I recently posted excerpts from the House passed National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for FY2019. Passed with significant bipartisan support, the bill calls for:
- The creation of a new “numbered” Air Force unit responsible for space warfighting operations, and
- A new subordinate command, under the U.S. Strategic Command, called the U.S. Space Command.
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Today’s Air Force Space Command
The U.S. Air Force’s Space Command provides “resilient and affordable space and cyberspace capabilities for the Joint Force and the Nation”, quoting their website. The Air Force Space Command’s web page lists two subordinate numbered units:
- 14th Air Force (Vandenberg AFB): “The 14th Air Force is responsible for the organization, training, equipping, command and control, and employment of Air Force space forces to support operational plans and missions for [terrestrial] U.S. combatant commanders and their subordinate components and is the Air Force Component to U.S. Strategic Command for space operations.”
- 24th Air Force (Lackland AFB)-primarily responsible for cybersercurity.
The NDAA would add a third numbered Air Force unit. Rather than having a mission to support terrestrial U.S. combatant commanders, this new unit would appear to be formed to provide extraterrestrial warfighting capability to the new U.S. extraterrestrial combatant command—the U.S. Space Command.
New Air Force space warfighting unit
Beyond a limited anti-ballistic missile capability, the U.S. military lacks an overt space warfighting capability that is known to the public and, hence, serves as a deterrent against attack. Like several other nations, the military has tested space warfighting technologies, such as anti-satellite technologies, and, at one time, tested nuclear warheads in space. Some operational capabilities, such as the land- and ship-based anti-ballistic missile systems and the X-37 military unmanned spaceplane, inherently have some space warfighting ability. This is insufficient to dominate space should the need arise. The new numbered unit in the Air Force Space Command would appear to have this responsibility.
First U.S. Space Command
The United States had a U.S. Space Command from 1985–2002. In 2002, for policy reasons, Space Command was subsumed within the U.S. Strategic Command. The overt role of U.S. Space Command was to support terrestrial military forces using space-based assets for communication, intelligence, warning, weather, etc. While these are vital functions, they don’t fall in the category of actionable military operations. In part, this consolidation was a consequence of the 9/11 attack that led to the creation of a new Unified Combatant Command responsible for the defense of the United States. Apparently, there are only ten permitted Unified Combatant Commands—thus, the consolidation to maintain only ten.
U.S. Space Command-reboot
The reboot of U.S. Space Command would create it as part of the U.S. Strategic Command—one of the Unified Combatant Commands. It would appear to consolidate existing space operational functions of all services including the Air Force Space Command’s existing and new numbered units.
Closing thoughts
History since World War II shows very clearly that a peaceful world has U.S. military superiority at its foundation. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, at the end of the Cold War between the United States and the former Soviet Union, the United States had the opportunity to move to deny the use of outer space for aggressive military operations in the same manner that the U.S. Navy denies the use of the oceans for such purposes.
U.S. Space Command was initially stood up in 1985. Emphasis was placed on passive space capabilities. The U.S. government and Congress lacked an integrated vision of what space warfighting capabilities the U.S. military should pursue to deter attack and maintain peace. One argument was that having an overwhelming ballistic missile and airborne nuclear warfighting capability would be sufficient to deter aggression in or through space. Time has shown this argument to be false. Another argument was that the United States should lead the world in maintaining outer space as a Shangri-La. Time has shown that other nations seeking Great Power status to challenge the United States do not share this belief. Now, thirty years later, at least the U.S. House of Representatives is awakening to the realization that outer space must be considered as a likely arena for military conflict in which the United States military forces must be able to deter, deny, or defeat aggressive actions. The creation of the new numbered unit within the Air Force Space Command and the rebooting of U.S. Space Command are but two important first steps.
While the NDAA bill’s call for these two actions are important, it is not apparent that the House Armed Services Committee yet understands and appreciates where all of this is headed. The United States’ transition into a true spacefaring nation will require the development and deployment of routine civil, commercial, and military human spacefaring operational capabilities throughout the Earth-Moon system, to start. Fortunately, the House NDAA bill opens the door to the public discussions of what the United States needs to undertake and accomplish in outer space this century if it is to remain a Great Power. This discussion will be pursued in this blog.
Mike Snead is a professional engineer and Associate Fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA). He is president of the Spacefaring Institute™ (spacefaringinstitute.net) and writes this Spacefaring America blog. He has formed the LinkedIn group Space Solar Power to advocate for space-based sustainable energy and the coming American spacefaring industrial revolution. He can be reached through the contact form or through LinkedIn. His technical papers are available here.