IHI Aerospace’s Post

A prescient post from Fred Kennedy. Unfortunately, we are seeing our adversaries inside the US OODA loop too often -- from deployment of capabilities to on-orbit operations across the kill chain (including Space Domain Awareness (SDA -- not to be confused with Space Development Agency!), analysis and assessment, COA selection and execution). The DoD continues to accept a level of awareness in the space domain -- lacking in accuracy, latency, capacity, etc. -- that would be unacceptable in other military domains; their legacy capability is deemed to be good enough simply by virtue of being available, when they should be moving to meet operational needs by adopting best of breed commercial capabilities. Commercial can help with TRL-9 decision quality SDA capabilities for all orbit regimes. The DoD Commercial Integration Strategy and USSF Commercial Space Strategy are steps in the right direction, but the pace needs to accelerate. Commercial stands ready to partner with DoD now to move at speed of relevance / speed of threat.

From today's New York Times (with a nod to Scott Sadler): “We’re not acquiring the counterspace capabilities at the pace we need to fight and win in space,” Representative Mike Rogers, Republican of Alabama and the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said at an Air Force budget hearing last month. No, we're not. We're moving far too slowly. Our objective ought to be to get inside our potential adversaries' decision (i.e., OODA) loops, rapidly orbiting deterrent capability that will give bad actors pause. We founded the Space Development Agency (SDA) on that very premise. But SDA doesn't appear to have been given the remit to go work *this* problem. When we started out, we talked about orbiting a deterrent layer - something that would pay close and detailed attention to everything that was going on in cislunar space and - more importantly - offer a means to reach out and touch what needed reaching out and touching. Let me humbly suggest that SDA deserves a real crack at this problem. Let's see "Semper Citius" applied to the grossly deficient story we're currently (not?) telling around achieving ubiquitous access and effects in the cislunar regime. Let's get a few tranches up and flying to help address what Chairman Rogers is so concerned about. There's no reason why we can't do that. We've got the industry base and the smarts. Lt Gen (ret.) John Shaw noted in this same article '...that directed-energy devices based on the ground or in space would probably be a part of any future system. "It does minimize debris; it works at the speed of light,” he said. “Those are probably going to be the tools of choice to achieve our objective."' Right on. And by the way, there's absolutely no reason to be coy about any of this. That's what deterrence is all about. We just need to go get it done and deployed. And show our adversaries just how serious we are.

Interesting how this is becoming a reality now.

What would you do with no phone, no GPS, no internet, no television? For some, I think that would be a blessing. 😂 Most in the space industry already understand that with each launch from space capable nations, the landscape in space becomes more complex. This article highlights some very important points about the future of warfare as it begins to delve into the space domain and some of it, is just downright disturbing to think about. For instance, John Plumb is quoted in the article as stating, “Russian plans for a space-based nuclear device would threaten the standing the U.S. has carved out in low-Earth orbit, both for a growing commercial sector and military assets. Detonating such a weapon could inflict damage to satellites already deployed and render orbits near Earth as unusable for a year or more” The further that space capable nations progress, the more there becomes a clear need for redundancy in critical systems that we depend on for everyday life. I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again, the future is exciting, but man, it’s going to be dangerous as hell out there. What are your thoughts? #geopolitics #space #spaceweapons #defensestrategy #defense #satellites #spacewarfare #technology #future #innovation #military

Last week, the Space Entanglement and Annealing QUantum Experiment (SEAQUE) team was at Aegis Aerospace’s Payload Operation Control Center (POCC). The SEAQUE team was at the POCC for two days as they got their experiment commissioned before Thanksgiving break. The SEAQUE experiment aims to successfully allow quantum-level communication in space with the use of entanglement. https://lnkd.in/gCCaiMNj

Interesting stuff regarding space intercepts and the Fractional Orbital Bombardment System. "China Aerospace Studies Institute 12 was launched to the GEO belt in 2021, composed of not one, but two inspector satellites, which engaged in evasive maneuvers when a US inspector satellite approached: “the Chinese inspection satellites took off in opposite directions with Shiyan-12-02 moving into position to get a sunlit view of the US surveillance satellite.”24 Such close maneuvers between spacecraft in a non-cooperative manner could be interpreted as hostile engagement of like-for-like capabilities in space. As more state and commercial operators deploy servicing capabilities in orbit, these encounters and interactions are likely to become more common and establishing norms and rules-of-the-road for such encounters is becoming increasingly urgent." & "Experts at DARPA, the Pentagon’s advanced research agency, remain unsure how China managed to fire countermeasures from a vehicle travelling at hypersonic speeds. … Military experts have been poring over data related to the test to understand how China mastered the technology. They are also debating the purpose of the projectile, which was fired by the hypersonic vehicle with no obvious target of its own, before plunging into the water."

Space is critical to national defense. At Impulse Space, we are closely monitoring the evolving space defense landscape as global advancements accelerate. Building an agile, tactically responsive space defense ecosystem is critical to mitigating advancements by potentially subversive actors. Impulse Space was founded to accelerate in-space mobility through our advances in propulsion. When looking ahead to the challenge of securing the nation's defense through space, space responsiveness must be on-demand and able to operationalize quickly in orbit. https://lnkd.in/gGt54NyS

The Militarization of Space: Understanding the US Space Force The idea of militarization in outer space has often been depicted in science fiction as battles among the stars with advanced interstellar weaponry. However, the reality, at least for now, is far more grounded. #Astronomy #Exploration #MilitarizationofSpace #Nasa #space #spaceexploration #spaceforce #SpaceTravel #Spaceart #Spaceexploration #spacex #Universe

(90 second read) Lot’s of birthday wishes to the Space Force are probably in your news feed… but, what does it mean for the nation to have had a separate military service focused on space? Five facts… 1. This year, America became aware of Russia’s desire to place a nuclear weapon in space. That is the manifestation of Space Force Intelligence and our National IC partners working daily to “avoid operational surprise”. That type of predictive intelligence just doesn’t happen, it happens because professionals are focused on the right priorities. 2. We now have over two dozen new satellites using the most advanced technology in orbit that only 3 years ago were a new contract requirement on paper. Three years is “faster” in space acquisition. This new Proliferated Warfighting Space Architecture from Space Development Agency complicates Russian and CCP targeting approaches against key military capabilities. In the next three years, this group of capabitiles will proliferate into “many hundreds” of satellites… this is key to warfighting resilencies. This will provide missile warning, missile tracking, global Link-16, secure comms, and more. Great technology, but even better military strategy. 3. Space Force demonstrated “warehouse to orbit” in 5 days for rapid launch. In fact, we supported America’s most successful launch year to space… the space ports of the future are really our space ports of today…. There is more to come. The ability to reconstitute is critical to resilency. 4. But the rapid expansion of CCP/PLA assets in space continues… with over 1000+ PRC satellites in space and over half of those being for remote sensing. This adversary capability must be force planned against. America’s ability to project power MUST be assured to ensure freedoms in all domains. Space Force has worked diligently inside the DoD to reform policy, educate leadership, and make the case for rapid real change. More must be done. 5. Fact number five is most important in DC. We have grown budget, its doubled since our inception, but it remains inadequate when compared to the pacing challenge. The CCP increases PLA funding by ~7% annually on average. Military advantage and net assessment isn’t just about what you do; it is about overmatch against a growing more capaible adversary. Space Force, thank you for your first 5 years of efforts. There remains much to do. Semper Supra…