Space Threats to be Reviewed

NASA estimates there were over 27,000 pieces of space debris circling the planet 15 months ago. Last November Russia added another 1,500 pieces to that count when it used a missile test to destroy one of its Soviet era, non-working satellites. As the amount of debris continues to climb so does the threat to safety in space and the possibility of war from novel space weapons. Next week Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin will host a classified meeting to consider the implications of Russia and China’s pursuit of advanced space weapons. The public announcement of this discussion comes after two key events last year: the destruction of the defunct Russian satellite and the historic first with China’s testing of an advanced hypersonic glide vehicle and fractional orbital bombardment system, according to Joe Gould of Defense News. Admiral Charles Richard, chief of US Strategic Command, admitted such a test was “never before seen in the world.” “Richard, speaking at the Space and Missile Defense Symposium earlier this month, said the military must now overhaul its missile defenses and develop systems to better warn against launches aimed at the US.”

The Secretary will meet with his Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks, Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Colin Kahl and the Defense Policy Board, which is comprised of former national security officials. Assistant Secretary of Defense for Space Policy John Plumb will brief the board on the Pentagon’s upcoming space strategic review. Putin’s war in Ukraine has not slowed Russia’s aggressive space policy. DOD is planning to examine potential responses to Moscow’s ground-to-space weapons program and how it could impact US defense policy. Military analysts are calling 2022 a “pivotal year” for space security, according to Gould, sue to Russia’s use of counterspace capabilities.

Russia is developing ground electronic warfare and directed energy weapons to counter western on-orbit assets, according to Courtney Albon of Defense News. She points out that the intelligence community’s 2022 Annual Threat Assessment predicts “Russia [will] continue to train its military space elements and field new antisatellite weapons to disrupt and degrade US and allied space capabilities, and it is developing, testing, and fielding an array of nondestructive and destructive counterspace weapons — including jamming and cyberspace capabilities, directed energy weapons, on-orbit capabilities, and ground-based ASAT capabilities — to target US and allied satellites,” according to this year’s assessment. To date, DOD has not release publicly evidence confirming Russia’s capabilities although senior Pentagon officials have confirmed tests took place. “Clearly the Russians and Chinese are trying to develop systems to get around the missile defense systems the U.S. has been developing,” said Kaitlyn Johnson, deputy director of the Aerospace Security Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. She added that “It’s hard to evaluate what that is from the public side of things, what that’s entailed. I imagine that’s what this meeting is about.”

The meeting comes as a surprise to many in the defense community because the US Government is starting to make public its assessment of the potential Russian threat. Secure World Foundation’s Brian Weeden, a former Air Force space operations officer, said he finds it “interesting, because while Russia and China have been worried about the US developing space-to-ground weapons for decades, the US has during the same time resisted any serious discussions or proposals, saying that these are not real threats.” The November 21, 2021 Russian conducted, direct-ascent hit-to-kill anti-satellite (ASAT) test served in part as a wake up call for the defense community. While Russian military leaders claim their test is to restore strategic stability, US Space Command commander Army Gen. James Dickinson at the time said that Russia is “deploying capabilities to actively deny access to and use of space by the United States and its allies.”

He further notes that Russia’s counterspace weapons systems undermines strategic stability, in complete contradiction to the Russian claims. The Arms Control Association adds that “Russian military literature is replete with discussions about how these high-precision aerospace weapons are changing the nature of warfare. Russians argue that, in past wars, the main burden of any confrontation rested on ground forces tasked to breach the enemy’s forward defense and enter the adversary’s territory to occupy it. Future wars, they argue, will not be conducted using the massing of armed troops. Instead, their opening salvo will involve massive air missile strikes at targets throughout the adversary’s territory.” The Pentagon appears to be considering that Putin’s war in Ukraine may be one of the last for traditional Russian ground forces.

Daria Novak served in the U.S. State Dept.

Quick Analysis

NATO’s Growing Challenges

Gen. Christopher Cavoli, supreme allied commander Europe and the head of U.S. European Command has warned of growing threats facing NATO. “There is a lot of work to be done, and there are big challenges looming — some of them are right in our face, right now,” he warned at the Aspen Security Forum. He is not alone in his concern. the Germany-based Friedrich Naumann Foundation for Freedom notes that “The beginning of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine … marked a deep break … Questions concerning Europe‘s self-image as a voluntary alliance of nation states, its ability to defend itself and the protection though NATO as well as the values for which it stands are further tested by refugees coming to Europe from Ukraine. The democracies of the European Union are vulnerable and their reaction to Putin’s war are carefully watched. Authoritarian states, such as China, predict Europe’s decline and emphasize their own superiority over the ‘Western systems.’” The most interesting fact General Cavoli emphasized was that, in addition to the renewed danger from expansionist Russia, is the growing threat from China. The German Marshall Fund describes the problem.. “Russia and China continue to deepen their partnership, mounting a common challenge to the West. They can advance their strategic objectives better together, undermining perceived Western domination of the global order and impacting Europe’s future security. Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine has de facto upended the post-Cold War security architecture in Europe and is a direct, existential threat to European security. Beijing plays an important role for Russia’s war efforts, regardless of China’s status as Europe’s largest trading partner or its desire to hedge on Europe to win its geostrategic competition with the United States. “ NATO has continued to concentrate on the potential threat from Beijing. . It developed its concern against the backdrop of China’s designation as a “long-term strategic competitor.” Both the Trump and Biden administrations have sought to expand transatlantic cooperation on China, motivated by the belief that greater European support to US policies is key to effectively addressing the economic, political and strategic challenges associated with China’s growth. While Washington has put much emphasis on discussing with the EU and individual European countries how best to tackle the geo-economic, technological and diplomatic challenges associated with China’s rise and behaviour, NATO has also become an increasingly important partof transatlantic cooperation on China. Some Chinese military threats to Europe are conventional. China and Russia have engaged in joint maneuvers in the Mediterranean, and the Chinese naval presence in the Middle East has grown. Others are of a different variety. The Atlantic Council says that some Chinese threats to European security are merely insidious. For example, China undermines Europe’s military capabilities by stealing defense-related intellectual property and sharing it with its own military and defense industry as China develops new weapons and capabilities. Similarly, Chinese investment in European infrastructure—especially shipping terminals, utilities, and telecommunications networks—provides an excellent platform for intelligence-gathering on NATO military operations. In a worst-case scenario, China could weaponize its ownership or operation of infrastructure in Europe to frustrate, limit, or prevent US or allied use. In other cases, the Chinese threat to Europe manifests in the form of outright attacks. Chinese cyberattacks on European government, industry, military, academic, and civil institutions—including, reportedly, on hospitals during the pandemic—are relentless and massive. In 2014, NATO declared that cyberattacks could trigger the invocation of Article 5, the Alliance’s mutual-defense clause. Increasingly, the links between Russia, China, and now Iran as well, are a source of deep concern to Europe, the United States, and other nations.