing tests of antisatellite weapons.
Mr. Salter is an associate professor of economics in the Rawls College of Business at Texas Tech University, a research fellow with TTU’s Free Market Institute, and a senior fellow with the Sound Money Project.
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eff Bezos’ greed could cost the U.S. the moon
His lawsuit delayed NASA’s lunar program, leaving it vulnerable to be leapfrogged by China
By Jianli Yang
With its rapid development of advanced space technology, China’s space agency is pressuring NASA in a way not seen since the height of the cold war. Many even believe that China could supersede the United States by the end of the decade. Surprisingly, though, the biggest obstacle to continuing NASA dominance isn’t coming from abroad, but the greed of one of the world’s richest men — Jeff Bezos.
For months, Mr. Bezos, a person who symbolizes the triumphs and failures of capitalism more than most, has attempted to sue his way into industry relevance. NASA denied his private space firm, Blue Origin, a contract in the spring to develop a moon lander for America’s return to the lunar surface, so he decided to launch a lawsuit against his country in response.
Mr. Bezos couldn’t win the NASA contract on merit because he charged millions of dollars more than his competition. His Plan B of having his home-state U.S. senator force NASA to select a second contractor for the mission, which would have cost taxpayers $10 billion, also failed. So, his strategy of getting more money from the public treasury hinged entirely upon this NASA lawsuit.
After months of legal maneuvering and a prolonged pause to NASA’s lunar program, the court ruled against Blue Origin, allowing the development of the lander to continue. But the damage has already been done.
At a recent press conference, NASA Administrator Bill Nelson announced that NASA would have to delay the landing a year because of the lost development time it incurred because of Mr. Bezos’ lawsuit holding up the process for months on end. The delay puts America at risk of being leapfrogged by China’s lunar program, which many experts now believe is highly capable of putting a man on the moon within the next three to four years.
Thank God Mr. Bezos wasn’t ludicrously wealthy in the 1960s. Americans may have watched Alexei Leonov take one small step for man instead of Neil Armstrong at the expense of all mankind.
China has decided that building massive dams and railroads connecting countries under their new silk route idea-One Belt One Road Initiative -- is not enough. They now wish to take over the space in outer space. Last Summer, China unveiled plans to launch a mile-long fleet of solar panels into space to return energy to earth by 2035, and the system could have the same power as a nuclear power plant by 2050. China is hoping to have a massive space station and capture solar energy, tourism, mine asteroids and also have gas stations. They are calling it a megastructure that should be able to do these things. One would say they are in an awful hurry to have space dominated by China. Therefore, China is keen on overtaking NASA and, in turn, the United States and is working hard in their research facilities to corner the market for special parts required for different space expeditions.
For the Chinese, landing on the lunar surface would mark an unmatched triumph, at least until someone reaches mars. With the global community watching the authoritarian government take on America’s influence, stopping this symbolic victory for the communist regime alone is enough to justify the massive expense of stopping it. But of course, the Chinese occupation of the moon would be more than a symbolic victory over the west.
The Chinese have already agreed to develop a moon base with the Russians. National security experts have raised concerns that occupation of the moon by two of our biggest rivals is likely to have geopolitical consequences in the years ahead, including but not limited to anti-American military operations from above. For years, officials from both political parties have understood it’s in the U.S.’s best interest to reach and occupy the moon before the Chinese. The Trump administration set out an ambitious timeline to culminate with a landing before the end of this decade. Now, President Joe Biden is facing the reality of running a reelection campaign in the shadow of the Chinese planting the red flag in the lunar ground.
The magnitude of Mr. Bezos’ selfishness cannot be understated. The billionaire accomplished many incredible things with his time building Amazon, and many hoped he would use his talents to benefit the space industry. Instead, however, he’s prioritized his selfish desire for more federal contracts over everything else, including the U.S.’s ambitious moon timeline.
Jianli Yang is the founder and president of Citizen Power Initiatives for China and the author of For Us, The Living: A Journey to Shine the Light on Truth.
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https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3157213/chinas-space-programme-will-go-nuclear-power-future-missions?fbclid=IwAR3pyEexW7PooackB1VknO0j2GyCeohbyejN1pBlFRB6GMeSBP9iG6zMy9M
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https://amgreatness.com/2021/12/01/space-force-general-claims-american-satellites-are-under-attack-on-regular-basis/
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December 3, 2021
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From the Earth to the Moon
Thoughts in and around geopolitics.
By: George Friedman
I spent the past few nights watching the series, “From the Earth to the Moon,” which depicts the American side of the space race. Produced by Tom Hanks, it was subdued and thoughtful, and it reminded me of my teens. Watching the story unfold back then, I very much wanted to be an astronaut, propelled by my obsession with science fiction and a sense of adventure. Even more, I envied the astronauts’ cool collection in the face of death. Hanks’ production brought me back to my longing and reminded me that remaining calm was not a posture but indispensable to survival.
In combat, panic is death. This, I think, is especially true in aerial combat, when disaster suddenly rears itself, when there is no time to prepare and certainly no time to think of dying. An infantryman may receive a moment to consider the abyss opening before him, but not a combat pilot. This is why all of the pre-Apollo astronauts were Air Force and Navy pilots. I don’t think anyone thought that the mechanics of flying an aircraft had anything to do with being on board a Mercury or Apollo craft. The thing that connected them was that there might come a moment, without warning, where things went wrong, and the only hope of life was crystal clear thought and precision action. Experienced combat pilots had all faced that moment and had survived. Courage is a willingness to die. What the astronauts had was the grace that allowed them to live.
The astronauts were not alone in their majestic quiet. In the series, you see over time that the engineers who designed the system, and especially those who manned the stations that monitored the flight, had become almost as precise and reserved as the astronauts were. In one scene in which the data flow from a mission collapsed, the engineers did not seem as inhumanly calm but were nevertheless as precise and decisive as the astronauts were.
There is something deeper here. In Western films of the distant past like "High Noon," the hero is someone who speaks little, appears fearless and is violent if forced. I am thinking of Shakespearean heroes, who are loquacious and indecisive. The American theater shows emotion constantly, as does the British – the audience seeming more composed. I think there is an aspect of American culture that longs to be like astronauts and cowboys. We speak at the top of our lungs, and most of us would run away at the first sight of danger.
We can see the same grammar of action in how the spacecraft were designed, destined and rebuilt as was always necessary. If not restrained by their souls, the engineers were restrained by the nature of their universe. From the first moment of design to the final order of return to Earth, the engineers followed a constrained and self-critical process. The complexity of the project and its novelty demanded that each part of thousands of parts be examined and reexamined. Most of us can talk ourselves through a tough spot. For the engineers, every spot was tough, and endless examination precluded fast talking.
Why did the pilots and the engineers undertake their grueling and dangerous tasks? The reason was glory. The English philosopher Thomas Hobbes talked about humanity as a collection of pain and pleasures, of animals avoiding one and seeking the other. He was trying to free humans from the constraints of religious sentiment and to explain them by the laws of necessity. Then he threw a curveball: He knew that the irreligious life and necessity were insufficient in explaining man or satisfying his true need, which Hobbes called glory. It was the human hunger for something extraordinary, something that would challenge eternity. The extraordinary presence of man on Earth was a glorious sight; for all of the flaws and corruptions of man, he was a glorious piece of work, and that glory reconnected him to God in unexpected ways. Glory was a celebration not of the self but of all of humanity. Men may speak slowly and carefully, but they speak of an extraordinary creation.
When I watch “From the Earth to the Moon,” I slowly realize that behind the banal terseness, the apparent limits of engineering and a pilot’s imagination lay the fundamental hunger of humanity, the hunger for glory. The hunger for an achievement so great it would be of the ages. Most of us cannot aspire to such glory, nor even imagine it. It is a glory that does not breed arrogance but tears of humility, the glory of reuniting with the eternal through one’s own effort.
When I start a series like this, my first response is that I am seeing something I have seen before. It is all so obvious. The Soviets challenged America, America overreacted, and the best and brightest – not those who planned the Vietnam War but those who understood the extraordinarily small steps that carefully executed it – would bring us to the moon.
Landing on the moon over and over was glorious, perhaps beyond the limits of Hobbes’ brilliant mind. It took humanity to another celestial body that was strange and wonderful, and it gave man a sense of the creation of the universe that was beyond the mind of Copernicus. All nations have deep flaws and crimes in their past. But none have the glory of landing on the moon, nor the certainty of future landings. There are many things I regret in America, and so many I admire. But none brings greater glory than the courage and hubris of Apollo 11 and the rest. When the history of Athens is told, the tale is of Plato and Aristotle and the navy that destroyed the Persians, not the oppression and cruelty Athens showed. It is the triumph, the glory of Athens, that is remembered.
We are too close to the Apollo missions to understand them. It seems banal to speak of it. We speak incessantly of the sins of America, but when America is remembered in 2,000 years, it will be not for its failures, which it shares with all nations, but for its glory, in opening the universe to humanity. Hopefully, some will remember the harsh discipline of its pilots and engineers, who suppressed fear to carry out the mission. Their obsession was their duty. We are too close to them to realize their place in history, but those who come after us will grasp what they did and understand the fact that others did not do it. That’s glory.
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https://www.theepochtimes.com/us-space-force-general-warns-china-is-advancing-space-capabilities-at-twice-the-speed-of-us_4140723.html
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https://www.defenseone.com/policy/2021/12/should-killing-satellite-provoke-war-earth/187405/
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https://www.defenseone.com/ideas/2021/12/nuclear-command-and-control-satellites-should-be-limits/187472/
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https://www.space.com/james-webb-space-telescope-launch-nasa-reaction
https://dailycaller.com/2021/12/25/nasa-launches-james-webb-space-telescope/?utm_source=piano&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2360&tpcc%3D=newsletter&pnespid=uqc6UXkXL.IQguLEqT63AcLcpE3yVYJoIfS80Ltk.xRmWiJfX4W7bbm9FmNp4UoU1O26g7qg
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https://dailycaller.com/2021/12/30/china-moon-base-2027/?utm_source=piano&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2360&tpcc%3D=newsletter&pnespid=q6dqC3lBNf8FgqfHuGq_TIOeuUqsVcBqP_TkmO5lpx9mH9x9VEpRaR6hjPDbEjK0PmoN8e.J
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China to est. a moon base by 2027.
no biggie compared to the racism *crises*. in NY schools:
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2021/12/30/new-york-gov-hochul-declares-racism-a-public-health-crisis/
Gotta keep minorities all emotional for '22 and beyond..... and of course racism for the LEFT is always a one way street.
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The idea of a Chinese moon base reminds me or Robert Heinlein's "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" wherein the colony on the moon looks to declare its independence from earth and essentially lobs moon rocks at earth, using the acceleration generated by earth's gravity to generate nuclear bomb level energy upon impact.
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https://michaelyon.locals.com/upost/1489754/space-nice-recap-of-2021-and-more-2022-unfolding-quickly
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https://www.theepochtimes.com/china-seeks-space-dominance-with-40-planned-launches-in-2022_4196911.html?utm_source=uschinanoe&utm_campaign=uschina-2022-01-07&utm_medium=email
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Beijing's plans for space. China released a white paper on its space program, laying out its goals, principles, policies and achievements in space science and technology. According to the paper, Beijing wants to focus on specific areas in the next five years, including space transport, space infrastructure, deep space exploration, manned spaceflight, exploring the moon’s polar regions and new technologies. Relatedly, China and Russia will reportedly sign an agreement to explore the moon together. The two countries aim to build the infrastructure for a lunar station by 2035 and to launch a robotic lunar mission by 2025.
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https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/44054/a-chinese-satellite-just-grappled-another-and-pulled-it-out-of-orbit
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China Wants to Own the Hypersonic ‘Domain,’ DOD Official Says
While the United States focuses on highly maneuverable missiles, China aims to control all of “near space.”
Patrick Tucker
BY PATRICK TUCKER
TECHNOLOGY EDITOR
FEBRUARY 7, 2022 10:28 PM ET
MISSILES
MISSILE DEFENSE AGENCY
CHINA
China sees the area of hypersonic weapons—those that can maneuver at Mach 5 or faster—not as a missile race but as an entirely new domain of warfare, Gillian Bussey, director of the Defense Department’s Joint Hypersonics Transition Office, said Monday. One consequence: the United States will have to rely on a wide range of layered defenses to protect military assets from a potential onslaught.
The Chinese “often use the terms near-space and hypersonics interchangeably,” said Bussey. “Near-space” refers to altitudes between 20 and 100 kilometers: higher than most airliners, lower than the heights achieved by ICBMs. That suggests that they are “approaching hypersonics as a domain, like land and sea.”
While big breakthroughs like last July's hypersonic test garner big headlines, Bussey noted that China has for years experimented with different technology combinations to get at that altitude layer. “You can look at their papers,” she said. “They have lighting scramjet vehicles; they have glide vehicles with scramjets….vehicles with liquid rocket, solid rocket propulsion. There's a whole host of propulsion systems that they are working on.”
It’s easy to lump hypersonic missiles in with nuclear weapons. The key nuclear-armed hypersonic missiles that both countries are developing certainly fall into that category. But Mark Lewis, the executive director of the National Defense Industrial Association’s Emerging Technologies Institute, has concerns about the smaller weapons as well.
“It's really the tactical systems that I worry about the most,” Lewis said during Monday’s event Imagine a hypersonic missile swarm that can sink an aircraft carrier; that's really quite a capability. And that leads to us asking the question: are we willing to risk an aircraft carrier say in a potential scenario?”
Various U.S. military services are pursuing hypersonic missiles; the Pentagon requested a total of about $3.8 billion for the work in fiscal 2022. The budget request for hypersonic defense technology was far lower: around $248 million through the Missile Defense Agency, or MDA, plus around $7 million for a three-year-old DARPA program called Glide Breaker. On top of that, the Space Development Agency is launching a constellation of satellites to track highly maneuverable hypersonic missiles. These would work to “cue the MDA’s hypersonic and ballistic tracking space sensor…to provide more precise target-quality data so that you could actually develop a fire solution that would allow you to intercept that weapon,” said Kelley Sayler, an analyst for Advanced Technology and Global Security at the Congressional Research Service.
Said Bussey, “Despite the obvious threat, as a department, we've chosen to focus on offense, first, because a good offense is the best defense—and offense is a lot easier.”
But a CSIS report released at Monday’s event highlights the need to have layered defenses. The most important element is probably anti-hypersonic interceptor missiles, which will be far harder to create than offensive missiles intended to hit stationary or relatively slow-moving targets.
Bussey said her office has been looking at new forms of infrared sensing technology and new radio frequency antennae to outfit such interceptors. But those will require big scientific breakthroughs to develop materials that allow the particular spectral energy loads to reach sensors inside the seeker while still protecting that seeker from the high temperatures generated by flying through the air at five times the speed of sound.
You also need to “understand sources of optical distortion for [infrared sensors] sensors such as ablation or erosion on [infrared] windows and what the hypersonic airfoil looks like over that window” she said.
The United States is also looking at directed energy, such as lasers or microwave beams, to destroy hypersonic missiles. But the same tracking and guidance challenges would affect those as well. The Defense Department doesn’t expect those to come online until the 2030s—with a good chance they will arrive “much later than that,” noted Sayler.
The CSIS report also highlights the importance of “passive” defenses like decoys and “other forms of deception to confound hypersonic weapons’ terminal guidance systems.”
Commanders need to start now to conceal key command nodes or valuable assets from hypersonic missiles.
“Critical air and missile defense nodes could also be concealed in mobile and containerized platforms, along with decoys, to complicate targeting,” the report said. “Operational procedures can also improve survivability. Additional investments in training for damage control and runway repair, coupled with the unpredictable rotation of forces between bases, could mitigate the destruction or disruption of forward-deployed forces.”
Lewis said the Defense Department needs to appreciate that hypersonic weapons won’t just be an aspect of the future battlefield but its defining feature. “This can't be a few years' effort [where] we deploy a couple of systems, and then we move on. Because this is the future of warfare and we need to be in this race,” he said.
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I file Business Insider under the heading of "Dishonestly Named Prog outlet" and cannot see this article, but I note the headline
https://www.businessinsider.com/netflix-space-force-real-one-no-longer-a-joke-2022-2?fbclid=IwAR17Uvoq3nv2TqkQyY-hMoIpP-A8fTRG0A_ZzG4C8_HsFVffbDltSJF_9zA
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I file Business Insider under the heading of "Dishonestly Named Prog outlet" and cannot see this article, but I note the headline
https://www.businessinsider.com/netflix-space-force-real-one-no-longer-a-joke-2022-2?fbclid=IwAR17Uvoq3nv2TqkQyY-hMoIpP-A8fTRG0A_ZzG4C8_HsFVffbDltSJF_9zA
"Space Force... Now it's seen as Donald Trump's best idea."
Strange, backhanded compliment issued by an opponent. His best idea was probably build a wall, voter I'd, stop rocket man, drill baby drill, stand up to Xi, or cut business tax rates from highest in the world, and then build space force. They likely don't mention those.
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America sleeps while China plans to conquer space
U.S. reliving the worst aspects of the Cold War with Russia
By Brandon J. Weichert
At a time when the West appears to be in relative decline compared to its rivals, the People’s Republic of China is proceeding with its plans for dominating the world. That is not an overstatement. A recent white paper outlining China’s next five-year plan for its country’s space development plans is proof-positive of just how far along Beijing is in its plans to dominate the strategic high ground of space (and whoever controls the strategic high ground rules the “lower” ground on Earth).
China’s rulers have conceptualized space in explicitly geopolitical and geoeconomics terms. Meanwhile, the Americans who decisively won both the Space Race and the overall Cold War to become the hegemonic power in space for decades, think about space in the impractical and airy notions of globalism.
Recently, NASA, once the world’s premier space exploration organization, announced that it was yet again pushing back its timetable to return Americans to the lunar surface. At the same time, China announced that it would have its taikonauts on the moon several years before NASA would. And the one aspect of America’s space capabilities that truly challenge China’s new space dream — private space start-up companies, like SpaceX — is being threatened constantly with onerous government regulations and political chicanery.
Sensing an advantage over their flailing American competitors, the Chinese have now pressed ahead. Following on from Ye Peijian’s stark claim that China views the “universe as an ocean and the moon as the South China Sea,” Beijing has rapidly deployed an advanced suite of space technologies meant to challenge the Yanks in the strategic high ground. In 2020, China launched its heavy-lift rocket that can place personnel and equipment in every orbit around the Earth and beyond. China then began construction in orbit of their modular space station that is meant to rival the aging International Space Station (set to be decommissioned by the end of this decade).
What’s more, China has built tiny, reusable spacecraft that many believe are for military purposes. The rising power is building advanced satellites meant to give China considerable advantages both militarily and commercially, and it has constructed a robust arsenal of anti-satellite weapons that could render American military forces or the U.S. economy deaf, dumb and blind.
The Americans, of course, should not be surprised by any of this. After all, China’s autocratic president for life, Xi Jinping, told audiences many years ago that dominating space was a vital component of his “China 2049” vision. This is Mr. Xi’s dream of ensuring that China, not the U.S., is the global hegemonic power by the hundredth-year anniversary of Mao Zedong’s creation of the People’s Republic of China — the moment that his Chinese Communist Party defeated Chiang Kai-Shek and his Chinese Nationalist forces during China’s brutal civil war.
Building off the positive momentum that China’s space program (civilian and military alike) has enjoyed, Beijing is now implementing a far more intensive program over the next half-decade. If the universe is an ocean and the moon is the South China Sea, then China will need actual capabilities to fulfill its strategic goals in that domain as much as it will need a greater naval capacity to achieve its objectives in the Indo-Pacific on Earth. The new five-year plan has a heavy focus on enhancing China’s space launch and satellite capabilities. These two things form the bedrock of a national space program. Further, greater launch and satellite capabilities mean more money flowing into Beijing’s coffers (which, in turn, will fund the next round of advancements for China) as China hopes to get other countries and companies from around the world to use its systems.
The white paper that China released outlining its five-year plan for space development explicitly called for the creation of an orbital “defense system.” Ostensibly aimed at deflecting potential lifeending asteroids that are zinging around our area of space, such a system could easily be deployed against terrestrial targets — such as sensitive installations belonging to the U.S. military or other enemies of China on Earth or even against critical satellites orbiting Earth, which Americans and their allies rely on. And this would not be the first time that China has attempted to weaponize space through dual-use means. Recently, China stunned Western observers when its Shijian-21 satellite reached out with menacing-looking grappling arms and moved debris that was floating in geosynchronous orbit — the highest orbit around Earth and where some of America’s most sensitive military satellites operate. Observers in the West understood the implications of the Shijian-21 test. Yes, in peacetime this system could help to mitigate the threat that man-made debris in space posed to the safe operation of satellites, spaceships and even the space station alike. In wartime, however, that same system could be used to sabotage and destroy those critical American satellites orbiting nearby. So, China is moving ahead with major advances for its space program that will fundamentally alter the balance of power on Earth. This is not your father’s space race. It is no longer simply about having the prestige of planting your country’s flag on the surface of an alien world or placing the first humans on a distant planet. Instead, this is about dominating Earth from above while capturing major new industries in space — from the launch services sector to satellites to space mining — and the Chinese are implementing a robust plan to beat the Americans in this endeavor. As China looks to conquer the stars, America attempts to relive the worst aspects of the Cold War with Russia, this time over the future of Ukraine. Now is a critical time for the development of space and the future of humanity. Will the world fall under the sway of the terrible, technologically advanced tyranny of the Chinese Communist Party or will some semblance of freedom remain under the American-led world? Whoever controls space will be the one to answer that. Sadly, it is increasingly looking like China will be the victor in this long competition unless Washington starts making radical changes to the way it views space policy and the new space race.
Brandon J. Weichert is the author of “Winning Space: How America Remains a Superpower” (Republic Book Publishers). He manages The Weichert Report: World News Done Right and can be followed via Twitter @WeTheBrando
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https://www.defenseone.com/policy/2022/03/if-russia-hacks-us-satellite-it-act-war/362762/
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China Developing Comprehensive Arsenal of ‘Space and Counterspace Capabilities’: Expert
By Andrew Thornebrooke and David Zhang April 2, 2022 Updated: April 2, 2022biggersmaller Print
Western nations are responding to the growing threat of space-based warfare from China and Russia, according to one expert, but much work remains to be done to mitigate risks to vital infrastructure.
“We recognize that space is a critical domain for military operations, it’s an operational environment,” said Malcolm Davis, a senior analyst at the Australian Strategic Policy Institute, during a recent interview with EpochTV’s “China Insider.”
“It’s not some sort of peaceful sanctuary that sits serene and untouched, above geopolitical rivalries on Earth below.”
Davis said that space was a contested domain, where authoritarian nations were vying for control of terrestrial systems through extraterrestrial means.
“It’s contested in the sense that you are seeing countries like China and Russia and others developing counterspace capabilities to attack and interfere with Western satellites and to deny us space support.”
Numerous systems that are required for the daily operation of modern society are space-based. These include everything from GPS and telecommunications relays to military equipment like early warning systems designed to defend against missile attacks.
In each case, if key satellites were to be targeted, the system itself could fail.
Davis said that China in particular was developing its capabilities with the aim of better attacking Western space infrastructure, which many believe would be the first step in a war with the United States and its allies.
General David Thompson, the U.S. Space Force’s second-in-command, said in November that China and Russia were launching reversible cyberattacks on U.S. satellites “every single day.”
“China is developing a range of comprehensive space and counter-space capabilities, including both hard kill and soft kill systems,” Davis said. “Soft kill being systems that are designed to disable or deny rather than physically destroy a target in space.”
“Space is a critical domain in future war, both for ourselves and for the Chinese. So, there will be competition on that, in that domain by both sides, in terms of deploying and sustaining space support forces, and also deploying and use of utilizing counterspace capabilities.”
Davis said that Western nations were working to counter this threat by creating more resilient systems, such as distributed space architecture, wherein satellite systems are decentralized through many satellite clusters, rather than built out of only a few major satellites.
“What we have to do is build resilient space capabilities whereby… we can augment existing space systems in a crisis to increase our ability in space to be able to have greater numbers of satellites to support terrestrial military operations.”
“We can disaggregate space support across a greater number of platforms, satellites, so that we’re not having so much essential capability concentrated on just a few very large, very complex satellites that are more easy to kill.”
Likewise, U.S. Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall said in January that Western nations would need to develop offensive space-based capabilities to adequately deter emerging threats, whether those new capabilities be electronic platforms or kinetic weapons or both.
Davis said that closer collaboration and joint efforts between allied nations would also unlock the potential of future warfighting capabilities and help to render space a more peaceful domain to prepare for the proliferation of humanity beyond planet Earth.
“The future is wide open in terms of what’s possible,” Davis said. “There are huge opportunities out there if we can work together and if we can get past some of this international tension.”
“The possibility of humanity going back to the moon, learning how to develop a multi-planet species, [inter-]planetary civilization, how we utilize space resources, to go on to Mars and beyond. All of that is in front of us.”
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https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2022/04/ukraine-war-giving-commercial-space-internet-moment/364101/
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THIS is where conflict will be determined. WHO sees FIRST.
https://www.defenseone.com/threats/2022/04/dia-warns-chinas-space-tech-seeks-block-us-radars-jam-munitions/365549/
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https://www.theepochtimes.com/another-top-pentagon-tech-official-resigns-says-breaking-through-bureaucracy-was-like-working-to-defy-gravity_4411640.html?utm_source=China&utm_campaign=uschina-2022-04-19&utm_medium=email&est=GWmfAWJPQelu4ih%2B50zbzLua8lpmgigf78C27E6BCSxLB%2B5a2kW4O1ywicPuQpLLyhT9
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https://www.theepochtimes.com/if-we-lose-those-satellites-theres-no-putting-humpty-dumpty-back-together-brandon-weichert_4421927.html?utm_source=China&utm_campaign=uschina-2022-04-25&utm_medium=email&est=Xld6LARi1PWATZ2na6nV%2Fmdm4OMbUwy4EYnVECL1lxXXARmIHEUiqC9IhZuwpTz5AP94
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China and Russia's 'Space War': Where Is The US?
by Judith Bergman • April 28, 2022 at 5:00 am
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"Evidence of both nations' intent to undercut the United States and allied leadership in the space domain can be seen in the growth of combined in-orbit assets of China and Russia, which grew approximately 70% in just two years." — Kevin Ryder, senior analyst at the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) for space and counterspace, Air Force Magazine April 12, 2022.
Space has already become the scene of an ongoing "shadow war" in which China and Russia conduct attacks against U.S. satellites with lasers, radiofrequency jammers, and cyber-attacks every day, according to General David Thompson, the U.S. Space Force's first vice chief of space operations.
"The threats are really growing and expanding every single day.... We're really at a point now where there's a whole host of ways that our space systems can be threatened.... Hostile action toward our space-based assets is not a question of 'if,' but instead, 'when.'" — General David Thompson, Washington Post, November 30, 2021.
"Fifteen years after China's ASAT strike, we still lack the ability to defeat an attack on our space systems or launch an offensive strike if circumstances warrant." — US Air Force Gen. Kevin Chilton (Ret.), former commander of U.S. Strategic Command and Air Force Space Command, The Hill, April 12, 2022.
"The PLA [People's Liberation Army] will continue to integrate space services... to erode the U.S. military's information advantage." — Annual Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community, Office of the Director of National Intelligence, February 2022.
"If deterrence were to fail, we would face an adversary that has integrated space into all aspects of their military operations.... Space provides the foundation of everything we do as a joint force, from delivering humanitarian assistance to combat on the ground, in the air, and at sea.... We cannot afford to lose space; without it we will fail." — General John W. Raymond, U.S. Chief of Space Operations, Space Force News, April 5, 2022.
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"Fifteen years after China's ASAT strike, we still lack the ability to defeat an attack on our space systems or launch an offensive strike if circumstances warrant." — US Air Force Gen. Kevin Chilton (Ret.), former commander of U.S. Strategic Command and Air Force Space Command, The Hill, April 12, 2022.
just looked this up as did not remember :
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2007_Chinese_anti-satellite_missile_test
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https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2022/04/satellite-images-reshape-conflict-worries-mount-about-keeping-them-safe/366265/
As Satellite Images Reshape Conflict, Worries Mount About Keeping Them Safe
Radio data collected from space is the next frontier.
Patrick Tucker
BY PATRICK TUCKER
TECHNOLOGY EDITOR
APRIL 28, 2022 03:04 PM ET
INFOWAR
SATELLITE COMMUNICATIONS
NGA
UKRAINE
RUSSIA
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
DENVER – If Russia is defeated in its war against Ukraine, it will be thanks in no small part to publicly available satellite images. Pictures of Russian military movements and actions have helped mount defenses, expose Russian falsehoods and war crimes, and galvanize Ukrainian allies. But precisely because the recent explosion in space-generated intelligence is proving so valuable, industry and military officials are concerned about potential adversaries’ growing abilities to target satellites.
In the leadup to the invasion, images bolstered leaders’ credibility as they issued increasingly dire warnings. After it happened, the photos helped policy makers in Washington, Brussels, and elsewhere marshal support for sanctions on Russia.
“You're in the middle of a war where a new piece of technology changes the calculus of decision,” Planet co-founder and CSO Robbie Schingler told Defense One. “It wasn't just ‘Trust us, this is happening.’ Everyone could see it. You're on a common operating picture” that enabled leaders around the world to “come up with their own decision making processes internally in their countries and then be able to act in unison when it matters.”
The images even helped force many large corporations to act.
“The thing I think that was really quite unique out of this is that companies—unilaterally, without laws—are choosing to pull out of doing business in Russia,” Schingler said “That was like an unintended consequence.”
Unlike military satellites that produce largely classified imagery, private-sector providers have much more freedom to release anything they like.
“The shareability of commercial imagery has always been one of the key features,” Tony Frazier, Maxar’s executive vice president and general manager of public sector earth intelligence, said at the GEOINT conference here this week.
The availability of satellite imagery they could share and talk about made it easier for the Biden administration to rapidly declassify their analysis of Russia’s intentions and actions, said Robert Moultrie, the defense undersecretary for intelligence. “That decision was made by the commander in chief: a gutsy decision to say we're going to disclose some of the most sensitive sense intelligence that we have… It has worked. I think it has helped turn the tide.”
The U.S. intelligence community is entering a new era in which publicly available intelligence is given more weight and in which the U.S. government is more transparent about what it sees, particularly about Russia and China. Moultrie called the U.S. effort to warn the public about the impending invasion “a case study for us. And it really is one that's going to really pave the way for the future.”
Some military leaders want to move even faster. Gen. Richard Clark, who leads U.S. Special Operations Command, said too much information remains classified, in part because it’s too easy for the national-security community to reflexively mark it as secret.
“I think we will learn from things like the current conflict in Ukraine that we have to be more effective. We have to open things earlier and yet every situation is going to be different. There are things that, as a nation, as a government, we have to protect and we should protect,” Clark said. “But I think we really have to put more emphasis on that declassification or…opening up to knowledge.”
But declassification and the wide availability of satellite imagery also present a new challenge: how do you gain an edge if everyone has the same picture? That’s where officials hope that artificial intelligence and new forms of space-collected intelligence, such as radio-frequency data, will create new advantages.
Frazier highlighted work that Maxar has been doing with the Army’s 82nd Airborne, as part of their Scarlet Dragon events, which occur every 90 to 100 days. Over the past 18 months, he said, they learned how to move images to troops on the battlefield in one-tenth of the time.
The company is also putting up more satellites, which “is going to allow us to continue to collect imagery at very high resolution, so 30 to 50-centimeter resolution, but then also be able to dramatically increase revisit over areas of the world that matter.” Over the mid-latitudes, the region between the tropics and the polar circles that includes much of Asia, “We'll have the ability to collect up to 15 times a day and then also be able to interweave that with other sources to just get persistence.”
In the years ahead, expect an explosion in other kinds of satellite-gathered data—for example, unencrypted radio chatter from military units that are broadcasting their location via global positioning. At the conference, Annie Glassie, a mission analyst with HawkEye 360, a satellite company that specializes in gathering radio signals, showed how her firm could identify ships that had turned off their AIS receiver— in effect, trying to go dark.
Kari A. Bingen, HawkEye 360’s chief strategy officer, said, “What we are able to detect is effectively.. those electronic warfare, those indicators, emitters, jamming GPS radars, other things that are a leading indicator of, frankly, where Russia forces are and where they're moving.”
Artificial intelligence is also adding value by combining satellite imagery with new forms of data, including in U.S. European Command’s activities near the Ukrainian border, said one senior executive with a satellite imagery company.
“The feedback we've received is that the capabilities both for the role of commercial imagery, the ability to apply AI machine learning against that data, and the things you can do with 3-D are playing a big role in supporting current missions,” he said. He declined to be named out of sensitivity to current operations.
But some officials and representatives from industry are increasingly worried that commercial intelligence satellites will soon become key targets for adversaries who want to return to the days when the world couldn’t easily track their military formations.
“Both Chinese and Russian military doctrine now capture their view of space as critical to modern warfare. And they consider the use of space and counter space capabilities as a means of reducing U.S. military effectiveness and for winning future wars,” said Lt. Gen. Chance Saltzman, the chief operations officer for the U.S. Space Force. “We've seen destructive debris generated by anti-satellite missile tests, [radio-frequency] interference, cyber attacks on terrestrial space nodes and provocative on-orbit anti-satellite demonstrations, such as firing projectiles.”
They have also developed advanced ways to target U.S. government and commercial satellites, Saltzman said.
Just discerning whether a satellite has been attacked or merely stopped working is challenging. Saltzman said. That’s one reason why attribution of space-based attacks should be its own mission set, with clearly defined tactics, operations, and budget, he said.
During a directed-energy attack on a satellite, for instance, “You better be looking at exactly the right space because it's only on for a sec. Attribution can be a little harder for activities on orbit, in close proximity, a little harder to assess in real time. And then you have to do a lot of forensics…because there's not an eyewitness to it...It's hard for me to say, ‘Hey, that came from this country. And here's the effect.’”
The industry executive said the government is beginning to have better discussions with satellite companies about protecting private assets.
“This crisis has highlighted how important we are in the architecture for both imagery comms and different types of services,” the executive said. “And so what that's helped us do is—really, I'd say as an industry—is start to highlight what the risks are to the architecture and as a result, what are the things we need to do to mitigate that risk?”
Government officials have even started talking about ways to rapidly replace private satellites damaged in a conflict, the executivel said. But the outcome of those discussions is a long ways off.
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Used to be it was America who was the leader in this sort of thing:
https://www.popsci.com/space/moon-rocks-for-fuel-oxygen/?utm_source=Newsletter+Subscribers&utm_campaign=f16cae0383-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2022_05_06_04_10&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_387276506e-f16cae0383-515834222#affinity=Space
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https://www.nasa.gov/offices/odeo/LGBTQ-special-emphasis
This is where we lead now.
Used to be it was America who was the leader in this sort of thing:
https://www.popsci.com/space/moon-rocks-for-fuel-oxygen/?utm_source=Newsletter+Subscribers&utm_campaign=f16cae0383-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2022_05_06_04_10&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_387276506e-f16cae0383-515834222#affinity=Space
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https://www.popsci.com/space/plants-grow-moon-soil/?utm_source=Newsletter+Subscribers&utm_campaign=fc4733b2cb-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2022_05_13_03_56&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_387276506e-fc4733b2cb-515834222#affinity=Space
https://www.popsci.com/space/moon-rocks-for-fuel-oxygen/
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https://breakingdefense.com/2022/05/space-force-targets-2027-for-resilient-on-orbit-posture-initial-capability/?fbclid=IwAR1eroG6pWBEE_WqJULVEen7PhQKvptqSQyn-6RY95xdwMGgKsilRlwa320
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https://www.businessinsider.com/china-need-ability-to-destroy-elon-musk-starlink-researchers-say-2022-5?fbclid=IwAR2wjzuISXL2sTtWkfqEyPl_V3K9TdodSw4gO3780lUe8lJsc0LaYjr8Tu4
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Beijing Angry Over US News Report on Close Encounter Between US and Chinese Satellites
By Nicole Hao July 1, 2022 Updated: July 1, 2022biggersmaller Print
News Analysis
A U.S. news publication revealed an “in-orbit game of cat and mouse” between a U.S. surveillance satellite and two new Chinese satellites in geostationary orbit, angering Beijing. In response, China’s state-run media published a commentary on June 30 that slandered the United States, accusing it of “threatening [the] Chinese satellites’ safety.”
SpaceNews reported on June 16 that China launched two satellites, Shiyan-12-01 and Shiyan-12-02, to geostationary orbit (GEO) early this year. The U.S. surveillance satellite USA 270 reportedly moved toward the Chinese satellites “to get a closer look.”
When the USA 270 closed in on Shiyan-12-01 and Shiyan-12-02, the Chinese satellites “took off in opposite directions.” But the Shiyan-12-02 moved into a position that can “get a sunlit view of the U.S. surveillance satellite,” according to SpaceNews.
“It’s pretty clear that as USA 270 gets close, these guys are getting out of Dodge,” Space News quoted Dan Oltrogge, research director at COMSPOC. “It also demonstrates that countries are doing what we call counterspace. They’re taking action to avoid disclosure of their capabilities or their activities.”
COMSPOC Corp. is an American space situational awareness (SSA) company based in Pennsylvania.
Beijing Fires Back
The Chinese regime doesn’t allow private companies or individuals to work on space research or develop related technologies. Moreover, Beijing treats the progress of China’s space development as a guarded state secret.
After SpaceNews reported on the close encounter between the U.S. satellite and two Chinese satellites, Chinese state-run tabloid Global Times published a commentary on June 30, claiming that the action of the U.S. satellite was “threatening [the] Chinese satellites’ safety.”
The article claimed the USA 270 approached the Chinese satellites, Shiyan-12-01 and Shiyan-12-02, with the intention of “monitoring secretly.”
Global Times warned that “China has the ability to track and maneuver satellites with extreme precision. … Space is a new field for the benefit of mankind, and is also a new battlefield that is moving towards militarization and weaponization.”
Global Times is published by People’s Daily, the mouthpiece of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). Thus, articles published by Global Times and People’s Daily represent the CCP’s stance.
Epoch Times Photo
A piece of a Long March 3B rocket that fell in a field in Suichuan County in China’s central Jiangxi Province is seen on Dec. 11, 2016. The rocket sent an FY-4 meteorological satellite to geostationary orbit on the day. (STR/AFP via Getty Images)
Conflicts in GEO
The GEO is an essential and fragile orbital shell. Its orbital period is the same as the Earth’s rotation period, which means a satellite can remain motionless on the vertical equator at a fixed position relative to any point on the surface of the Earth. This can allow the satellites in GEO to telecommunicate, broadcast television, observe, and forecast weather that covers a fixed region on the ground.
At the same time, “one collision or explosion could spread very quickly throughout the GEO belt,” Oltrogge said. “It requires careful allocation and assignment of spacecraft for both conjunction-assessment purposes and to make sure you don’t have RF [radio frequency] interference.”
The GEO has become more and more crowded in recent years. According to the latest information from UCS Satellite Database, 574 operational satellites were in geostationary orbit, up from 449 in January 2018. In detail, the United States owned 179 satellites in January, while China had 80 and Russia operated 33, the UCS Satellite Database showed.
Moreover, some satellites allegedly attempted to damage other countries’ interests in GEO in recent years. For example, a Russian satellite in GEO was found intercepting military-related communications between two European satellites in 2018.
Experts claim that Chinese satellites in GEO can pose a threat, such as carrying out surveillance activities, based on the current technologies that China recently unveiled.
“When you say, ‘that satellite moves next to mine to spy on me,’ that may be true. Or maybe that was the only free space they could find to park for a while,” SpaceNews quoted Jonathan McDowell, an astronomer and spaceflight analyst, to describe the situation in GEO.
To enable space flight safety, such as satellite collision avoidance, the U.S. military launched the Geosynchronous Space Situational Awareness Program (GSSAP) satellites in 2014, which monitors the resident space objects (RSOs) and performs rendezvous and proximity operations (RPO). RPO means two or more satellites matching in space and then performing maneuvers to affect their relative operations, including positions, information exchanges, and mechanism exchanges.
The GSSAP works well “without the interruption of weather or the atmospheric distortion that can limit ground-based systems,” the U.S. Space Command (USSPACECOM) posted on its official website in September 2019.
US-China Space Race
China launched the Shijian-21 space debris mitigation satellite into GEO on Oct. 24, 2021. In late December, the satellite approached a defunct Beidou-2 G2 navigation satellite in orbit, rendezvoused with it, and then docked with it. On Jan. 22, the Shijian-21 hauled the Beidou-2 to a graveyard orbit about 200 miles above the GEO belt.
COMSPOC recreated the process by using video animation.
With the successful operation of Shijian-21, China became the second country in the world to possess the capability of removing a satellite.
The United States acknowledged that China is developing advanced space technology.
U.S. Army Gen. James Dickinson, USSPACECOM commander, testified before the House and Senate Armed Services Committees on March 8: “In 2021, the PRC [People’s Republic of China] increased on-orbit assets by 27 percent. … In January, the recently launched SJ-21 ‘space debris mitigation’ satellite docked with a defunct PRC satellite and moved it to an entirely different orbit. This activity demonstrated potential dual-use capability in SJ-21 interaction with other satellites.”
Dickinson confirmed the USSPACECOM could protect and defend against such threats but asked Washington for more support to “authorize and fund Space Domain Awareness programs that enable USSPACECOM to monitor, characterize, and attribute behavior as well as provide combat-relevant indications and warning of potential threats to U.S. government, allied, and partner space systems,” according to the USSPACECOM statement.
China’s test of a new hypersonic weapon last year raised red flags. In an April report, the Defense Intelligence Agency warned that China and Russia pose the biggest threat to U.S. national security interests in space.
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https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2022/07/five-space-lessons-russias-invasion-taught-ukraine/374101/
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https://michaelyon.locals.com/upost/2479339/china-marching-to-seize-moon
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The U.S. Resets Its Sights on the Moon, Kicking Off the Next Space Race
11 MIN READAug 18, 2022 | 16:57 GMT
NASA's Artemis I Moon rocket sits on the launch pad at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, on June 15, 2022.
NASA's Artemis I Moon rocket sits on the launch pad at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, on June 15, 2022.
(EVA MARIE UZCATEGUI/AFP via Getty Images)
Through NASA's long-awaited Artemis program, the United States is seeking to secure its lead in the new space race, as a combination of technological advancements and the potential for lucrative natural resources on the moon and other planetary bodies draw more countries to venture beyond Earth's atmosphere — with the United States' top geopolitical rivals, China and Russia, being chief among them. After many delays, the first major mission launch under NASA's Artemis lunar exploration program has been scheduled for Aug. 29, with Sept. 2 and Sept. 5 as the backup launch windows. The unmanned Artemis I mission will test the performance of the U.S. agency's new Space Launch System (SLS) and Orion spacecraft in the hopes of certifying their use for future crewed missions.
The Artemis program, which was created in 2017, aims to launch a manned lunar mission as early as 2025. NASA's last manned lunar mission was the Apollo 17 mission in 1972. The Artemis program builds on the Apollo program by including a space station orbiting the moon that not only would service manned missions to the moon, but potentially to Mars and other destinations.
There are currently five Artemis missions actively being pursued — all of which will be flown using the SLS and Orion spacecraft. Several support missions are also being done more closely in tandem with commercial launch providers, including SpaceX.
The SLS is a super heavy lift expendable launch vehicle that is even more powerful than the Saturn V launch vehicle that was used in the Apollo program and it, as well as more powerful variants, will launch each of the future Artemis missions.
NASA's SLS will be the most powerful vehicle of its kind that has ever been launched into space. But SpaceX's Starship will be more powerful; the company is currently targeting a six-month launch window beginning on Sept. 1 for Starship's first orbital test flight.
The Artemis program comes amid increasing geopolitical competition and interest in the moon by other space agencies. Over the last 15 years, the ambitious Chinese Lunar Exploration Program (CLEP) has demonstrated significant advancements in China's own capabilities to explore the moon, including with orbiter, lander and sample return missions. Although China remains at least a decade away from a manned mission to the moon, in 2021 it signed a pact with Russia to develop an International Lunar Research Station. Realistically, the moon base, if it is ever completed, would not be operational until the late 2030s at the earliest, but shows China and Russia intent on moving in that direction. Manned missions to the moon (or Mars) take decades to develop and while China has been successful in its lunar missions thus far, Beijing still has to make a number of advancements to successfully carry out a crewed mission to the moon — particularly when it comes to long-term habitation environments and landers.
In addition to its proposed lunar research station with China, Russia is currently slated to launch its Luna-25 in September. The timeline for the launch, however, has been repeatedly delayed and will probably again be postponed due to funding and technological challenges. Nonetheless, the Luna-25 mission aims to revive Russia's lunar program, as the country's last lunar mission was Luna-24 in 1976.
South Korea, the European Union, India, Israel, the United Arab Emirates and Turkey have also all either been involved in lunar missions in recent years or plan to be in the near future.
The commercialization of space and the reduced costs of robotics and other technologies used in spacecraft, landers and orbiters are making once unthinkable projects scientifically feasible and potentially cost-effective — setting the stage for the next space race. Over the last
decade, U.S. spacecraft manufacturer and launch provider SpaceX has repeatedly demonstrated that the first stage of launch vehicles can be repeatedly reused, driving down the costs of launches to Earth's orbit on a per-kilogram basis. SpaceX's demonstration is now leading China and Russia (as well as other countries and private space companies) to develop reusable rockets. Advancements in materials sciences are also making spacecraft lighter. New robotic technologies are making spacecraft cheaper and more advanced as well. This, coupled with the growing importance of technologies based in space for commercial applications on the earth's surface (such as satellite internet services), is creating a much more robust commercial space sector where once-unthinkable projects (like lunar outposts, missions to Mars and the development of natural resources on the moon and the rest of the solar system) will be actively pursued within the coming decades. This makes government-sponsored programs more significant as technologies are developed in coordination with private companies that could be used in those applications. Moreover, it also means that legal structures and government policies around the commercialization of space, particularly beyond Earth's orbit, are more critical.
SpaceX is currently charging around $1,300 per lb of payload for cargo aboard its Falcon 9 rocket to reach earth's orbit. Comparatively, Russia charges about $8,000 per lb for flights aboard its Soyuz rockets, which debuted in the 1960s. NASA's costs to launch the space shuttle were an estimated $30,000 per lb in 2021, though the high costs for the space shuttle were due in part to the need to reach higher
certifications with most flights due to being manned missions. Nevertheless, when SpaceX debuted its Falcon Heavy rocket 2008, it did so at a cost of less than $1,000 per lb.
Over the last few years, a number of startups have emerged trying to develop resources in space. In May 2022 alone, two startups — Lunar Outpost and AstroForge — raised a combined $25 million in seed funding. Lunar Outpost is developing large rovers for use on the moon, while AstroForge is looking to mine platinum and other metals from asteroids.
Although the prospect of mining asteroids to bring natural resources back to earth is tantalizing to many governments and space companies, the establishment of lunar outposts (and in the distant future martian outposts), missions to Mars and the development of privately-owned space stations will eventually create a market for in-place resource consumption, where for example mining an asteroid for water is then used on Mars.
With competition intensifying, the United States is trying to entrench its dominance in the emerging new space race by establishing international guidelines for exploring and developing resources on the moon (and eventually elsewhere). The United States and the national space agencies of 21 other countries have so far signed the Artemis Accords, a legal framework for exploring the moon and developing its resources. Other governments seeking to join NASA's Artemis lunar exploration program — including by participating in the Gateway space station — must first affirm their commitment to the rules outlined in the Artemis Accords by signing their own bilateral agreement with the United States. As the global leader in space exploration and the only country that has sent people to the moon, the United States is hoping that by setting the guidelines for how to behave on lunar soil, the Artemis agreements will help ensure that it (and not China or Russia) shapes the norms and standards of future space exploration and resource development.
Saudi Arabia was the latest country to join the U.S.-led Artemis Accords, which it did in July during U.S. President Joe Biden's trip to the kingdom. In June, France became the 20th country to sign an agreement, which marked a major win for Washington given that France is the largest contributor to the European Space Agency (ESA). Germany, the second largest contributor to ESA, is the next major country the United States is trying to convince to join the Artemis Accords.
The United States has largely been successful in using its dominance in space to convince other nations to join its programs on its terms. In the immediate aftermath of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union, the United States reached an agreement with Russia in 1993 to build a space station that would later become the International Space Station.
The Artemis Accords represent a significant development of space law and aim to expand on the principles outlined in the 1967 Outer Space Treaty. However, the pact's treatment of space resources and the establishment of ''safety zones'' has proven to be controversial, with some fearing that it could enable the United States and its allies to effectively claim certain areas of the moon. Keeping in line with the typical U.S. position on related issues of governance, the Artemis Accords call for transparency and interoperability of space systems, and pledge that space should only be used for peaceful purposes. The legal framework also explicitly states that the Outer Space Treaty permits space resource development, reiterating a long-standing U.S. interpretation of the 1967 pact that has not been universally accepted. The United States argues that ''safety zones'' are needed on the moon surrounding mission sites, lunar outposts and other areas as a way to de-conflict activities and ensure that one project's mission is not affected by another. The need for deconfliction is high, as lunar regolith, debris and other byproducts of a project can easily be kicked up and cause damage to another project. But critics of the U.S.-led Artemis Accords argue that establishing such safety zones would effectively carve out areas of the lunar surface for certain countries, thereby excluding other actors, which would then violate the Outer Space Treaty's provision that no country can claim the moon or another celestial body as its territory.
During the United States' talks with France on joining the Artemis Accords, questions on whether the treaty permitted the use of space resources arose as something that had to be negotiated.
The space resource strategy outlined in the Artemis Accords has come under scrutiny amid fears that it could effectively trigger a ''gold rush'' between countries seeking to mine the moon's potential lucrative natural resources and minerals, including silica and alumina. To avoid such a ''free-for-all'' competition, Washington's geopolitical rivals (like Russia), as well as some scientists, have argued that the international community needs more time to negotiate a new treaty or U.N. mechanism that regulates extractive activities in space.
The Artemis Accords also do not mention the 1979 moon Agreement, a multilateral supplement to the Outer Space Treaty that confirms the de-militarization of space. The United States has not ratified the agreement, which protects the moon and other celestial bodies as a common heritage of mankind that therefore cannot be appropriated by any government or corporation.
As space becomes more crowded with new entrants, and as the great power competition with Russia and China heats up, the United States' attempts to impose its own view will collectively fray the international governance of space and spur disputes over what is permitted. The final decades of the 20th century have been defined by cooperation in space. During the second half of the Cold War, even the United States and the Soviet Union maintained a basic level of communication on space-related matters. But that era appears to be coming to an end, with the great power competition on Earth poised to only intensify in tandem with the competition for influence and resources in space. Instead of engaging in multilateral negotiations like they once did, the three most powerful countries in space exploration — Russia, China and the United States — are all pursuing bilateral agreements and/or unilateral strategies. And Washington's attempt to force its Artemis Accords vision on the world is only deepening this trend by sowing further distrust among leaders in Beijing and Moscow. The decreasing level of international cooperation could, in turn, lead to increased militarization and accidents in space by creating an environment ripe for disagreements and misinterpretations. For other countries hoping to someday explore the final frontier, it could also limit access to space resources by forcing them to effectively choose between working with China, the United States or Russia.
Earlier this month, Russia announced plans to end its participation in the International Space Station once its own space station is operational in the 2030s. Since the Ukraine war began, Moscow's space cooperation with the West has come increasingly under strain. In May, the (since-fired) head of Russian space agency Roscosmos made provocative statements regarding the war, which prompted the European Space Agency to suspend certain key projects it was coordinating with Roscosmos.
U.S. law explicitly prohibits NASA from working with China. This makes it highly unlikely that Washington and Beijing will ever be able to reach a level of cooperation in space seen between the United States and the Soviet Union at the end of the 20th century.
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China Threatens to Destroy Elon Musk's Starlink
by Judith Bergman • August 30, 2022 at 5:00 am
Chinese military researchers are threatening that Musk's Starlink satellites must be destroyed. The problem, however, does not appear so much to be the fear of collision, but rather that China believes that Starlink could be used for military purposes and thereby threaten what China calls its national security.
"[A] combination of soft and hard kill methods should be adopted to make some Starlink satellites lose their functions and destroy the constellation's operating system." — Five senior scientists in China's defense industry, led by Ren Yuanzhen, a researcher with the Beijing Institute of Tracking and Telecommunications, under the People Liberation Army's (PLA's) Strategic Support Force, by Stephen Chen, South China Morning Post, May 25,2022
Soft kill methods target software and operating systems of the satellites, whereas hard kill methods physically destroy the satellites....
Unsurprisingly, China has eagerly copied Elon Musk's SpaceX to achieve its own space ambitions: China's Long March 2C rocket, for instance, which China launched in the summer of 2019, had parts that were "virtually identical" to those that are used to steer the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket.
China's threats against Musk's Starlink is more proof that the country is not ready to let anyone stand in the way of its "fierce space game", as China puts it.
In addition... China is forging ahead with a number of projects that will significantly accelerate the country's space capabilities.
China has reportedly sped up its program to launch a solar power plant in space. The purpose of the plant is to transmit electricity to earth by converting solar energy to microwaves or laser and directing the energy to Earth, according to the South China Morning Post... It is probable that China got the idea from the US; NASA reportedly proposed a similar plan more than two decades ago but never went on to develop it.
China's explicit goal is to become the world's leading space power by 2045. It is important to keep in mind that China's space program – even what might look like harmless, civil aspects of space exploration – is heavily militarized.
Chinese military researchers recently called for the destruction of Elon Musk's Starlink satellites, an extraordinary threat for a state to make against a private foreign enterprise. Pictured: A long exposure photo of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket lifting off on May 6, 2022 from Cape Canaveral, Florida, carrying Starlink satellites. (Photo by Red Huber/Getty Images)
Chinese military researchers recently called for the destruction of Elon Musk's Starlink satellites, an extraordinary threat for a state to make against a private foreign enterprise.
In December 2021, China filed a complaint with the United Nations, claiming that two of Musk's Starlink satellites had nearly collided with the Tianhe module of its Tiangong Space Station -- in April and October of 2021-- and that Chinese astronauts had been forced to maneuver the module of the station to avoid the collision. Starlink is part of Elon Musk's SpaceX and the satellites are part of a plan to make internet coverage from the satellites available worldwide, with the goal of launching nearly 12,000 Starlink satellites into low Earth orbit.
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"Unsurprisingly, China has eagerly copied Elon Musk's SpaceX to achieve its own space ambitions: China's Long March 2C rocket, for instance, which China launched in the summer of 2019, had parts that were "virtually identical" to those that are used to steer the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket."
again we spend the billions/trillions and the communists simple rip it off
for a penny on the dollar
and are right behind this
how about 70,000 more white collar and espionage law enforcement agents
life imprisonment or death penalty for spies ; PERIOD!
instead democrats spend a trillion on going after its own citizens who do not curry favor with them and
The shake down party's IRS extortion racket.( only one of their many extortion rackets )
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https://www.space.com/chinese-nuclear-reactor-power-10-space-stations?fbclid=IwAR0NofqchuNvgDsbP3lYNgPyyda9Wby4vr98q3nCChap5KcuJ7WdCCzon0w
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How to Beat China in the New Space Race
It’s about more than money. The U.S. needs a strategy to harness private innovation.
By Arthur Herman
Sept. 11, 2022 4:36 pm ET
It’s been 60 years since President John F. Kennedy declared “we choose to go to the moon.” In a landmark address at Rice University on Sept. 12, 1962, Kennedy affirmed America’s commitment to the space race with the Soviet Union. Seven years later, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the moon—one of the most significant moments in the human history.
Today we are in a new space race, this time with China. And our economic and national security both are at serious risk.
The experts are worried, according to a report from the State of the Space Industrial Base conference, held in June and sponsored by the U.S. Space Force, the Defense Innovation Unit and the Air Force Research Lab. For the first time since the conferences began in 2019, the 350 participants from industry and government were pessimistic about the U.S. space sector. They predicted that China will overtake the U.S. as the dominant space power by 2032.
It isn’t only a question of money. The annual budgets for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration ($24 billion) and Space Force ($24.5 billion) dwarf what the Chinese government officially spends on its space programs ($10.29 billion in 2021). It’s a matter of having the right strategy for harnessing the energy and innovation of private industry so America’s space leadership doesn’t get stuck on the launch pad like the current Artemis I mission has.
Xi Jinping was forthright about China’s strategy in the preamble of a January 2022 white paper: “To explore the vast cosmos, develop the space industry and build China into a space power is our eternal dream.” Boosting China’s commercial space industry is a critical part of this plan, “which is subject to and serves the overall national strategy.” According to the Chinese data company Qichacha, there are now about 95,000 space-related enterprises in China. The country will complete more than 60 space launches in 2022, surpassing its record-setting 55 successful launch missions in 2021.
If China becomes the dominant space power in the next two decades, that will put in Beijing’s hands the future of global telecommunications, space exploration and human settlement as well as the application of space satellites and technology for strategic and military use.
If NASA Administrator Bill Nelson is correct and China is already laying claim to the moon, it’s clear that to win the space race, the U.S. needs a national strategy for maintaining and promoting America’s leadership in space.
The first step is strengthening our space industrial base. Kennedy’s 1962 speech came at a time when it was clear that the federal money poured into the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo programs (more than $110 billion when adjusted for inflation) would feed American industry and workers, while the innovative technologies that government developed to reach the moon and space would benefit the nation. Those innovations included computers, semiconductors and fire-resistant polymers.
Today, companies like SpaceX and Blue Origin lead in innovation and productivity. SpaceX alone conducted 37 orbital launches so far this year. America’s dominance of a commercial space sector that reached $469 billion in 2021 globally, according to the Space Foundation, will be an essential support for our national defense and intelligence communities. These companies also are a springboard to a future space sector that includes economic activity on the moon and Mars. U.S. military and intelligence services will depend on the private companies that build the rockets, launch and track the satellites, provide the sensors, optical equipment, and encryption that keeps data and images secure, and provide ground support to missions in the sky.
A World War II-style mobilization model for harnessing this thriving commercial base to support national security is a key to the future of American space leadership.
Space will be the next great commons, a shared global resource like the oceans or cyberspace. History shows that these great commons are inevitably a source of competition and conflict, not voluntary cooperation. Whoever dominates space will determine the future of nations. We have to abandon the globalist fantasy that the U.S., China and Russia will work together to keep space rules-based, free and open.
For a global shared resource domain to benefit all, it needs rules as well as a rule maker and enforcer. In the case of the oceans, for 200 years that was the British navy; in the 20th century it was the U.S. Given what we know of China’s behavior in other circumstances, American leadership in space is essential for the future of humanity.
Kennedy himself struck this note in his Rice University speech. “We set sail on this new sea because there is new knowledge to be gained, and new rights to be won,” he said. “For space science . . . has no conscience of its own. Whether it will become a force for good or ill depends on man, and only if the United States occupies a position of pre-eminence can we help decide whether this new ocean will be a sea of peace or a new terrifying theater of war.”
Sixty years later, we face a similar choice when it comes to the space race. How we respond will determine the future of space and the future of freedom in the 21st century.
Mr. Herman is a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and author of “To Rule the Waves: How the British Navy Shaped the Modern World.”
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https://www.space.com/russia-private-satellites-legitimate-target-wartime-united-nations?fbclid=IwAR1-OP6Sd9ND6qJ_MO9wjtJVyX_BETmPCpyWuog1GvgV-w5cpnOnOWDmqp8
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https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-09-16/bezos-s-rocket-engine-nears-debut-ending-us-reliance-on-russia?fbclid=IwAR1K31haQCf1EAq4DzrKqvQybqn2RXVs9-pQ4_Oy2YspPUYWErbnG7qzeEI&leadSource=uverify%20wall
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https://spacenews.com/china-looks-to-build-space-partnerships-with-gulf-nations/?fbclid=IwAR358q9R5lrnUzOwSsaBDT4XwbtpPtqACoTzLiC7HRRLk9pzkkZo36MvNJA
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https://www.freethink.com/space/moon-base-lunar-pit?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=BigThinkScience&fbclid=IwAR2wkowzAHgraYsQ6R4LlIfA2YlYRIdwzA5y4l5keXJVIBRF8Dvx0Hbtxgk
Hope the Chinese don't steal this , , ,
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I am reminded of Robert Heinlein's "The Moon is a Harsh Mistress" wherein rebel colonist lobbed rocks at earth with the impact having the effect of nuclear bombs or something like that.
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China May Place Weapons on the Moon to Counter US and Allies, Expert Warns
By Hannah Ng and Tiffany Meier January 11, 2023
As the United States and China are racing to resume sending astronauts to the moon, China might militarize the lunar surface as Beijing sets to establish a permanent presence there, warns Rick Fisher, senior fellow with the International Assessment and Strategy Center.
“So if the PLA [People’s Liberation Army] is going to the moon, the PLA is very likely going to be bringing military capabilities to the moon. And they’ll probably not hesitate to use those military capabilities if there is a conflict with the United States or another country among many that are planning to put assets on the moon,” Fisher told the “China in Focus” program on NTD, the sister media outlet of The Epoch Times.
“China’s space program, its entire space program, is controlled by the People’s Liberation Army and is designed almost entirely to produce dual-use military benefits for the People’s Liberation Army,” he added.
China Reveals Date of First Manned Moon Mission: Rick Fisher on This Year’s Zhuhai Airshow
China Reveals Date of First Manned Moon Mission: Rick Fisher on This Year’s Zhuhai Airshow | China in Focus (NTD)
Limit Access to Resources
In this second moon race, the United States and China will compete for strategic positions and secure access to resources, according to Fisher.
“Space technology has advanced to the point where we can consider accessing the moon both economically and for real profit. We can use water on the moon to produce oxygen and use resources, metals, and other materials, minerals on the moon, to build things, to build an infrastructure, perhaps to build spaceships to go to Mars, or to build large solar energy gathering satellites that will be put in cislunar,” he said.
He expressed concerns that the Chinese regime might try to limit access to the moon’s resource-rich areas from the United States, citing the recent warning from NASA Administrator Bill Nelson.
“NASA director Nelson in an interview … with Politico, made clear his fears that once China gets to the moon, it will act in an imperialistic manner, it will claim territory and deny access to that territory to others,” the expert said.
Nelson sounded the alarm about Beijing’s misconduct, citing China’s actions in the South China Sea, a contested region where the communist regime has unlawfully constructed a network of artificial islands with military installations.
Push Back Threats
Fisher pointed to the Outer Space Treaty as a guide to behavior on the moon, as both China and the United States are signatories.
“But China has a very poor record of adhering to agreements even if it signed on to those agreements, even if it ratified agreements. So any Chinese statement or agreement that it does not intend to militarize the moon has to be taken with deep skepticism,” he noted.
Thus, he called on the United States to be very careful and keep track of China’s activities on the moon.
“And we have every right to expect that China will be transparent about its activities on the moon,” Fisher said.
He urged Washington to encourage more countries to sign on to the Artemis Accords, initiated under the Trump administration, seeking to establish a common framework to guide responsible space exploration.
Up to now, at least 21 countries have been part of the treaty, but China has refused to join.
“Based on resource extraction on the moon energy generation, we should encourage as many countries as possible to sign on to the Artemis Accords and join all of the other countries that have pledged to a program of peaceful behavior,” Fisher said.
“That would be our first defense if you will have a peaceful future for the moon,” he added.
“But secondly, we should also be prepared. We should have in reserve the means to send to the moon equipment that could defend our people and the means to identify quickly what China is doing on the moon should we detect any placement of weapons.”
Fisher pointed out that it is “critically important for the United States to sustain funding for its moon program” despite any threat on Earth imposed by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), such as launching an invasion against Taiwan or India.
In 2010, then-President Barack Obama canceled former President George W. Bush’s Constellation moon program.
“Because the Chinese Communist Party’s plan for hegemony on Earth requires hegemony in space. And if the United States were to cancel its moon program again, as did President Obama, we would be, in short, helping to ensure that China gains hegemony on Earth by helping it to gain hegemony in space,” Fisher said.
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https://www.space.com/china-yaogan-shiyan-satellite-launch-january-2023?fbclid=IwAR13AW1DYXYT1xRrVeALNaC3ZMqz0KXgmYguM32v8BSJ5Q-GB5u45vzEEME
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https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/intelligence/2023-03-13/whats-there-where-it-and-whats-it-doing-us-space-surveillance?eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=6cc61cbb-3e28-431f-b967-0a3a514e55b1
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https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2023/mar/14/space-force-chief-warns-china-russia-deploying-spa/?utm_source=Boomtrain&utm_medium=subscriber&utm_campaign=newsalert&utm_content=newsalert&utm_term=newsalert&bt_ee=g9IePJZ9ke8zQeuBkJxhBabdBwvszn%2BTmz8MJgo2Dn34cAITBERDMQnmaUuDeNuL&bt_ts=1678875116540
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March 22, 2023
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Latin America in the US-China Space Race
Partnerships and strategic locations are in high demand.
By: Allison Fedirka
Next week, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva and his science and technology minister will be in China to negotiate the construction of a new satellite. They want the satellite for climate observation and to monitor deforestation in the Amazon. Brazil and China have more than two decades of history working together on satellites, but this potential project takes place in a very different geopolitical context than past dealings. Space has emerged as a serious battleground in the U.S.-China rivalry, and Washington is sensitive to any Latin American space collaborations involving Beijing. Anxious about security risks in its own hemisphere, the U.S. has only recently emphasized space cooperation with its southern neighbors.
Situational Awareness
Space is a critical domain for national defense. Businesses and militaries worldwide depend on satellites for information and communications. A few countries – the United States, China, Russia, Japan, the United Kingdom, Canada, France, Germany and, arguably, India – boast robust space programs with military applications. Historically, the Americans are the dominant player in space, but thanks to massive public investment the Chinese are quickly catching up. For the rest, partnerships are essential to overcome the immense technical and financial challenges.
First, a primer. The space domain includes terrestrial, orbital and link segments. Fixed, secure ground locations are required to monitor space activity and communicate with hardware in orbit. Ground stations support telemetry, tracking and command of satellite and spacecraft operations. However, ground stations can’t communicate with satellites when large objects – the Earth, for example – get in the way. Instead, states need a global network to maintain space situational awareness. This includes the detection and tracking of launched and orbital objects, threat assessments, and data integration and exploitation. Situational awareness enables warfighters to predict the future location of space objects and the overall operational environment. The broader the satellite and observation network, the more complete the coverage. Therefore, interstate cooperation is critical, and it presents opportunities for regions like Latin America to accrue the funding and expertise to develop their own space capabilities.
Information Mobility for Space Operations
(click to enlarge)
National space programs in Latin America are more than 60 years old, but funding has always been a problem. Prior to the pandemic, the U.S. government allocated $22.7 billion to space programs, while Brazil, Argentina and Mexico together spent roughly $100 million. Until fairly recently, space was not a priority in the region. China’s emergence in the sector, combined with the falling cost of launching a satellite, helped change this. Vast borders are ripe for smuggling, while remote areas are difficult to monitor for illegal mining or deforestation. Satellites would boost governments’ abilities to secure their borders and enforce the law within them.
China was quick to develop space partnerships in the Western Hemisphere. Determined to become a leading space power, Beijing targeted middle-income countries for partnerships and leveraged its technology and expertise through commercial agreements. Moreover, ground stations close to the equator provide more robust satellite coverage, making South America even more attractive. Today, China operates or can access a series of space observation centers across South America.
Chinese Satellite Ground Stations in Latin America
(click to enlarge)
Beijing’s growing footprint in the Latin American space sector triggered alarm in Washington. The U.S. worries that China could use the proximity of its space facilities to spy on U.S. communications. There is hardly any daylight between civilian or commercial space research and military applications, especially in the Chinese case. (For example, GPS is useful whether you are trying to pinpoint a local restaurant or armed insurgents.) Latin American governments have few problems with this, given their own interest in the technology’s contributions to national security. For instance, Brazil’s national defense strategy promotes heavy use of satellites to monitor the border. Although its satellite negotiations with China will center on deforestation, the areas of interest significantly overlap with Brazil’s military interests.
Washington Joins the Race
The U.S. strategy for countering China’s ambitions for space in Latin America started to take shape last year. Last summer, U.S. Southern Command and the Space Force’s Space Training and Readiness Command hosted their first Latin America Space Doctrine Conference, intended to incorporate space into the U.S. security cooperation framework for the region. Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Peru and Uruguay attended. A second conference in January 2023 attracted 11 Latin American countries. Washington hopes to convince Latin American states to adopt U.S. standards and procedures so that they can share information – and shut China out. It has highlighted the immediate payoffs of cooperation, such as access to information to counter illegal logging, mining and fishing, as well as crop monitoring. Eventually, the U.S. says it wants to conduct large-scale space-based exercises with Latin American militaries, which China has never done.
Alignments in much of the region are practically settled. Venezuela and Bolivia are firmly in China’s camp, while traditional U.S. security allies Colombia, Chile and Peru are sticking with Washington. The current focus of the U.S.-Chinese competition for space partnerships is the southernmost part of South America. The Southern Cone countries, along with Mexico, have the most advanced space programs, and their alignments will shape security in the Antarctic region. A presence there is important to keep the Strait of Magellan and the Drake Passage free and clear for navigation.
By far the most prized relationship is with Brazil, the Latin American country with the most advanced space program. Brazil is well positioned to monitor most of the South Atlantic and hosts the Alcantara Space Center, the closest launching base to the equator. Five years ago, the U.S. and Brazil signed an agreement to share information about known space objects, including Brazilian satellites. They also discussed a deal to permit the U.S. to launch satellites from Alcantara. Some of the Space Force’s first international outreach efforts in 2020 involved discussions with Brazil about opportunities to collaborate. Not to be outdone, China has leveraged its decades-old relationship with Brazil in satellite development and launches as well as telecommunications.
After Brazil, Chile was the next Latin American country that U.S. Southern Command engaged in direct space talks. China leases some facilities at the Santiago Satellite Station in Chile, but the station’s operator, the Swedish Space Corp., has said it will not renew the contracts. The U.S. will probably fill the void. Meanwhile, Argentina hosts China’s most important space observation facility in the region. The secretive Espacio Lejano station in Neuquen is owned and operated by China; even the Argentine government’s access is restricted. The intelligence community assumes China conducts both scientific and military activity there.
Mexico is the exception to the U.S.-China competition for space partnerships. Mexico is too close to the U.S. to form a strong partnership with China, but space is too sensitive for Mexico to depend on the United States. Therefore, Mexico has advocated the creation of a Latin American and Caribbean space agency. A regional grouping to pool resources makes sense for Mexico – and many countries have signed on – but funding and the huge technological disparities between members remain obstacles. Mexico will likely have to give the U.S. major concessions to secure a partnership, or accept that it will trail its regional peers
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something seemingly we should intervene
why can't they get their weather satellite's from us?
rather then CCP
we need to send our delegation down to meet lulu
if he promises to nix the Chinese satellite deal he would get a free chopper :
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:American_Chopper_and_Lula.jpg
:))
diplomacy does not need to be hard
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https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2023/05/space-force-will-look-how-hack-targets-space/386755/
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https://www.theepochtimes.com/chinas-shanghai-cooperation-organization-for-the-moon_5275892.html?utm_source=China&src_src=China&utm_campaign=uschina-2023-05-23&src_cmp=uschina-2023-05-23&utm_medium=email&est=sjEqJomAIDmry7MkXLT5Inl0d1OWxKo8MQ8AFn38zV4zTPqkmYkF%2F3Yx%2Bnl4g%2BMdQ9Hl
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https://www.theepochtimes.com/us-should-deploy-space-dominance-measures-to-counter-china-threat-analyst_5300117.html?utm_source=China&src_src=China&utm_campaign=uschina-2023-05-31&src_cmp=uschina-2023-05-31&utm_medium=email&est=bvqZJwUqinom5ml%2BLXddVGomIYYNtBbm7woOjMWcSO0e9qGtLFRHl3nMEv4k%2BAyTkPSG
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China's Space Program: Designed to Defeat the United States
by Lawrence A. Franklin • June 6, 2023 at 5:00 am
Far more significant than scoring space spectaculars, however, is the question of which nation will achieve military dominance in the domain of near-earth space. Chinese international media deceitfully stresses the peaceful, cooperative, and scientific nature of its national space program. However, the ambitious nature of China's space program indicates that Beijing's primary objective is to dominate near earth space.
China's PLA is openly preparing for war, particularly in areas where Beijing's territorial and maritime claims are illegal and hegemonic.
The aggressive nature of China's space program is particularly obvious in its anti-satellite projects.
The proximity of these Chinese anti-satellite vehicles clearly reveals the mission to degrade and/or blind collection and transmission of intelligence data by US systems. Another Chinese anti-satellite project features a satellite with a grappling hook, designed to capture US satellites as an immediate prelude to war.
Beijing is planning to win a war in space as part of its reported overall objective of replacing the US as the dominant power on earth. One assessment estimates that fully 84% of China's space launches are military in nature -- indicating that the CCP may well be determined to emerge as the only remaining superpower.
It will also most likely be in the dimension of space, as well as biowarfare, that mankind will get a tip-off that a major armed conflict is about to breakout between China and the United States. China at present not only has "killer satellites," but also reportedly: "Beijing also has rapidly developed an array of space warfare capabilities, including several types of ground-launched anti-satellite missiles capable of hitting satellites in different orbits; ground-based lasers that can blind or damage orbiting satellites; and small robotic satellites capable of maneuvering and grabbing orbiting satellites."
China will most likely attempt to shut down US intelligence collection, "eyes and ears in the sky," prior to combat operations on earth. The United States, if an impending military clash seems unavoidable, may be forced to "preemptively retaliate" by disabling China's intelligence collection and data transmission space-based assets – if it can.
"f the U.S. military doesn't change course... we're going to lose fast" — Air Force Lt. Gen. S. Clinton Hinote, the deputy chief of staff for strategy, integration and requirements, americanmilitarynews.com, March 11, 2021.
It seems high time that the US increased its defense budget instead of cutting it, prepositioned arms in Taiwan for deterrence, and got serious about acknowledging the Chinese Communist Party, led by President Xi Jinping, not as a "competitor," but as an adversary, and an intractable one at that.
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https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2023/jun/29/report-space-force-urgently-needs-counterspace-wea/?utm_source=Boomtrain&utm_medium=subscriber&utm_campaign=newsalert&utm_content=newsalert&utm_term=newsalert&bt_ee=T1FpZ2QT%2ByKBMJSIaLZFcfQ%2FlURKYGomePiWYAc%2Fs2%2Fvi15Nc5%2F7Bj%2BXp60Gm2gJ&bt_ts=1688119654517
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SECURITY
Space Force arsenal falls dangerously short to defend U.S. against China, Russia
BY BILL GERTZ THE WASHINGTON TIMES
The Space Force needs new offensive weapons and more sophisticated defenses to counter China’s rapid deployment of multiple space arms that would pose major dangers for the U.S. military in a conflict, according to an extensive study.
The report, published by the Mitchell Institute for Aerospace Studies on June 26, found that, unlike China, the U.S. military largely shunned the idea of deploying space weapons after the end of the Cold War.
“The United States must take urgent action to respond to this mounting threat or risk losing its ability to deter Chinese aggression and maintain peace in key regions around the globe,” the report states.
It warns that the Biden administration’s renewed emphasis on diplomacy and engagement to seek norms of space behavior will not be enough to deter confl ict with Beijing. China views the vulnerability of U.S. satellites as its strategic advantage.
“U.S. combatant commanders should have a wide range of options for offensive counterspace operations to defeat spaceenabled attacks in the event of a major conflict with China,” the report states.
The report stops short of calling directly for deploying ground-based antisatellite missiles, similar to those fielded by China and Russia. Instead, the Space Force should be equipped with weapons that can “responsibly” attack or disable Chinese satellites without creating major fields of orbiting debris.
Recommended weapons include ground-based and space-based lasers,
jammers and other directed energy systems, as well as better defenses for satellites, such as larger fuel tanks that increase the ability to maneuver away from space threats.
The report was written by retired Space Force Col. Charles Galbreath, a former command space operator who until recently was deputy chief technology and innovation officer at Space Force headquarters.
“Russia and China have developed counterspace capabilities specifically to attack U.S. space systems,” Col. Galbreath told The Washington Times. “The U.S. must be prepared to respond in a credible and proportional manner. Ongoing efforts to establish norms of responsible behavior, improve space domain awareness, and increase resilience are all necessary, but insufficient at deterring our potential adversaries from attacking our space capabilities.”
The report warned that additional debris in space could produce a cascading series of collisions of satellites in low-Earth orbit known as the Kessler syndrome, named after astrophysicist Donald J. Kessler. A Chinese anti-satellite (ASAT) missile test in 2007 created a huge field of high-speed orbiting debris that threatens spacecraft, as did a more recent Russian ASAT test.
Last year, the Biden administration announced a unilateral imposition moratorium on ASAT missile tests that can cause space debris. China and Russia have refused to impose similar moratoriums.
“China and Russia have a history of rejecting the West’s call for space norms and limits while putting forward their own selfserving versions,” the report said.
Despite the growth of Chinese and Russian space arsenals, the 4-year-old U.S. Space Force has just one known weapon: an electronic jammer called the Counter Communications System. The jammer can interrupt some Chinese military systems, the report said.
China has built an array of offensive space weapons that include ground-launched missiles capable of hitting U.S. satellites in all orbits, satellites with robotic arms that can maneuver and crush satellites, lasers and jammers that can disrupt or damage satellites, and advanced cyberweapons capable of targeting satellites and their ground links.
The report notes that the Space Force jammer “alone will not effectively protect U.S. space capabilities, nor does it have the capacity to hold the increasing number of Chinese space capabilities at risk. Responsible counterspace campaigning will require more.”
A Space Force spokeswoman declined to comment on the report.
“But,” she said, “I’d like to emphasize that weapon systems, for the Space Force and other services, are not inherently offensive or defensive. While the Space Force prefers that space remain free of conflict, we’re committed to protecting U.S. space capabilities and defending the joint force from space-enabled attack.”
Gen. B. Chance Saltzman, chief of operations, told Congress in April that the Space Force plans to deploy a “substantial” military counterspace system by 2026.
The Mitchell Institute report said a single counterspace weapon will not be enough to address “the scope and magnitude of threats and potential targets that are now confronting the Space Force.”
In the opening days of their 2022 invasion of Ukraine, Russian forces used cyberspace and radio frequency attacks to block Ukraine from accessing satellite communications and GPS navigation.
China’s kinetic and non-kinetic space weapons were developed after 2001. While the Pentagon was focused for nearly two decades on the war on terrorism, the Chinese People’s Liberation Army deployed multiple offensive weapons targeting U.S. and allied satellites.
“These fielded weapons include ground-based electronic warfare, directed energy, and kinetic [anti-satellite] missile systems,” the report said. “They also demonstrated technologies related to on-orbit counterspace weapons.”
China has a different view of space warfare deterrence that includes, at a later stage of a crisis, “an over-awing space strike.” The attack could involve simultaneous attacks on multiple U.S. space systems with several types of weapons.
Chinese space arms include satellites equipped with powerful lasers or microwave guns that can disrupt satellites. Also a concern is the PLA’s orbiting hypersonic missile, known as a fractional orbital bombardment system, that can destroy ground targets. The system was tested two years ago.
“By attacking critical U.S. space systems, China could reduce the American military’s overall ability to see, communicate, navigate, project power and command and control its forces,” the report said. “The net result would be American soldiers, sailors, airmen, Marines, and Guardians at increased risk from attack and unable to prevent China from achieving its objectives.”
Chinese space attacks eliminating missile warning satellites and position, navigation and timing satellites would “have devastating, potentially decisive consequences for U.S. military operations,” the report said.
An even more powerful threat would unfold if China attacks the entire GPS constellation, the report said.
Destroying the GPS system would make military operations more difficult and damage a global economy reliant on GPS for the power grids, global banking networks and communications lines that enable the local, regional and international transit of goods.
Col. Galbreath, author of the study, said the United States must act quickly to develop and deploy counterspace systems.
“A U.S. failure to field counterspace capabilities will erode our deterrent posture and place our military at increased risk,” he said. “The United States did not want to be in this position, but the actions of Russia and China have led us to this reality and we must be prepared to respond.
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second
Don’t blow up Space Force’s reliability standards
Keeping National Security Space Launch program on schedule is crucial
By Nick Lampson
While promoting contractor inclusivity and competition is paramount, becoming all encompassing to the point of risking national security is not.
Unfortunately, by attempting to override the Space Force’s space procurement reliability standards, that is the position that some members of the Senate Armed Services Committee may risk putting the United States in, and the clock is ticking for Congress to rectify the committee’s mistakes.
The Space Force recognizes the need for contractor competition.
That’s why, when it released its February draft solicitation for bids for the National Security Space Launch program — the most important government program for fending off America’s adversaries in space — it opened a new section of the program for all space companies (even the one that can’t reach the nine reference orbits the Air Force Space and Missile Systems Center deems critical) to compete for federal contracts.
The only thing it didn’t do was open the door for these newer contractors that can’t yet meet those Air Force efficiency and operational benchmarks to service high-risk missions.
But that’s what some Senate Armed Services Committee members want it to do, and they haven’t shied away from making their position known.
After arguing with the government’s space experts over this issue in a May committee hearing, they wedged language into the National Defense Authorization Agreement at the end of June that would open bidding for highrisk missions to these higher-risk contractors — and the full Congress will consider passing that very bill any day now.
I have long been a strong proponent of increasing competition in the American space industry. I aggressively supported the bill that effectively stopped the government monopoly on space launches and created the modern era of private spaceflight competition. Our work in Congress led to nascent companies rising from scrappy upstarts to marquee companies.
That said, there is a time and a place for allowing new competitors to compete. In this case, some of the companies that would benefit from the Senate Armed Services Committee’s procurement change haven’t even completed their launch systems after years of delays, so no one knows how reliable they’ll be. America’s space and defense leaders have been clear: China is inching in on the United States’ space dominance. As such, any delays to the NSSL can lead to significant geopolitical issues for the U.S. in the years and decades to come. Lt. Gen. Nina M. Armagno, director of staff for the U.S. Space Force, recently warned that China’s “pacing threat” is accelerating and “continues to mature rapidly.” She cautioned that China “could catch up and surpass us, absolutely” because “the progress they’ve made has been stunning, stunningly fast.” The U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission has noted that “China is pursuing a broad and robust array of counterspace capabilities, which includes direct-ascent antisatellite missiles, co-orbital anti-satellite systems, computer network operations, ground-based satellite jammers, and directed energy weapons.”
For these reasons and more, the Space Force recognizes that keeping the NSSL on schedule is critically important. Congress should too.
Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall is right: The Space Force’s NSSL proposal “balanced a lot of competing things very well” — “[allowing] us to bring new entrants in fairly fluidly” while also “[giving] us assured access for the higher risk missions.”
The legislative branch shouldn’t tip the scales of this balance. It should listen to America’s defense leaders and safeguard America’s space program from China and other rogue actors.
Nick Lampson is a former Democratic con-gressman from Texas who served as ranking member of the House Space and Aeronautics Subcommittee
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https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2023/07/chinas-commercial-space-ventures-pose-variety-threats-dod-officials-say/388178/
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https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2023/08/next-big-space-business-satellite-pictures-other-satellites/389362/
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The Space Force needs a brand-new culture of its own
It doesn’t do organized violence—and shouldn’t pretend that it does.
Paula Thornhill
BY PAULA THORNHILL
ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR, JHU SAIS
SEPTEMBER 5, 2023 09:20 PM ET
COMMENTARY
SPACE FORCE
PERSONNEL
AIR FORCE
The nearly-four-year-old Space Force has taken pains to emphasize its uniqueness as a military service, especially vis-à-vis the Air Force. Leaders have introduced new uniforms, organizational structure, fitness test, enlisted ranks, basic training, and professional military education. However, these initiatives are not meaningfully connected to a deeper, organizational culture. Such efforts will succeed only when Space Force leaders understand they are responsible for a new, different type of national security organization—not a military service. The Space Force needs an organizational culture that reflects this reality.
A military service masters, manages, and employs organized violence on behalf of its nation against other political units. Service cultures are shaped by this relationship to organized violence. The Space Force supports these services and the warfighting combatant commands, and plays a critical role in today’s military operations. However, people do not (yet) fight and die in or from space. Without a direct link to organized violence, encouraging a warfighting culture in the Space Force creates a profound disconnect between the rhetoric and day-to-day operations. Most importantly, forcing a warfighting culture on the Space Force restricts its ability to grow into a unique organization with its own vibrant culture.
If not organized violence, what then are the defining characteristics of the Space Force, and how can understanding these characteristics help to shape its culture?
A systematic review of 132 articles appearing in five defense publications reveals that the Space Force narrative is dominated by its multi-dimensional relationship to industry. Over one-third of the articles focused on this relationship, though a range of topics that included speeding up space launch, improving the kill chain, using commercial space, and building out the space architecture. Conversely, articles devoted to space operations, including efforts to achieve tactically responsive space (which also has an industry-heavy component) numbered in the single digits. Interestingly, fitness testing and prospects for a Space National Guard garnered as much attention as space operations.
Even recognizing a possible bias for industry issues in these publications, their striking focus on new technologies, industry, programs, contracts, and contracting suggests such areas are fundamental to the Space Force’s purpose and hence cultural core. Thus, rather than try to impose an ill-fitting warfighting culture on the Space Force, its leaders should embrace this unique relationship to technology and industry by creating a culture to match. Here are seven ideas that suggest what this might entail.
First, leaders should emphasize recruiting and retaining an elite, STEM-focused workforce by hiring personnel with accredited, demanding STEM undergraduate and graduate degrees. Hiring practices could include a practicum to demonstrate an aptitude for understanding and solving technical, quantitative problems. Such a workforce would foster more substantive discussions with industry about various technologies and what it would take to operationalize them. It would encourage adaptation and innovation in using space for military purposes as technology continues to advance. This, in turn, would also encourage lifelong learning in the STEM disciplines. Professional relevance would require Guardians to stay abreast of scientific and technological developments in their disciplines. Such expertise would even help from a contract management perspective, by allowing Guardians to bring their expertise to contract oversight.
Second, reconsider who qualifies as a Guardian. If STEM expertise underpins the Space Force workforce, then civilians, who already make up 35 percent of the force, could conceivably fill even more of the ranks. Preparing them for their duties would require considerable training but of a different sort. Everything from the purpose of basic training to fitness testing to base inspections to the role of command would need reevaluation. Do these help execute the mission? Or are they attempts to compel the Space Force to adopt incompatible vestiges of the military services?
Third, Space Force leaders should continue to explore a longer-term approach to assigning personnel. Rather than subjecting Guardians to a more traditional move, or PCS, cycle, consider how teams are assigned to major space projects such as the Mars Rover or the James Webb Telescope. This would build deeper technical expertise, foster team esprit, and encourage the development of integrated problem-solving skills. Such an approach could contribute to building a strong cultural identity while providing personal stability for Guardians.
Fourth, leadership should embrace the Space Force’s relatively small size, using it to build a reputation as an independent elite organization only the best can join. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, or DARPA, an agency of only 220 employees, has long enjoyed such a reputation within DOD, as have the national labs affiliated with some of the nation’s top universities. Space Force could then concentrate on its core mission and sidestep competing with the military services within the Pentagon bureaucracy.
Fifth, Space Force leaders should create a “uniform,” even khakis and a polo shirt, that all its personnel can wear. Government civilians and contractors are so fundamental to the Space Force’s operations that, arguably, civilians rather than uniformed Guardians possess greater credibility when dealing with everything from space acquisition to operations. Better for all to build a single team across the spectrum of uniformed and government-civilian personnel and contractors. The Army Futures Command has already adopted such an approach, eschewing uniforms in an effort to remove barriers within the command and when dealing with civilian companies.
Sixth, make learning about war and the military services important, but not core, to the Space Force’s role. Guardians must help the military innovate and adapt to the changing character of war, and they need to understand the services they support. But building and retaining currency in their technical areas must come first. They need to use their technical expertise to help identify and address large national problems in peace and war.
Finally, leaders need to articulate what the Space Force uniquely does. This delineation must address not only the overlapping roles among the multiple space organizations within DOD but how the Space Force fits into the broader, more complex government, private-industry space ecosystem. Until this is accomplished, the Space Force will continue to battle a powerful, mostly unspoken four-part narrative: First, politicians created the Space Force for political reasons, rather than to address a large national problem; second, these circumstances produced an organization confused about its purpose; yet, third, now that the organization exists, it jealously protects perceived prerogatives; and fourth, no one wants to discuss the narrative, especially with the Space Force, because of the huge contracts it controls. It is an unfortunate narrative, but leadership must confront it directly or it will insinuate its way into the organization’s culture.
Being a small, elite, technically unrivaled organization offers the best way to challenge this narrative and create a powerful new one. Only by embarking on this unchartered course can the Space Force fulfill its full potential as a crucial guardian force released from direct responsibility for wielding organized violence yet absolutely essential to providing for the nation’s security
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https://www.theepochtimes.com/us/us-space-command-reaches-full-operational-capability-5548326?utm_source=News&src_src=News&utm_campaign=breaking-2023-12-17-2&src_cmp=breaking-2023-12-17-2&utm_medium=email&est=%2F3lTstx4nDliruapKc3jgaFz8OIrk7LaFKhXGyZQtvdSrlS2vbetiTDUDQmXwZoGLpWf
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https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2024/jan/4/china-space-warfare-includes-cyberattacks-jamming-/
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Trump was right to establish the Space Force:
I agree with the deeper point of this editorial, but would like to have seen more acknowledgment of Turner and the White House's play about getting money for Ukraine.
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America’s Space War Vulnerability
Maybe Mike Turner’s national-security threat warning will awaken a complacent Washington, D.C.
By The Editorial Board
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Turner created a stir in Washington this week when he warned of a new security threat, and credit the Ohio Republican for doing a public service. America is sleepwalking into a new age of military and homeland vulnerability, and political leaders need to tell the public the uncomfortable truth.
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Biden Administration leaks to the press say the threat concerns a Russian program that would target U.S. satellites, perhaps with a nuclear explosion. Satellites are vital to nearly every aspect of modern American life and commerce, as well as national defense. Destroying those would send the U.S. into a communications blackout with untold damage.
Other leaders were quick to downplay or dismiss the threat, saying it’s not imminent and there’s no need to start building a shelter or laying in the canned goods. House Speaker Mike Johnson said “we just want to assure everyone: Steady hands are at the wheel, we’re working on it, and there’s no need for alarm.” Whose steady hands is he talking about—81-year-old President Biden’s, or those in the currently dysfunctional House?
Some GOP critics say Mr. Turner is sounding an alarm about Russia to drum up more support in Congress to pass the weapons package for Ukraine. But the Russian threat Mr. Turner cites either exists or it doesn’t. He asked President Biden to declassify information on the threat so the public can judge for itself, and that’s a good idea. That would be more reassuring than relying on those who told us that the Afghan government wouldn’t fall if the U.S. withdrew its troops from the country.
All the more so because the military threat in space is real and growing. Russia and China are working hard to develop space weapons. A Pentagon official told Congress last year that “Russia has fielded several ground-based lasers that can blind satellite sensors and has a wide range of ground-based electronic warfare systems that can counter the Global Positioning System,” satellite communications, radars, and space-enabled weapons guidance.
China “has already fielded ground-based counterspace weapons, including electronic warfare systems, directed energy weapons, and direct-ascent (DA) anti-satellite (ASAT) missiles designed to disrupt, damage, and destroy U.S. satellites,” the same Pentagon official told Congress last year.
Nina Armagno, a U.S. Space Force official, told a Sydney conference in 2022 that “the progress they’ve made has been stunning, stunningly fast.”
That sounds as if an alarm is justified, yet the Biden Administration thinks this can all be handled with U.S. restraint and arms control. In 2022 Vice President Kamala Harris announced a unilateral U.S. anti-satellite test ban, if you can believe it.
“The United States seeks to establish this as a new international norm for responsible behavior in space,” the White House said in a fact sheet. This seems to have worked as well as President Biden’s effort to deter Vladimir Putin from invading Ukraine.
The unhappy reality is that U.S. satellites are large and vulnerable to attack. Military officials have known this for some time, and their strategy is dispersal and hardening. Details are classified, but in general terms this means relying on more and smaller satellites and making each one better able to withstand an enemy’s anti-satellite lasers or blast weapons.
This takes money, and the Senate’s fiscal 2024 defense spending bill increases space investments by 9%. The bill funds 15 national-security space launches this year, five more than in 2023, plus money for a variety of space monitoring and satellite protection purposes. If Congress fails to pass the bill and instead lapses into a continuing resolution, the Space Force would lose $2.8 billion in spending. That’s nearly a tenth of its budget.
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Space has already become the next theater for military competition—the new battlefield “high ground,” as strategists have long predicted. The only question is whether the U.S. is going to cede dominance in space to our adversaries, or treat it like we would any other military theater. The risks of space vulnerability are worse than losing a land battle because the U.S. homeland is threatened.
Political complacency about space war is part of a larger refusal by American elites to educate the public about U.S. vulnerability to new military technologies. The liberal internationalists in the Biden Administration don’t want to highlight growing threats on their watch—and in any case think they can be meliorated with treaties. The GOP’s isolationist wing wants to spend less on defense and cede global spheres of influence to Russia, China and Iran.
Thanks to Mike Turner for trying to wake up the sleepwalkers.
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https://simplicius76.substack.com/p/planetary-scare-russian-doomsday?publication_id=1351274&post_id=141657380&isFreemail=true&r=379fkp
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March 8, 2024
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The Risks of a New Space Race
Could a potential weapon in space cause a major shakeup to U.S. policy?
By: Ronan Wordsworth
Alarm bells rang out in the United States when Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee Michael Turner went public about the threat of Russia deploying a space-based weapon – presumably a nuclear one – and asked President Joe Biden to declassify information about the threat. The idea of an imminent Russian attack is far-fetched, but the due diligence about long-term threats isn’t without merit. For decades, the U.S. has commanded the geopolitical aspects of outer space because it has by far the most developed network of satellites, essential for a multitude of military applications including surveillance, communications, targeting, early warning systems and detailed intelligence gathering. This is to say nothing of the role its satellites play in the commercial sector, covering bank transactions, GPS systems, communications, the internet and weather monitoring. And though these satellites have been crucial for Washington’s military supremacy, they are inherently vulnerable to destruction.
The Outer Space Treaty of 1967, which was adopted as the space race was gaining speed, banned the use of weapons of mass destruction in space, which would pose an existential threat to any nation. A space-based weapon able to destroy satellites and inflict large-scale damage on the territory of their owners would fundamentally alter geopolitical balances of power. It could, for example, negate America’s existing technological advantages by disabling reconnaissance, targeting systems and communications, and bring its economy to its knees. This is why there was such a strong reaction from Washington following the announcement that U.S. intelligence believed Russia was developing such a weapon.
What that weapon could be is unclear. Space weapons could largely be divided into three categories – Earth-to-space weapons, space-to-Earth weapons and space-to-space weapons. It is widely understood that though technically feasible, no country has risked either the condemnation or the investment to deploy the latter two types of space-based weapons.
So far, the systems that have been developed and tested have all been Earth-based direct ascent anti-satellite (ASAT) weapons. China, India and Russia have all demonstrated their capabilities with these systems by hitting their own satellites in orbit. The tests attracted their share of criticism, not least because they left debris that will remain in orbit for decades. Each debris cloud poses substantial risks to other satellites and potential future space missions. Perhaps the biggest concern is the possibility of a chain reaction: If debris hits one satellite, it will create more debris, increasing the likelihood of future collisions to a point where bands of orbital space would be unusable for decades. Following Russia’s test in 2021, the U.S. signed a self-imposed ASAT test ban, and 155 members of the United Nations adopted a similar measure. (Russia, India and China did not.)
Successful Direct Ascent ASAT Missile Tests
(click to enlarge)
According to reports, Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the development of a new “space weapon” capable of eliminating multiple satellites at once after growing frustrated with the level of resistance his forces were encountering in Ukraine. Using intelligence and targeting information collected from U.S. and British networks of orbital satellites, Kyiv has frequently anticipated Russian assaults and has struck Russian assets well behind the frontline. Moscow already has dual-use systems in orbit that could disrupt U.S. and British satellites, including jamming devices, directional lasers and kinetic systems for debris clearing. However, none of these can inflict sudden, wide-scale damage like a nuclear weapon can.
Since the House Intelligence chair sounded the alarm about the potential weapon, U.S. administration officials have backed up the intelligence while noting that the threat remains theoretical. Still, many U.S. government and military officials believe the U.S. space program is not prepared for such a threat. If Russia or another hostile state managed to put a nuclear ASAT weapon in space, it could threaten U.S. plans to shift from large, single-purpose satellites toward clouds of smaller, cheaper satellites that can act in unison. Washington’s plans are intended to better protect its satellite network from attack while capitalizing on the recent dramatic fall in launch costs, but a space-based nuclear weapon would revolutionize space warfare. In addition, the proliferation of objects in low-Earth orbit creates the risk that a significant attack using ASAT weapons could produce an almost impenetrable field of debris around the planet. In one worst-case scenario, a state in possession of a space-to-space weapon of mass destruction could annihilate its adversaries’ satellites and cement itself as the dominant military actor in space for generations.
Therefore, Washington’s first objective is to deter Moscow from deploying such a weapon in the first place, using diplomatic and military pressure. The U.S. will argue for the preservation of existing norms that have prevented any state from deploying nuclear weapons outside of Earth’s atmosphere. If this fails, the U.S. would be forced to decide whether to develop its own space-based nuclear weapon, which would sound the starting gun on a nuclear arms race in space.
The U.S. and its allies hoped that self-imposed bans on ASAT weapons testing would pressure other countries to follow suit and limit the weaponization of space. However, Russia and China have already demonstrated their ASAT capabilities, and they will be loath to give them up. Whether Russia or another state will go a step further and develop a nuclear ASAT capability is a different question, but the existing international framework based on the Outer Space Treaty looks more fragile than ever. This will force the U.S. to rethink whether safety in numbers is the optimal strategy to maintain its advantage in space, which translates into its military dominance on Earth.
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https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/elon-musk-on-war-footing-with-spy-satellite-army-that-targets-any-enemy/ar-BB1kKDaG?ocid=msedgntp&pc=HCTS&cvid=315d3d9635aa4b729984df65cf211075&ei=51
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April 2, 2024
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Geopolitics and the Moon
By: George Friedman
The moon will soon totally eclipse the sun – an event rare enough to be measured in centuries. This is a suitable occasion, then, to think about the moon, Earth and humanity. But I also have a more prosaic reason to do so: I am in the process of writing a book on the geopolitics of the moon, so the eclipse has given me an excuse to flesh out some early thoughts. (I assure you that, psychologically, writing for immediate public consumption is dramatically different from endlessly sawing away for the future.)
The primary issue at stake is the relationship of the moon to Earth. Indeed, the moon is intimately connected to Earth. Long ago, a planet roughly the size of Mars brushed by Earth, tore a large chunk of our planet away and placed it in orbit around Earth – or so the dominant theory goes. Though this seems cosmically unlikely, people who know about such things insist that it is true and that it undoubtedly affected the shape of Earth, its climate and perhaps even global agriculture.
The most striking theory is that the moon is filled with valuable minerals on which much of Earth’s economy is built. If it indeed struck Earth many years ago, it must be assumed that a substantial amount of Earth’s mineral structure was torn away with it. If this is true, the moon must be a mineral-rich planet and thus a foundation of wealth. It is known that the moon has substantial amounts of water, for the most part frozen, as well as the ability to capture enormous amounts of energy, radiated by the sun, that could drive industry on the moon and a great deal of Earth’s energy, assuming it is retransmitted to Earth.
The moon is also an excellent place from which to influence or even dominate Earth. It could become a military base from which a hostile enemy could bombard Earth with solar power or boulders procured from the surface of the moon. Equally important, it is an excellent defensive point with offensive weapons hidden beneath its crust, able to withstand attacks – even nuclear attacks – by digging into its surface. Rather than a vast wasteland, a well-defended lunar base would be able to intersect attacks in the Earth-moon area of space and protect mining and industrial installations.
This is a primitive sketch of the significance of the moon. Much must still be learned. But the interest, especially the interest of the United States, is there. In fact, Washington will launch a series of manned missions ultimately designed to establish a base that might stand for a substantial amount of time.
“He who controls Eastern Europe controls the world” has long been a common refrain in the history of geopolitics. I am not sure how true this is, but it sounds definitive. I take much more seriously the principle that, “He who controls the moon controls Earth.” If, as it is assumed, the moon has the resources needed to sustain a long-term presence, energy to control near space and weapons with which to defend it, the proposition makes some sense. After all, the moon is the ultimate high ground, providing clear vision to detect attacks and material that might attract Earth-based powers to seek an alliance with the moon – assuming the proposition that humans might live on the moon merely to become wealthy. There are obvious and not-so-obvious reasons why this might not work, but it should be remembered that Europeans went to South America seeking gold, silver and all the rest. Given current technologies, the relative distance between Portugal and Brazil and between the moon and Portugal is not wildly different. The voyage to the moon may even seem less daunting.
Humans pursue wealth and will use military power to attain it. The history of the world is the history of movement and the struggle for wealth. It seems to me that, if the value many assume the moon possesses comes to fruition, geopolitics might continue to govern in a new game.
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(7) U.S. SPACE INFRASTRUCTURE REMAINS VULNERABLE: The National Security Space Association, a think tank associated with the Space Force, released a report yesterday announcing that the U.S. space infrastructure is vulnerable to adversary Dynamic Space Operations (the terminology for maneuver warfare in space). The Space Force and commercial space sectors are also behind in developing countermeasures due to cost overruns and delays, according to the report.
Think tankers note that several space maneuver capabilities will just begin to be fielded in 2026, but many projects are still only in the planning phase without a prototype.
Why It Matters: Despite previous assurances that U.S. Space Warfare capabilities are beyond the competitor’s capabilities, this report highlights that Russia and China can attack with near impunity. Until the U.S. publicly fields new capabilities, we should assume an absolute vulnerability to Chinese and Russian space warfare. – J.V.
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April 12, 2024
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Rocket Launch Exposes Russia’s Technology Gaps
The space industry is a bellwether of Moscow’s technological development and import substitution efforts.
By: Ekaterina Zolotova
Russia on Thursday successfully test-launched a heavy-lift rocket called the Angara-A5, its first space rocket developed after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Though the Kremlin has touted it as a success, the event was plagued by several setbacks. The launch at the Vostochny Cosmodrome was initially planned for December 2023 but was postponed. It was rescheduled for April 9 but canceled at the last minute. (Officials said there was a failure of the pressurization system of the rocket’s central block oxidizer tank.) It was postponed again the following day, due to technical issues, before the rocket was finally launched on April 11. This case highlights Moscow’s challenges in the face of Western sanctions, especially in technology-heavy sectors such as the space industry.
For Moscow, the space industry is critical not only in maintaining Russia’s status as a space power but also in ensuring the continued progress of its defense and tech sectors. Space technologies are key to guaranteeing the security of communications, the internet and global navigation systems, which have both civilian and military purposes. Since the Soviet era, the West has repeatedly tried to impede Russian advancements in these technologies. For example, restrictions were imposed in the 1990s when Russian rockets entered commercial markets, and after 2014, when Russia annexed Crimea. On Feb. 24, 2022, the first day of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, the U.S. restricted the sale of certain advanced technologies to Russia, which led to supply shortages, the cancellation of launches and the suspension of scientific programs.
Russian Rocket Launches, 2018-2024
(click to enlarge)
Since the sanctions came into effect, the space industry has become a bellwether of Russia’s technological development and import substitution efforts, not only in space but also in related industries, from mining to manufacturing to transportation. The Kremlin believes successful rocket launches can demonstrate that, despite sanctions, Russia can develop new technologies and maintain its space program while also continuing to supply its military campaign in Ukraine and stimulate its economy.
The Kremlin doesn’t have much choice but to develop more advanced technologies that can aid its war effort and ensure internet accessibility for all regions of the country. The Soviet-era Proton-M rocket, which Angara-A5 was designed to replace, will be in operation until only 2025. Angara-A5 has several key advantages over its potential predecessor, including that it is kerosene-based and does not use toxic fuel components. It’s also produced with only Russian components and can be launched from Russian cosmodromes, unlike Proton-M, which is launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome, a Russian-operated spaceport in Kazakhstan. Russia doesn’t want to rely on a foreign country to conduct its space operations, especially considering that Kazakhstan has recently emphasized its neutrality, fearing it could be hit by secondary sanctions if it’s seen by the West as helping Russia’s war effort.
This week’s test-launch was the first for this particular rocket at the Vostochny Cosmodrome in Russia’s Far East region. Previous launches took place at the Plesetsk Cosmodrome in the northwestern Arkhangelsk region in 2014, 2020 and 2021. They were moved to Vostochny for financial and safety reasons. According to the Kremlin, Vostochny will also enable the country to conduct more frequent launches on its own terms, without having to rely on a foreign facility.
Russian Launches at Cosmodromes, 2023-2024
(click to enlarge)
In addition to Angara-A5, Russia hopes to produce completely domestically operated communication satellites by 2026, after foreign companies stopped providing satellite services. However, Moscow’s space industry has suffered many stumbling blocks due to continued reliance on foreign technologies and components, despite its attempts to ramp up domestic manufacturing and innovation. The company that produces engines for the Angara family of rockets indicated that it had to find Russian analogues, or at least analogues from friendly countries, of parts needed to manufacture the engines in order to fulfill the order. Russia is also still dependent on imported microelectronic components, which has especially affected the space program. Development of Russia’s Glonass navigation system has also stalled due to reliance on foreign-made parts. (The satellite uses 6,000 types of imported electronic components.) In 2023, Russian imports of communication base stations and their components increased by 15 percent. These parts are produced mainly by foreign tech firms Huawei, Ericsson and Nokia and supplied most likely through Russia’s parallel imports program rather than direct contracts, meaning they are likely purchased at retail and at higher prices than in the past.
Clearly, there are many gaps in Moscow’s import substitution scheme due to a lack of personnel, equipment and modern technology. In the energy sector, Russia remains almost completely dependent on foreign sources of catalysts, used in the production of various fuels, including the kerosene used by Angara rockets. Cutting off supplies from abroad completely would have a ripple effect, potentially closing production in sectors from automotive to food. In 2024, under Moscow’s Action Plan for Import Substitution in the Oil and Gas Engineering Industry, Russia aims to increase self-sufficiency in the geological exploration, geophysical equipment and seismic equipment category to only 40 percent; metal-cutting machines to 33 percent; pumps to 55 percent; equipment and materials for drilling, cementing wells and overhaul of wells to 45 percent; and reactors and coke chambers to 55 percent. Sanctions have also caused delays in repairing oil refineries – which forced the fourth-largest refinery in the country to reduce gasoline production by 40 percent. Adding to these deficiencies, production facilities are now also concerned about Ukrainian drone attacks, which have become more frequent since the start of this year. These strikes have targeted oil refineries, which have already reduced output by about 10 percent, and plants focused on the domestic market.
Russia’s space industry is managing other long-term problems, such as corruption and brain drain. A shortage of engineering and scientific expertise creates risks for the quality of services and reliability of the satellite fleet. Moreover, developing expensive advanced technologies requires substantial funds, which could attract corruption. In 2019, Russia’s prosecutor general said more than 1.6 billion rubles ($17 million) to modernize the country’s production base and weapons industry were stolen from state-owned firms Roscosmos and Rostec.
It seems that Moscow realizes now that its transition to import substitution will be slow, complicated by structural problems and complexities arising from sanctions and geopolitical disruptions. But time is running out, especially when it comes to critical industries like space. The lack of funds and increasing difficulty in implementing the parallel imports scheme add to the roadblocks, and as deadlines approach, the Kremlin will seek more external funding and cooperation from its remaining international partners. In the meantime, it will tout its few successes – including the Angara-A5 test launch – to distract from its failures.